#Neverthelessshepersisted

Did you know that Diet Coke is even fizzier when it comes back up?  At least if it makes its return in 30 seconds. That is now a proven fact. I was expecting no drama from my biopsy on Monday, but there was a bit, and it was self-admittedly self-inflicted. I don’t mind anesthesia; I kind of like it, truth be told. The doc said I’d be getting Versed and Fentanyl for the procedure. Now, Fentanyl and I have a terrible relationship, so I asked how long it has been combined with Versed. A long time, I was assured. I figured I’ve probably had the combo before and didn’t know it and did fine. So I said nothing. My bad.

The biopsy itself went uneventfully. As I was being wheeled to the recovery area, I started feeling Fentanyl-y. I told the nurse that even though I’d eaten nothing for more than 19 hours, I felt the urge to purge. Like, right now. And that’s pretty much how the afternoon went, leading up to the discovery about used Diet Coke. 8 units of Zofran mainlined into my port, A sketchy ride home, some homemade miso soup and white rice (Thanks, Al!), and things started looking up. Kind of.

I went for a short, slow run/walk the next morning, Cyber Knife Day One at the (University of) Maryland Proton Treatment Center in Baltimore. (See above.) The hardest part at the hospital was getting my car back from the valet afterward. Too many cars, too few valets. I’m having two tumors leaning on my spine zapped this week, on Tuesday, Thursday, and Monday. It takes about half an hour a tumor, for a treatment that lasts just under an hour. I just lie on the table while a robotic arm moves around me,  firing targeted radiation beams from several angles. The radiation kills tumor cells with minimal  exposure to surrounding healthy tissue. My part is easy.

Wednesday was The Day We See What That Fork in the Road is Going to Serve Up. No phone call from Dr Rajan all day long. I heard that evening that my tumors do NOT express Mesothelin like 70-79 percent of other Thymic Carcinoma patients’ tumors do. For whatever reason, I had been hopeful, but not optimistic that I’d get in to that trial, and again, unfortunately, my intuition proved right. I figure I’m usually in the minority of any group: In the group of hardly anyone who gets TC… In the ten percent of people for whom milciclib maleate works… And now, in the 21-30 percent of TC patients who don’t qualify for this trial. It’s all in the balance of the universe, I suppose. Still, disappointing because that would have been “easy.”

So now what? Dr Rajan is trying to track down another targeted or standard therapy for me and says there might also be a couple of other trials that could be interesting for me at the NIH. I have to wait til next week to get more info on those. I’ll finish my cyber knife treatments next week and figure that proton beam therapy on my heart lining is a real possibility now. But that’s for another week. And since I’ve already combed through www.clinicaltrials.gov 

again, there was nothing for me to do yesterday. So I went to Hell Week at Orange Theory and kicked my own ass.

I gave up trying to be in control of everything many, many years ago. Therefore, I am not feeling super stressed about this. I am aggressive in learning about and seeking out options for myself, as I like this life very much and want to maintain quality of life for many more adventures. But I won’t worry about what I can’t control. Worry is bad energy that I won’t tolerate in myself and I won’t allow others to bring to me. The last thing I need is an energy suck. Really, it’s the last thing I or anyone else ever needs.

So for today (and every day), I live. And I persist. (Thanks for the shirt and the thought, Angie!) #Defy