good news/bad news

I received a call from the receptionist at the oncologists office yesterday. She said that the CT scan showed no new cancer growth. That's all the information she had at the time. I'll talk to the doctor and see the scan results on Monday so I'll have more information then. No new growth is good. This is the good news.
The bad news. I think my hair is falling out again. Bummer. This puts me at a slight disadvantage for the hair growing contest, we may have to change the rules:)
I'm going in on Monday for my first round of maintenance chemo, should be shorter, and they promised no side affects.

Life is good. Take care. -Eric

Nose Hair

My nose hair trimmer has received a well deserved rest over the past couple of months since loosing my hair. But now that my hair is coming back I need to dust it off and put it back it work. There's mixed blessings with new hair growth:)
Thursday I go in for another CT scan to see where the last chemo dose left me before we go into maintenance mode. I have high hopes that the results will be promising. I've taken to chanting "Die cancer die" repeatedly. That will work right? It certainly can't hurt:)
It's tough to bring up the topic of prognosis while talking to the doctor. I know what the prognosis is, and the doctor knows what it is, so everyone just seems to avoid the topic. But I did bring it up again the other day. I told the doctor "I need another 50 years, can you do that for me"? The response was, "This may not be a good time to start negotiating". Who's negotiating, I'm just setting the expectations:)
I've considered asking the doctor about his money back guarantee policy, just in case he doesn't cure me, maybe next time:) -Take care. -Eric

Hair growing contest

Some of my friends and the hair growing contest. This is day 7. It's going to be tight race.

What's up

This past week was little rough. Mostly I just had a complete lack of energy, and spent most of the time in bed. I missed a couple of days of work trying to recover. I seem to be getting a little stronger each day. Hopefully this week will be better. I tried to mow the law yesterday, it really needed it. I probably should not have done that. After finishing the front yard, I felt like had just finished running a marathon. Monica had to help me finish the back yard.
I stopped shaving my head after the last round of chemo this past Monday. I already have some really good growth. A couple of friends of mine from work have also shaved their heads and we're having a contest to see who can get their hair back the fastest. I'll post some pictures soon. Take care. -Eric

"heart attack"

Thanks to all those who gave us the "Heart attack".

6th round done

I just finished my 6th round of chemo. So far so good. This is my last round of chemo, so here’s what will happen next: I’ll go on to a regime of maintenance drugs. I’ll receive these drugs through an IV every three weeks just like the chemo, but instead of 6 hours in duration, the maintenance treatments should only take about 1.5 hours. The intent of these drugs is to maintain the current level of the cancer, and prevent new growth. The side affects from these maintenance drugs are minimal so I should start feeling better, start growing my hair back, and start getting back to as normal a life as possible. I’ll continue to receive CT scans every couple of months to monitor any changes in the cancer. If there is new growth then I will go back onto chemo and repeat this cycle again. Given the advanced stage of my cancer, and the fact that lung cancer does not take well to remission, I will likely be going through these cycles for the rest of my life. Lets hope that's a very long time. Moinca is awesome -Eric.