Cancer - Part 13 (Another setback)

On November 2, Mike had another setback. We arrived at the hospital prepared for another long day of chemo. He had been coughing for a few days, and we remembered his cough that indicated cancer in the first place. I admit we began to grow concerned. His cough was concerning to the nurses as well. Because of the nature of chemo patients and their weak immunities, the nurses decided that we should sit in a separate room. So Mike was in solitary confinement, so to speak. It was a little humiliating; however, we understood the reasoning. We knew that delaying chemo that day was a very real possibility.

They did his regular blood work, and his counts came back well enough to do chemo. But, after checking his lungs, Dr. Woelk concluded that Mike most likely had pneumonia. They sent him for a chest x-ray. Due to this infection, we were sent home. It was very disappointing for us. We had to call the people who were doing child care for the girls, un-arrange what had been arranged, and change the course of our day. That may not seem like a big deal, but Mike really had to prepare himself every weekend to do chemo on Mondays. We all psyched ourselves up for it in a sense. Chemo weeks were extremely difficult on all of us.

Mike was given very strong antibiotics to fight the infection. We were told to come back Wednesday. By then they would have the x-ray results and maybe the pills would have a chance to kick in. We prayed that the chemo wouldn’t be delayed any longer. We had so many appointments in the next little while, and shuffling schedules would just delay everything. That brought us too close to Christmas. We were so hoping to be done everything well before Christmas! Mike again became down-hearted.

Well, his pneumonia cleared up quickly thanks to the meds and prayer! And, our oncologist decided that we would keep the Wpg appointments as they were! Another heart. In November we met with a Head/Neck specialist in Winnipeg to discuss the thyroid results. He wasn’t very concerned about the findings. He said basically we had three choices: 1) to remove the thyroid just in case there was cancer, 2) remove half of the thyroid gland and still live a very normal life, with the help of medication, or, 3) assume it is nothing and keep monitoring the thyroid. Well, to us the choice was obvious. Because Mike believed that there was no cancer in the first place, we informed the doctor of our decision to do nothing and keep an eye on it.