Poor Prognosis - Terminal

That's what my wife saw this morning when she looked at what my oncologist wrote on the FMLA paperwork. The part where he says what's wrong with me, he wrote, "Brain tumor, poor prognosis". Under "Probable Duration of Condition" he wrote "Terminal". Well if that's not a fine how do you do??

For some reason I intuitively knew that this was bureaucratic bullshit. It did give me pause, to be sure. Those are some pretty loaded words to have staring you in the face. I called my Cancer Guide, Marti, and she confirmed that this is SOP doctors use to make sure you're as protected as you can possibly be under the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (thank you, Bill Clinton!). I've since had it confirmed by others in the medical field.

Lori and I have both decided - at least for now - we don't give a rip what anyone says my prognosis is. So much of any prognosis is about statistics and statistics just don't apply to individual cases. Trying to predict the future in my case, based on statistics, is next to useless. So we don't care.

And it turns out, according to Marti, my Cancer Care team has the same philosophy. They are VERY reluctant to discuss prognoses with patients. They don't think it's helpful to focus on that. Unless some government bureaucracy needs to hear things in the worst possible language. Then they are more than happy to use that kind of language.

So... no cause for alarm. So I got a little dramatic with the post title. Sue me.

Getting all set for tomorrow. Trying not to be anxious about it but it ain't easy not being a tad bit nervous. My experts assure me that the anxiety will be reduced dramatically after the first treatment. I hope they're right.

For all you pray-ers, positive thinkers, and good mojo practitioners - tomorrow (Wednesday) at 12:45p would be a good time to crank out some of that good stuff for me and Lori.

Yesterday I mentioned that I was unable to fill my chemo prescription. So I'll be filling that tomorrow which means I'll be around for an hour before the radiation therapy so I have time to take the chemo one hour prior. What this means is that Lori is going to be getting a Healing Touch therapy session while we wait. If there's time, I'll get one too. Marti says after having to have that "prognosis poor" crap staring her in the face, Lori's got a session coming.

Some good news I forgot to mention yesterday. Usually patients undergoing radiation therapy have to take steroids to reduce brain swelling. Because of how good my post-op MRI looks, I get to try it without steroids. We'll keep a close eye out for ANY signs of swelling, but until that happens I get to be steroid-free. This makes me very happy.

Tomorrow we find out if I get to drive. I have driving angels up lined up for Thursday and Friday if necessary, but I'm really really REALLY hoping they won't have to drive.

Remember I talked about Bob and Pat White a couple days ago? I got an email from their daughter yesterday. She sent me a picture she took back in 1966. She must have been 13 or 14 at the time. MAN, my brother and I had huge heads! When I showed Kevin the photo, he said "How did we walk upright??". I'm still laughing about that one.

I got a voice mail today from my dear Uncle Mike. He is my dad's younger brother. Nobody has ever had a cooler uncle. When I was 9 or 10 I had a silly autograph book that I think a couple of people actually wrote in. He wrote "You have the potential to be an All-Star if you work at it." He and my dad were very close - kinda like my brother and me - so he was always around. I love him dearly.

I talked to him later, but his initial voice message was priceless. He was getting all CEO on me. "We gotta make sure you're working with the A-team here. We can't have a bunch of these guys hanging out on the golf course pulling protocols out of their asses because that's what they did last time." I paraphrase, but it was hilarious and oh so heartwarming.

If you look at the links on the right at the top of this page, you'll see a new link to Lori's "Spare a Dollar" web site. Now you can see the ticker that tracks how many dollars have been accumulated. To those of you have contributed dollars, "Thank you" a thousands times from the bottoms of our hearts.

I am NOT going to be posting any more sagas like yesterday. So we will close this evening by celebrating my dear Uncle Mike. Go Buckaroos!!