Off again on again...

Karen is out of the hospital and at home now.  The surgeon has her on his schedule for July 2nd.  There are three likely scenarios that could play out. They will look with a scope first to see if there are lots of little tumors that don't show up on a CT scan. If that is the case nothing will be done. If it looks like there is enough good tissue available they will attempt a resection. If their is too much damaged tissue they will perform a colostomy.  We are hoping for the resection scenario.

After the appointment with the surgeon we had thought the directed radiation treatment would be delayed but after a few phone calls and some questions it looks like it is still a go.  The oncologist and radiologist both say it shouldn't affect recovery from surgery too much with how it is currently scheduled.  The surgeon agrees but did say the bowel prep prior to surgery will be made more difficult and uncomfortable with a sore leg due to the incision and catheter insertion during the mapping procedure.  Karen has said she is willing so I'll do what I can to help.

My help usually involves cracking jokes and twiddling my thumbs while she does all the hard work.  Some day we'll know why she had to go through all this.  Until then we just keep plugging along, hoping for the best and raising our little miracles as well as we can.

Braden

Y90

So the insurance has approved the Y90 procedure. The one where they use an artery in my leg to insert radioactive pellets to my liver.

It takes three appointments to do the procedure. The first is to map the blood vessels that go to my liver to make sure that the pellets will go to the cancerous areas without affecting too much healthy tissue. They use die covered pellets for this and then do a CT scan a few hours later to see where the pellets ended up. It is an all day thing, but if it doesn't show the doctors what they want to see then we don't move onto steps 2 and 3. This will happen just before the 4th of July.

If all goes well then mid July we have our second appointment where they go in and inject radioactive pellets into one half of my liver. Two weeks later they will go in and do the other half.

On the off weeks from radiation I will still be receiving my chemo treatments. We also have two family reunions in July. It is going to be one crazy month, but the timing seems to be working wonderfully. There was only one day where it looked like I needed to find help and then my sister tells me that my niece can come help.

I love my family and the way we come to each others aid. We are a crazy lot and don't always agree with one another, but when someone needs help there is usually someone who can come.

This post was originally created prior to Karen's latest hospital stay.

May/June Update (Just roll with it)

It has been a long time since my last post.  In that time a lot has happened.  Karen's treatment has been changed up and will be changing even more in the coming weeks.

She has been reduced to a single drug (5FU) in preparation for some directed radiation treatments.  Her oncologist referred her to a radiologist at the Huntsman Center in Salt Lake.  The appointment was the Friday before Memorial Day and went well.  He gave us a rundown on the treatment and a generic plan and then left it for us to decide.  We talked it over and think it's the best option at this point.

One of the nice things about this type of treatment is that the side effects are not as severe as with traditional radiation.  A line is inserted via an artery in her leg.  It is then run to her liver where radioactive beads are released.  Because of how the blood flow works to the tumors the diseased portion of her liver will get a significantly larger dose.  It's not perfect and they will have to do a premliminary mapping session to see how the blood flows but we are confident.

Unfortunately the liver is more easily damaged by radiation treatments so repeat sessions are limited.  They do have other directed options that have the same delivery method but use chemo medications instead.  Using the chemo medications it is possible to repeat the treatment.

Our holiday went well after Karen's appointment.  We were able to visit family and visit graves.  We weren't able to make the trip last year since Becca was still on oxygen at the time and Karen was still recovering from her own hospital stay as well as adjusting to the chemo regimen.  We are blessed to have kids that travel so well.  We are usually able to drive for 2-3 hours at a time before they need breaks.  It was nice to be around lots of family and catch up with them.  We don't get to see many of them nearly as often as we would like.

The above portion of this post was written prior to June 22nd.  When I originally said her treatment would be changing up, I had no idea how much...

June 22nd

Today Karen was admitted to the hospital.  Her hematocrit level tested at 18 this morning where 40 is normal.  Her oncologist called before I had left for work to give us the results.  He has never called that early so we knew it probably wasn't good news.  It wasn't much of a surprise to have him advise her strongly that she needed to head into the ER.

Karen and I talked it over and decided against a repeat of going to the local ER and then having her go via ambulance to another hospital.  Instead we packed up the car and headed to another hospital where she was taken into the ER and then admitted.  Her hematocrit was tested again and came back at 16.6.  Lower but within the margin or error between labs.

After Karen was in the ER I took the kids to stay with Karen's sister a few minutes away.  Once they were settled I headed back over and stayed with her for the rest of the day.  When I left they expected to test her levels again around 2AM and reevaluate.

Karen's oncologist raised the possibility of surgery to stop what they believe is bleeding from the tumor in the colon.  She has an appointment with a general surgeon on Wednesday if she isn't still in the hospital.  The current thinking is they will raise her blood levels and stabilize her in preparation for surgery as early as the end of this week.

That means the original schedule for the directed radiation therapy has been thrown out the window.  Something we have learned living in a rural area over the last few years is that when something unexpected happens that you just roll with it.  A few years ago I can't imagine being this calm with so many changes and challenges being thrown at us.  I feel the Lord is and has been supporting us all along in this trial directly and through friends, family and even total strangers.

Braden