We have not updated everyone for a long time, so we apologize if this entry leaves some gaps. But, be sure to read all the way to the end for the BIG family news.
Presently, (October 15th) Jeanne has been enduring much discomfort from the side effects of the chemo drug, Xeloda. She has developed redness on her hands and feet, so severe it is difficult to walk, and her hands are leathery. And, she has not been able to eat solid foods for a week due to extremely painful mouth sores and thrush. She has been taking some drugs (fluconosol and nyastatin) to treat it. We have seen a slight improvement with her mouth sores, in the last few days, but not yet with her hands and feet.
We appreciate your prayers and thoughts as she perseveres through this time.
Since the last posting in August, 2007:
In the last posting, Jeanne mentioned the chemo drug Doxil was showing good results. The scans in late September, however, showed it was beginning to lose its effectiveness. So, in early October, it was replaced with Taxotere and Xeloda. For those of you counting, this is her fourth chemo combination.
Taxotere is a heavy-hitter among chemo drugs, and the side-effects may be more pronounced as well. Xeloda is an oral drug, which Jeanne was on almost three years ago. The doc is hoping the cancer has not built an immunity to it if its combined with a different companion drug.
Everyone in the family is pitching in to help when Jeanne is not feeling good. One thing we are learning is the daily nature of a chronic disease. It requires us to plan ahead, and to be flexible when those plans need revisions.
The big news is (drum roll please!) ......
Our oldest daughter, Nicole, is engaged to be married! The big day is February 22nd, 2008. The lucky guy is Christopher Zimmerman. If I say much more, he and Nicole will be embarrassed for all the attention. So, I will leave it at that...for now.
Thank you,
Pat Hazleton
Monday, October 15, 2007
Thursday, August 02, 2007
We Made It!!
Well, this July has passed, and not a serious crisis has occurred!! No cancer diagnosis, no car accidents, no family deaths. I don't tend to be superstitious, but it was getting a little weird for a while. I did have a little incident where some ribs were rotated strangely, and caused enough pain to warrant Vicoden for a couple of days, and it took almost the whole month before I could sneeze without pain. I e-mailed Pat at work about the first sneeze, I was so excited. You can see what he has to put up with!!
As far as health news goes, evidently this chemo regime is working better. I had scans done last week, we met with Dr. Chui up at OHSU on Monday, and he is VERY pleased. He had called down to leave a message on the answering machine that things were looking good-he wanted me to have a good weekend. Nice guy. My liver enzymes are continuing to come down, which is a positive thing. As for the ones that are still a bit high, he thinks the high amount of tumor die-off is the cause. The bones are relatively stable, and the brain had two maybe-enhanced-a little-bit spots, (they were spots that had previously been radiated) but Dr. C. says that they see that all the time after radiation-that it's an inflammatory response. I guess I'd be a bit inflamed if I'd been nuked to pieces. So that's the scoop.
A friend who has inflammatory breast cancer is trying out a new, non-FDA approved drug called DCA. She's combining it with Gemzar (the old chemo I was on), and has had a spectacular drop in her tumor markers evidently. (She's going to the Seattle Cancer Treatment Centers of America-she's not all on her own :D ) It only costs $45 for a two month supply, so I can't imagine that any big company is going to ever want to back it up, but you know, if it works, and if some other country has a few more resources, it would be great to take advantage of it. In "nude white rats" they've seen a 70% reduction in tumor growth in 3 weeks. Dr. Chui says that there have been a LOT of nude white rats cured of cancer, (they just sound so cold, lonely and helpless!!). So it's hard to know if it could produce an actual cure, could stave the cancer off for a while, or what. The human studies have shown it to be effective against some but not all types of cancers. Breast cancer is one they've had success with.
I think that's all for the health stuff. I'm a little more fatigued after this chemo, and we're going to see if I can avoid the Neulasta shot this month and still keep my white blood cell counts up enough for chemo next month. We're thinking that the Neulasta (causes bone pain) combined with the Zometa (causes bone pain) was just a little too extreme for my 'ole bod. So we're praying that Robert's sore throat/head ache, etc. is just a quickly passing cold that doesn't get spread around the entire house. He's trying to set a record and not miss any baseball practices or games, and he's on quite the roll. Still loving it.
Other family stuff...
Sarah is really enjoying photography...enough to win first place in the Corvallis Library teen competition. She won an i-Pod shuffle (whatever that is). She's trying to perfect her abilities, and has taken some fun shots. Now we just need to get them framed and up around here. She's also wanting to photograph people, families, etc. so, if you have a need or just want to give her the practice, give her a call or e-mail. Valerie is getting ready to leave for Mexico with the church youth group for a week. They'll go down, help build houses, befriend people, get filthy dirty, and return home. As soon as she gets back, she has a wedding rehearsal to attend, and the wedding to coordinate the next day. Sounds a little tiring to me, but I'm so glad she has this chance. The rest of us will stay home in the air conditioning, hold down the fort, and pray for a successful trip for all of the kids. Fervency in their love of God, and that they can all be reflections of his caring and grace.
Thanks for "listening". ~ We appreciate our friends so much. Thanks for the prayers and thoughts, and we hope you're having a wonderful remainder of the summer. Take time to have some fun, and love one another.
Love you all,
Jeanne
As far as health news goes, evidently this chemo regime is working better. I had scans done last week, we met with Dr. Chui up at OHSU on Monday, and he is VERY pleased. He had called down to leave a message on the answering machine that things were looking good-he wanted me to have a good weekend. Nice guy. My liver enzymes are continuing to come down, which is a positive thing. As for the ones that are still a bit high, he thinks the high amount of tumor die-off is the cause. The bones are relatively stable, and the brain had two maybe-enhanced-a little-bit spots, (they were spots that had previously been radiated) but Dr. C. says that they see that all the time after radiation-that it's an inflammatory response. I guess I'd be a bit inflamed if I'd been nuked to pieces. So that's the scoop.
A friend who has inflammatory breast cancer is trying out a new, non-FDA approved drug called DCA. She's combining it with Gemzar (the old chemo I was on), and has had a spectacular drop in her tumor markers evidently. (She's going to the Seattle Cancer Treatment Centers of America-she's not all on her own :D ) It only costs $45 for a two month supply, so I can't imagine that any big company is going to ever want to back it up, but you know, if it works, and if some other country has a few more resources, it would be great to take advantage of it. In "nude white rats" they've seen a 70% reduction in tumor growth in 3 weeks. Dr. Chui says that there have been a LOT of nude white rats cured of cancer, (they just sound so cold, lonely and helpless!!). So it's hard to know if it could produce an actual cure, could stave the cancer off for a while, or what. The human studies have shown it to be effective against some but not all types of cancers. Breast cancer is one they've had success with.
I think that's all for the health stuff. I'm a little more fatigued after this chemo, and we're going to see if I can avoid the Neulasta shot this month and still keep my white blood cell counts up enough for chemo next month. We're thinking that the Neulasta (causes bone pain) combined with the Zometa (causes bone pain) was just a little too extreme for my 'ole bod. So we're praying that Robert's sore throat/head ache, etc. is just a quickly passing cold that doesn't get spread around the entire house. He's trying to set a record and not miss any baseball practices or games, and he's on quite the roll. Still loving it.
Other family stuff...
Sarah is really enjoying photography...enough to win first place in the Corvallis Library teen competition. She won an i-Pod shuffle (whatever that is). She's trying to perfect her abilities, and has taken some fun shots. Now we just need to get them framed and up around here. She's also wanting to photograph people, families, etc. so, if you have a need or just want to give her the practice, give her a call or e-mail. Valerie is getting ready to leave for Mexico with the church youth group for a week. They'll go down, help build houses, befriend people, get filthy dirty, and return home. As soon as she gets back, she has a wedding rehearsal to attend, and the wedding to coordinate the next day. Sounds a little tiring to me, but I'm so glad she has this chance. The rest of us will stay home in the air conditioning, hold down the fort, and pray for a successful trip for all of the kids. Fervency in their love of God, and that they can all be reflections of his caring and grace.
Thanks for "listening". ~ We appreciate our friends so much. Thanks for the prayers and thoughts, and we hope you're having a wonderful remainder of the summer. Take time to have some fun, and love one another.
Love you all,
Jeanne
Monday, June 11, 2007
Sarah's Stats
FINDINGS
The superior mediastinal mass seen previously is no longer evident. The lungs are clear. The cardiac silhouette and pulmonary vasculature are now unremarkable. Regional osseous structures of the thorax demonstrate no acute change.
CONCLUSION
Superior mediastinal mass seen previously is no longer evident.
Interpretation is that Sarah is doing GREAT!! We just really really really like to be unremarkable in this way. We have yet to meet with the oncologist, but the doctor who refered us to get the initial CT scan called today to say the scans looked great. Aaaahhh.
Thanks for the prayers. Happy Day.
Jeanne
The superior mediastinal mass seen previously is no longer evident. The lungs are clear. The cardiac silhouette and pulmonary vasculature are now unremarkable. Regional osseous structures of the thorax demonstrate no acute change.
CONCLUSION
Superior mediastinal mass seen previously is no longer evident.
Interpretation is that Sarah is doing GREAT!! We just really really really like to be unremarkable in this way. We have yet to meet with the oncologist, but the doctor who refered us to get the initial CT scan called today to say the scans looked great. Aaaahhh.
Thanks for the prayers. Happy Day.
Jeanne
Friday, June 08, 2007
scan results from May 31 '07
Well, this report was a little mixed. It sounds like there is a bit of bone involvement again in the spine (lumbar region), but there is also some sclerosing going on, which means healing. Same in the liver...there are some old spots that appear shrunken a bit, and some new spots that the oncologist thinks were actually there before but are just now appearing on the scans. This opinion is based on the very visual photo that they took of the liver when they took out the ovaries. So, since there was some new growth, and the other chemo was only moderately effective, we switched on Monday to Doxil. This has a better reputation for dealing with breast cancer cells than the Gemzar, so hopefully we'll see lots of tumor reduction. Complete would be nice. Monday we were at OHSU for treatment, (they also added Zometa back in for the bone mets), Wednesday I was at Ambulatory here in Corvallis for a Neulasta injection (keeps the white cell count up so you don't have to miss any chemo. Mine have been quite good so far, but I think he's erring on the side of caution.) Thursday I went to Salem for IV vitamin C, and today is quiet at home. Both the Zometa and the Neulasta have bone pain as a side effect, and yeow. I was side lined in the evenings for a couple of nights. Thankfully this regime is once per month and not weekly. I have an appointment with the herbalist this Tuesday, so we can get a tincture specific to this treatment plan up and running, and revise the other supplements I'm on.
Sarah is going in for her chest x-ray today to make sure things are still shrinking and not active. We do not yet have an appointment set with her oncologist, so we'll not have results back right away. Probably in another week. She's doing well-she's been picking berries at OSU in the mornings, and is enjoying the thought of a good paycheck. She's also wrapping up her "Pillowcases for Pals" project with her 4-H leadership group. They collected lots of donations, stuffed pillowcases with fun things and will take them to the hospital to give to children who need to be there for a length of time.
Robert got Player of the Game in his baseball game Wednesday night, so that was exciting. He'll be playing daily for Parks and Rec. this summer.
Everybody else is doing ok...working, doing music, taking care of the rest of us :D
Take care, love you, and thanks for the prayers!
Jeanne
Sarah is going in for her chest x-ray today to make sure things are still shrinking and not active. We do not yet have an appointment set with her oncologist, so we'll not have results back right away. Probably in another week. She's doing well-she's been picking berries at OSU in the mornings, and is enjoying the thought of a good paycheck. She's also wrapping up her "Pillowcases for Pals" project with her 4-H leadership group. They collected lots of donations, stuffed pillowcases with fun things and will take them to the hospital to give to children who need to be there for a length of time.
Robert got Player of the Game in his baseball game Wednesday night, so that was exciting. He'll be playing daily for Parks and Rec. this summer.
Everybody else is doing ok...working, doing music, taking care of the rest of us :D
Take care, love you, and thanks for the prayers!
Jeanne