fuck cancer

yah that's hard, I feel that. my friend is also keeping his latest news private for now, so I can only talk about it with two other people. he'll go public eventually, the last letter he wrote was so classy - "while I have always been conceptually opposed to chemotherapy, 3 to 6 months is simply not long enough for me to wrap up all of my loose ends" <3

My friend has had an interesting week. After two gamma knife surgeries, his last two scans have shown no more brain tumors. However, he's got two small ones on his back and one GNARLY one that grew from quarter sized to baseball sized in about 3 weeks. He had it removed Friday, but not before he posted this disgusting photo to instagram.

WARNING: GNARLY AS HELL: http://instagram.com/p/yxCSejjvWO/

I love how straightforward and honest he's been every step of the way. It's been a huge help for both himself and his friends and family.

Also, if anyone ever has to get Yervoy treatments they do some serious shit to a body, even though they help a ton. After six treatments he has near nightly vertigo attacks and problems with his depth perception, both of which are permanent for as long as he lives. Should make his band's tour next month a bit of a challenge.

This is worth reading.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-becklund-breast-cancer-komen-20150222-story.html#page=1

my darling father died the week before last. he'd had cancer for a long time, and during the past couple of months he had been weakening, but still the end came with shocking speed. i arrived in nz a few hours before he died. he wasn't conscious by then; we said our last words on the phone before i left. i visited for ten days in january and had a lovely time with him, which is a consolation. i'll miss him very much, he was extremely kind and funny and clever and self-deprecating. rip my beautiful father.

Sorry to hear that, Estela. The distance must have been particularly rough.

thanks, andrew. i had to accept a long time ago that i could not get there very quickly or easily. i'm so glad i was there in january and have visited him as much as possible during the past few years (as have my siblings.)

<3

sorry to hear this estela - sounds like he passed on some of those traits you praise

yep, and it is surely good that you were there, i hope you & your siblings had some kind words for each other

Sorry to hear Estela.

So sorry for your loss Estella.

Sorry, Estela.

Deep condolences. I've no doubt he was remarkable.

I'm sorry, estela. My condolences to you and your family.

so sorry estela. glad you have good memories to hold onto through this loss

<3

thank you all very much. people have been really kind and it's helped a lot.

All the best for the next few weeks estela, hope you found some solace being around yr family.

thinking of you e.

I'm so sorry Estela and I hope you are okay. I'm very glad you were able to get home and be with your family. Living overseas is horrible when a family member is ill. Hugs.

our sincere condolences, estela - sleeve & laurie

My condolences, too.

estela, all my best

sounds like you were good to each other. i'm sorry he's gone.

e- Much love, and always more love.

thank you, i deeply appreciate all of you for this.

Oh, estela. <3

darling estela, i am thinking of you and sending much love to your fine family.

also, fuck cancer :-(

So sorry, estella.

Oh estela I'm so sorry for your loss, much love x

estela, I am so sorry - thinking of you, wishing you and your family comfort in this sad time.

I'm so sorry, estela.

My love and condolences, estela.

oooh e.

so, sorry to hear about your loss, but you clearly have some fantastic memories, and that's very special.

3 years on from the exit of one evil lump from my world, a new fucker enters.

this time, the emotional attachement is not quite as intense (my father as opposed to my life partner), but due to my experience, there seems to be a demand on my groove for advise for all those concerned.

whereas the reality for me is : no. i do no want to deal with this again. f*ck off and leave me alone.

thanks again, everyone.

i'm very sorry about your father, mark. cancer is so cunning and relentless and its course so horrible for everyone involved. and you have been through so much already, it's just cruel. my best wishes to you and to your father and the rest of your family.

Nothing special to add besides good thoughts to all of you.

My cousin Alan was just diagnosed with cancer of the thymus, a cancer sufficiently rare that only about 400 people a year are diagnosed. Don't know what stage it is yet, but if it's III or IV, the 5-year survivability rate is approximately a coin toss.

This comes after he, a lifelong NYC resident, literally, just moved across the country to Palm Springs, and has no family or support system out there. I may be going out there during his treatment to help him out, take him to appointments, etc.

well, fuck that.

good luck to you and him.

Phil D., if you can do that it will be huge for him. Also hook up with the Cancer Society, I don't have experience in the US, but they should have a ton of resources/staff/volunteers to help out people in those situations. I'm so sorry this is happening.

ugh Phil that sucks

So I'm definitely going to California. I made a deal with work whereby I can work out of our Newport Beach office twice a week, then remotely the rest of the week in Palm Springs. So I'll spend every Mon-Tues in NP, then Wed-Sun with Alan. The rest of the time we're going to coordinate with ACS volunteers to help out. He's already excited because he hasn't even unpacked from his move and can't lift or move anything. And I know from having gone through this with both parents how absolutely exhausted he's going to be during chemo, so I'll be shopping, cleaning, cooking (when he can eat), driving him around, etc.

should be a huge help. awesome that you were able to work that out. best of luck to you both.

Phil you are a good bloke for arranging all of that. just him not going through it alone is a huge thing.

^^^^ otm

You are a wonderful friend and your help will be of immeasurable value. A+++ do you dude, lemme buy you a beer if you are ever in DC!

Phil, you are a champion. I'm so glad you were able to work it out.

Important thing for me is not just that he doesn't have to do this alone but that a family member is there. This side of the family is VERY close, both his folks are dead and his brothers just aren't in a position to take time off or travel right now. And this sounds like a really scary cancer.

God I hate cancer.

BTW if any of y'all live along the route from Cleveland to Palm Springs and want to put me up for a night on my drive later this week let me know! Otherwise it's cheap-ass motels along the I-70 and I-40 corridors.

Moving up my schedule to leave tomorrow morning for California. Got this update from my dad today, which creates some urgency, especially since Stage IV thymic cancer has a 5-year survivability rate less than 50%:

The reason Alan is back in the hospital is because he was again having difficulty breathing. The doctor was stumped yesterday so he ordered a CT scan this morning. The results are not good. This tumor has swollen significantly since last week and is now pressing against and closing off Alan’s trachea. The worst part is that there are several sound medical reasons why they can’t simply go in to do surgery. There are two types of thymus cancer; thymoma and thymic carcinoma. The treatments for both are very different and Alan’s surgical biopsy results won’t be back until Friday. With that said, Dr. Brooks consulted with their senior pulmonary
oncologist and they agreed that they need to immediately shrink this tumor to enable him to breath without intubating him or worse. They decided to start him on a Chemotherapy Cocktail today in hopes that this will shrink this monster. This particular chemo is very often successfully used on lung cancer patients. They can’t give him radiation right now, because the resulting inflammation will only cause more swelling and more difficulty breathing.

Even though the biopsy results are not yet back, his oncologist and the other surgeon are sure this is in stage 4. So Alan is in for a very rough ride. Now that Alan has given the doctor permission to share information with me I will make sure I pass it on quickly while it is fresh in my mind because frankly I’m an emotional soup sandwich right now. Yeah, I make lots of jokes on FB but I love my family and certainly want to help in any way I can. By the way, the doctor gave Alan a few options and Alan wants the chemo now. He will probably be at infusion therapy receiving chemo for 4-5 hours at a time and since this is in fact a platinum based chemo he can in fact have multiple sessions per week. The key is to shrink that tumor while waiting for biopsy results and helping Alan breathe normally.