Dear Friends and Family,
I believe that you last received an update from Steve dated December 16—just after his discharge from the hospital for emergency insertion of his feeding tube. How long ago that seems now! We apologize for the gap in information, but we have been preoccupied with ongoing events—mainly two more emergency hospitalizations, each apparently some result of "radiation effect." The first was in fact that very evening (coinciding with a visit from my two sisters and one brother-in-law), when he had a sudden onset of severe abdominal pain. A call to the Kaiser advice line, and via them to our oncologist, yielded instruction to head for the emergency room. From there he was admitted to Marymount Hospital for observation, and he stayed there until Dec. 19. The supervising physicians concluded that the cause was reaction to the radiation—therefore "a good sign" that the tumor was shedding necrotic tissue. The pain did subside to a significant extent during that hospitalization, though he remains on continuing dosage of painkiller.
We reported on schedule for the first chemotherapy treatment on December 28. Melissa came with us, since she had arrived the day before for her December holiday visit. The preliminary blood tests at the doctor's office that day showed dangerously low hemoglobin levels (I think I've got the terminology approximately right). So, after administering the chemotherapy, the oncologist shifted Steve to the Kaiser Parma Medical Center's "Clinical Decision Unit," where they keep people for up to 24 hours while deciding what the next step should be. Melissa and I saw him settled in his room there, and then went home while they gave him 3 units of blood transfusion overnight. In the morning, the report was that the hemoglobin levels had not gone up the way they should in response to the transfusions, so there must be some internal bleeding. Therefore, his next transfer was to the Cleveland Clinic Main Campus hospital (same campus as the radiation oncology office where we had *those* treatments) for observation and attempt to remedy that situation. Again, the explanation seemed to be a sort of "collateral damage" theory (radiation sometimes damages more than just the target tumor). They did another endoscopy and found severe ulceration in the stomach and esophagus. I must admit I'm not entirely clear as to how much of that is attributable to the cancer and how much to the radiation. Perhaps the doctors are, but I'm not sure about that either. Anyway, after several days of observation and IV medication, he was discharged again on Monday, January 2.
We reported again for chemotherapy as scheduled on Wednesday, January 4. That treatment seemed to go smoothly (though it took all day—partly because the infusion center was overflowing with folks, perhaps catching up on postponed holiday treatments?). Since then he has been at home and hanging in there, although thoroughly exhausted most of the time. I gather this is not unusual as a reaction to chemotherapy treatments.
We have just had a very nice two-day visit from Steve's childhood friend Ed Kramer, who flew in from Oregon to see him. That was a very good experience, and in spite of his fatigue Steve clearly enjoyed Eddie's company—talking about mutual friends, memories, politics…really a good visit.
Next on the agenda is the third chemotherapy treatment this coming Wednesday (Jan. 11), followed by a week off, then three more weekly chemo treatments, and then a re-scanning for assessment of the results of chemotherapy. I will be starting back to school January 17 (with preparatory meetings and arrangements in the coming week). We are arranging to have a home health aide come in for a few hours three days a week so that Steve won't be at home alone during all of the time I'm away. I'm hopeful that I'll be able to handle my in-school duties in those three days, and work from home the other two, while we have so much to manage on the health-care front.
Meanwhile, our daughter-in-law Celeste has graciously offered to help us with the keeping-in-touch aspect of this adventure by setting up this blog to which we invite you all, where from here on we will post Steve's health updates as the news becomes available. That way, you can check for postings any time you wish, and we can post briefly and more often rather than waiting until we get a lot of information or enough time to send out messages to several groups of addresses.
So—as you know by now, the blog address is http://steveshealthupdates.blogspot.com/. Please feel free to visit it at any time; we'll try to keep it current. And since it is a public blog, if you know anyone else who wants to check in on him, feel free also to share the address with them.
That's all from here for now. And it's probably the last direct message you will receive from us, at least for a while, since we will be relying on the blog to help people keep up according to their own schedules. Thanks again for all of your supportive messages and wishes. Steve does still check his email at the iPad pretty much daily, and enjoys receiving messages even though he hasn't the energy to respond. You can phone if you like—if answering isn't doable, we'll let the voicemail take it and get the message later.
Warm regards and best wishes to all of you for the new year,
Carol
