First the good news…

Splitting a gut with Susan in England last summer

Chemo is over! I met with my doctor yesterday, and he has cancelled my last 3 chemotherapy infusion appointments. We’re done. I couldn’t be happier about that. The accumulation of drugs in my system had caught up with me, and the fatigue was pretty powerful. I’d expected the next few weeks to be even more debilitating since, why wouldn’t they be? So instead I get to continue returning to normal. I gave myself my last injection today.

But that’s not why we stopped therapy. The treatment had done what it could—a few very small nodules and enlarged lymph nodes that had shown up on my baseline CT scan had shrunk or disappeared entirely in this month’s scan. Just what those little things were, we can’t be sure of, but it’s nice that they’re gone. But they were not as important as a larger mass that was detected, and which is growing, meaning the chemo I’d been taking was not working on that particular thing. We don’t know what it is exactly, but chances are very good it is something like the tumor I had removed in December (though much smaller, thankfully). I expect another surgery might be in my near future, to take care of it, but that it will be nowhere near the seriousness of the last operation.

The exact course of action is not decided yet, and in any case, it is in the future, so I am doing what I seem to do so well and focusing on the good news (always first the good news), which is taking place in the present. I am feeling stronger and more energetic these last few days, and I expect that trend will continue—maybe not in a straight line, but generally in the right direction. I can make plans with a little more confidence that my body will allow me to follow through. I know the saga continues—as it may for life—but right now I am entering a good part of it. Thanks for being with me on the ride!

Bonus: For those who like freaky coincidences, check out this, my very last (and I do mean last, maybe forever) shirtless selfie, taken at the Blue Lagoon in Iceland last summer. The weird smear across my abdomen, caused by blowing rain on the camera lens, is in the exact spot my tumor was growing at the time. Make what you will of it. :)