Thursday Evening---Sandi

Spent most of the afternoon at the hospital with Sandi. Once I got by the sign on her door which I had not seen on any other door until today.

 
While the bone marrow test results are not back yet, they do have the results of the PET SCAN. The news was not good as the cancer has spread further and appears to be growing in overall size. This was not a surprise as we had all kind of expected more growth based on what has been happening in recent weeks.

  
Despite the fact her blood sugar was so high today,  as it was yesterday, they have kept on with chemo. Today was the planned three drug day with all of them running at the same time by IV drip in through her port and PICC Line. At this point tonight only one continues as it won't finish until late tomorrow morning. That particular drug runs for 24 hours.

 
While this is all running into her they are also running saline and potassium into her and giving her a lot of insulin along with a couple of other things that are supposed to help with the blood sugar problem.

The current plan is for her to get yet another drug early tomorrow and then be released very late in the day. She then will have to return on two separate occasions at some point in the next couple of days for shots to finish this first round of chemo. What that schedule is and what the schedule will be regarding round two we don't know yet.


 Kevin

Medical Monday--- Sandi

It is another one of those days that we spend somewhere doing something medical. Today it will be at Medical City Dallas and the initial appointment with the doctor and staff that will be handling Sandi's bone marrow transplant, chemotherapy, and god knows what else. Her first appointment is for a minimum of three hours so it is going to take a while. Not to mention the drive time for this as well as shuttling Scott back and forth to UTD.

So, I am going to be offline most of the day. Will update when I can.

Sandi Update--- A Change In Plans

The upcoming schedule of events has changed in the last day. We now have a date for her port surgery. It is now scheduled for Monday at 7 am. That means we have to be at the hospital down the street at 5 am Monday morning. They hope to have her done by 8 am. If everything goes perfectly she will be back home by Monday evening.

This means the appoint with the bone marrow transplant doctor who will also handle her chemo therapy is now pushed back a week. Sandi will need the recovery time before they can start anything or do anything more to her.

In the meantime the nightly chills, shakes and sweats, and fevers continue unabated. But, at least, this is a step forward as the surgery for her port is now scheduled.

To, the waiting continues......

Doctor Day--Update

The news today was not at all good. It is once again a Non Hodgkins Lymphoma. This particular subtype,  while it is not the same ones she had before, is in the same family. That means radiation is now off the table and would be of no use with this cancer.

Instead, that are sending her to another hospital a fair distance from here and to a specialist in "advanced and complicated" cases who is experienced with doing bone marrow/stem cell transplants. Sandi's only chance for chemotherapy to work at all and for her to have any time in remission again is if they can do a bone marrow/stem cell transplant deal. Whether or not she is a candidate for that, we don't know yet, though her current cancer doctor believes she probably is one.

Assuming she is, that sort of deal (which I have no idea how that works at this point) will be done while she has chemotherapy. This is a six month or longer process before we will know if any of it is working.

Before that can happen she will have to go back in the hospital here for her port surgery as the port will now definitely be put back into her chest. We don't know when that surgery will happen and are hoping for next week.

Obviously, this is not the news we were hoping for today and we had no idea at all that anything regarding a bone marrow transplant deal was being considered. We are just stunned.

Update on Author Steve Brown

Monday was “Sell Books for Steve Day” designed to raise funds to help author Steve Brown pay for his bone marrow transplant. Over two thousand dollars was raised to help him in his cancer fight.

Excellent news!

To find out more or make a donation, please go to Steve’s blog at

http://handcuffedtotheocean.com/