It was Feb 22 last year when the Oncologist told Mary she was cancer free. These links are to my blog written a year ago. I am presenting them here for the simple act of reaching out and that helps me with my grief.
The Oncologist's pronouncement was based on what they could measure and see. Unfortunately, Mary's cholangiocarcinoma didn't behave in a manner that would allow the suite of technology used at Stanford to detect the cancer. And, truth be told, if they had been able to detect her cancer in early 2010, it would not have mattered. There was no "further action" available after the surgery and radiation she had as treatments in 2009, especially because the margins on the removed liver tissue was classified as "positive" meaning the surgery had not removed all the active cancer in her liver. And we know her body was not able to withstand the chemo recommended for her cancer as she had tried in October-November. Mary was about to be at the end, we didn't know it until a month later in March of 2010.
I've talked about my personal gauntlet. Feb 22 is the 2nd major date in the sequence because there was such hope, optimism and positive energy then. Click here for The Gauntlet.
Do I resent the Oncologist for what transpired on Feb 22? Absolutely not. I think the Oncologist and the Surgeon, Drs Fisher and Visser, were absolutely at the top of their game with the latest techniques and methods available.
When Mary was in Stanford for her last days, one of the residents took me through the history of Mary's care at Stanford. He had obviously spend considerable time reading, studying and even memorizing facts about her journey. As I have written multiple times before, Mary's cholangiocarcinoma created no tumors or other features that allowed the best imaging techniques in the world to "see it"--including some far out experimental set ups they sent Mary through. And, that is the basic truth of the situation. The doctors cannot target with the knife or blast with radiation a cancerous growth that refuses to be seen. There was simply nothing there for them to target after her liver surgery in May of 2009.
Plan B, therefore, is to use chemotherapy. And, Mary did agree and did start chemo with the most successful chemistry reported in the literature for stopping cholangiocarcinoma. Unfortunately, Mary's system did poorly with the chemo. So poorly, in fact, that it had to be abandoned after only two injections. The chemo was rather aggressively killing her.
Why were the doctors so positive? Because the blood test, affectionately called CA19-9, gave favorable readings month to month. The value was dropping each month after Mary's liver surgery (except during radiation, and that was typical) and then it dropped into the "normal range" for the prior couple of months leading to Feb 22. The Feb 22 reading continued this great trend. And that gave the Oncologist the confidence to say "Go live your life, you are cancer free."
As you read those year old postings, I don't know if you can feel the joy we were both experiencing. Mary never read the blog, she treated it as 'my therapy' and didn't want to influence what or how I said things. I think she may have also felt my openness on some issues would have caused her blood pressure to spike, causing a fatal coronary. If she was gonna die, it was going to be from cancer, not from my writings or my cooking.
Thanks to all my friends for their support, caring and letting me know how much they feel as well. Thank you.
p
In case you were wondering, click here for the definition of redux.
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