Lots of people going thru some poop for sure. I wish you all the best! Email me if ya like. I will have Kurt remove the entire posting when this is all over to save space. Thanx again to you all.. djc1@sonic.net
WELL…
Things seemed to be moving along well. I went to UCSF on the 20th and took 10 pills as prep for tests the following day. Needed to have a low TSH level after my 14 day low iodine diet. In those 14 days I didn’t wanna cheat so I only had 2 cornuts and 1 pistachio the whole time. No other salts. No other dairy, salts, fish, bread basically anything in life that tastes good. Lots of baked chicken and lettuce wraps with avocado and tomatoes. And a few other things if you get creative. You can have meat with very little on it. No processed food, salt free ketchup and so on. So the lower your TSH count is, the higher the number. 30 and they won’t treat you, as you have obviously been cheating. 40 and they will treat you IF they can get permission from your endocrinologist. Sometimes they do, sometimes you have to start all over. 50 is ideal and that’s where you need to be to walk right in the next room and get treatment. I was 53.6, so I was good. They WANT you to go into Hypothyroidism so your body craves iodine BAD. Then drop the pills and they go right at the Cancer and kill it, attacking bad cells only. RAI treatment has been around for 50 years! So on the 21st, I went back to UCSF and had some blood work done and hemoglobin testes and the like. Then a CT scan where I could not move for 25 minutes while they took pictures of my whole body. WBS = whole body scan. RAI = Radio Active Iodine. Only can blink your eyes. Then went into the next room and had an hour long meeting about the difference between exposure and contamination. And blah blah blah… Then took 2 heavy doses of Radio-Active Iodine Treatment. Then run down the steps and out the door. Then left there fast and straight home to isolation at a friends for 7 days. No riding on buses, sharing a cab, holding babies or animals or being around a pregnant woman as it could kill the baby.
Went down for another scan yesterday to see progress. My endocrinologist called me today with good and bad news. Good news = there is no Cancer anywhere else in my body. As there was a time where it was in a couple other places. Bad news = Cancer is still very present in my neck and throat area. Meaning the treatment did not get all the Cancer. I asked her if the medicine will continue working and she said not likely, as it is at its strongest at 48 hours. Then down from 100% to like 6 %. Then hangs around for a little longer and that is it. 8 days later and I am out of isolation and no longer a threat to anyone. Which means it’s probably done working. It MAY still have a little left to help eat away some of the residual Cancer, but not likely. Surprising as they gave me a VERY heavy dose. Had to put it in 2 pills. 15 thousand dollars a pill that the insurance does NOT pay for. Good times eh… So back to regular life for now, whatever THAT is.. and trying not to stress out. Not easy to do for sure. I was really hoping she would say we had a zero tumor count. I guess they are not really tumors, that’s just what they call it as a whole. So I asked her to give it to me straight and she said and I quote,” It doesn’t look good, and I am very concerned. I thought it would be Zero, or at least a lot less” End quote…
So no way to start more treatment right now, as the body needs to recoup. Then back to UCSF on August 18th to see where things stand and another WBS. THAT scan will tell her whether or not I start another RAI treatment in 6 to 9 months. Basically start all over again. ( Or pinpoint Radiation in Petaluma, CA. I guess they go in you and plant little chunks of Gold inside ya. Then zap THAT area and the gold keeps treatment close to the Cancer. ) If the masses that are left are too big, they do NOT do another RAI as it will do no good, and it’s straight to pinpoint radiation. I was told to NOT get my affairs in order just yet. I guess at least THAT'S good news.
That’s it I guess. That’s the short version. Next update after August 18th? Danny
