Posted in Just Our Day-to-Day Life

Today's appointment was rather strange. The doctor, whom we know well (she went to high school with my brother) was pretty non-committal about this being cancer or not, but at the same time, she prescribed Tarceva.  Tarceva is an oral chemo drug that is for treatment of advanced or recurring lung cancer that has not responded adequately to the first round of treatment. (Dad had combined chemo---2 types, and concurrent radiation treatments last spring and summer.) 

So we know that she knows this is advanced cancer, but yet she didn't tell him that.  You don't prescribe this drug unless you know you are dealing with cancer, at least I can't imagine that you would.  SUV numbers for the PET scan on the suspicious lesions were around 5, which she said was borderline.  My research showed that nearly 90% of SUV numbers of >5 are cancerous neoplasms when talking about lung cancer.  I really wish that she had just come out and told us for certain.  But yet, on the other hand, giving Dad 6 weeks to hope and pray that this is not cancer, yet realizing that this could quite likely the case, may make this easier for him to accept. 

So he will be going back in early May.  She said the cancer would "declare itself" if that is indeed what it is.  She also will be ordering another PET scan then.  My suspicion is that it will be declaring itself soon.  I hope and pray that I am wrong, but from what I read, this seems to be the thing to expect.  I will pray for a miracle, though.  After seeing my mother, aunt, and uncle die from this horrible disease, I can't even let myself go there in my thinking about Dad yet. 

I've done lots of reading on the lung cancer sites since coming home, and realize from what I have read that Dad is now most likely in either the Recurrent Stage of his cancer, or Stage 4, depending on which method of naming the stage you use.  This translates to a 3-6 month scenario for life expectancy in most cases. With the newly approved drug she gave him, 39% of patients have a life expectancy of 1 year. 

She said that Dad looked great, and told him to keep on doing whatever he wanted to do.  You can't imagine how great he looks sitting there.  I still can't believe something is going on inside that will take him from us. 

I was supposed to work at the Boy Scout Camp where BJ is working as Junior Commissioner this summer; I was to serve as the Trading Post manager.  This is to be a 12 hour a day, 7 day a week job, and will be right at the time when I want and need to be with my Dad.  I feel strongly that I need to tell the director that I am quitting, but am afraid they will all hate me and think I should just carry on.  It would give me no time with my dad at all. 

Do you see my super-woman complex coming out here again? I always feel like I need to be there for everyone and everything.  My aunt still asks for me everyday, and my daughter needs me to work extra at the shop the week the boys come to visit in a week.  And she will be needing a baby-sitter one day a week, and I long to be able to do that for her and get an opportunity to know my new grandsons. Then there is Bj's school. Yet it is impossible to be what I expect myself to be, and my mind/brain/emotions are spread so thin right now that they are ready to snap right in two. 

Many of you have asked if we can't adjust BJ's school, etc.  You see, we did that last year the entire year during my daughter's PPROM pregnancy, and we lost nearly a year of school.  So he is behind, and very discouraged by the fact.  I certainly don't subscribe to the public school philosophy of "having" to have certain subjects, but realistically, if he wants to attend college, we have to get in one more lab science, one more math, and due to his processing disorder, we still have some work to get done on his writing skills, including grammar and usage that need to be finished.  He is not able to cope with doing these subjects alone, and I need to be there helping him through each step of the way.  We are already working at my daughter's shop one full day a week, and he works for his grandmother to earn the money to finance his Boy Scout activities another nearly full day of the week.  That leaves only 3 days for school.  We are at our wits end trying to figure out how to squeeze it in last year and this year.  We just get the schooling back on track, and yet another family disaster comes along, either a personal "our family" disaster, or something involving the extended family.  This is not fun!!! 

So, what would the rest of you do about the summer job if your dad was in this situation?  Would you quit to be able to spend as much time with your dad as possible, or keep the job? The job will not make or break us financially, because after buying the required uniforming, and paying the gas money to and from, I would make less than $800 for 7 weeks of 12 hour days, 7 days a week.  It was to have been a "for fun because I love Boy Scouts" kind of job. 

I think I need to just get my nerve up to talk to the director and just plain tell him I quit...