21 days of Chemo

Some do the 21 day fix work out plan. I just finished my first 21 days of chemo plan.  To be honest, it went great!  We lived life as normal with minimal side effects.  We enjoyed Christmas with family and friends. As I embark on my first stretch of 7 days off of chemo, I am headed to St. Mary's in Grand Rapids tomorrow to have my ovaries removed.  As you may recall my breast cancer thrives off of estrogen, so removing the ovaries will eliminate a lot of estrogen in my body with hope to keep the cancer  from growing any more.

Surgery is scheduled for 2:00 pm for those of you who want to say some prayers at that time, we welcome them.

I am off of chemo until Wednesday and then we will start the next 21 day cycle.

The picture above was taken by my dear friend Christi Marsh a few weeks ago, and as teenagers would have it, Bryce got his haircut a few days later....  We will have to do some more pictures soon, as he hardly looks like the same kid.

Peace and Hope,
Chris

Accepting

I have found it a challenge this week to accept my diagnosis....

I have officially started all of my treatments. I started with an injection of Zoladex.  This is a hormone based chemotherapy that is used to shut down my ovaries.  I will receive Zoladex every 28 days until I have my ovaries removed. If my white blood cells corporate with us, I will have my ovaires removed on December 30th. Last week I started taking Ibrance otherwise known as palbociclib. This is the oral chemo I take for 21 days with a 7 day break and then repeat. I ended last week with an injection of Faslodex.  Faslodex is a form of chemotherapy used to stop your body from producing any estrogen that is left after the ovaries are shut down. I receive this every 14 days, eventually tapering down to every 28 days for life or until it stops working. My weekend was great, I was full of energy and enjoyed each moment.  As the days go on, and I continue treatment I am feeling the effects. I am tired, actually exhausted at some moments, and my body aches. Nothing I can't tolerate, nothing that I will let slow me down, and nothing I should really complain about, it is the new normal.

The last few weeks my life has been so consumed with working on a plan and putting it into action that I put all my energy into that. Now that the plan is in place, I have more time to think about the reality of stage 4 cancer. I can't help but find my mind wandering at certain moments, wondering how many of these moments I will get to enjoy. Last week Jeff and I sat through 4 basketball games between the 2 kids. I couldn't help but think I hope I am still here in 5 years sitting in these bleachers. As I Christmas shop I think about buying a gift that has meaning.  Something that my loved ones will remember me by. My mind doesn't shut off, at night I think about the letters I want to write to my children in case I am not here for milestones in in their life, to tell them in person how proud of them I am.  I think of the gifts I want to buy them for special days in their life that I may not live long enough to experience with them. It may sound strange to some, but this is what is on my mind these days. I think these are all probably normal thoughts for someone facing stage 4 breast cancer. I realize that none of us know how long we have here, but knowing you have cells living in your body working against you to kill you really makes you think about life. While these thoughts drift through my mind periodically, I do my best to stay strong and not let cancer bring me down or rob me of anymore time than it already does. But I would be lying if I said I didn't have sad moments.

As we continue to adjust to the "new normal" life really is good. This week I worked a full week, only had one doctors appointment, went to yoga a few times with my Mom and friends and sat through a few more basketball games...  Life is good, even with cancer.

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Philippians 4:13

Peace and Hope,
Chris

Gratitude....

Gratitude, tonight I attended a Heated Vinyasa class at Muskegon Yoga taught by Fred Meston with my friend Stephanie. I am a yoga beginner so Heated Vinyasa was a little much, but it felt great, and definitely gave me some yoga goals!  At the end of the class, as we slowed the mind and relaxed the body, Fred told us to think about gratitude. Well, instantly my first thought was how am I to find gratitude in my life right now?  What brought me here? I am not thankful for stage 4 cancer. Then I took a deep breathe, calmed myself and really thought about life and what it means.

By all means, the cancer part totally sucks. Any type of cancer sucks, but stage 4 cancer really sucks. Reading my medical summaries sucks. It is like a bad dream, only really it is reality and reality sucks.

In the midst of reality, I still have so much to be thankful for. I have a loving family that cares so deeply for me.  I have amazing friends. We live in an amazing community where strangers have reached out to our family. I have a loving church family that prays with me and for me. I am surrounded by other area church families that are also praying for me. I have a great job, with awesome co-workers. I feel great, I wake up each day and feel great!  I am so grateful for the last 39 years I have had here on earth and I pray I get 39 more. That is all good stuff to be grateful for.

Last week I met with Dr. Alguire at the Johnson Family Cancer Center.  We put together the rest of the treatment plan. I started some hormone based chemotherapy to shut down my ovaries.  Since my cancer likes estrogen, we need to shut down all the estrogen in my body.  So far I am tolerating that well. Tomorrow I will start my oral chemo treatment.  The treatment is a newer drug and has a great response in patients so far. I will take that drug for 21 days, and then take 7 days off. Then we will repeat the cycle.  Continuing to repeat while monitoring my cancer.  As long as the cancer doesn't grow, we stay on that drug cycle.  The treatment comes with side effects, but hopefully nothing that doesn't allow us to enjoy each day. This treatment also comes with a heavy price tag, one pill is $495 dollars.  Today I was blessed to find out that my insurance agreed to pay for it, and I was awarded a $25,000 grant bringing my monthly copay for the drug down to $10.00 a month.  New chemotherapy treatments, health insurance and grants have been added to my list of things I am grateful for...

So while the reality of my families new normal totally sucks, and we have no idea how long I will continue to feel well.  We are grateful for the days we have and are hopeful we will have many, many more.

 Peace and Hope,
Chris