On To Summer Break...

Hey all,

All of you here at Loyola are probably starting to get into your finals and then onto your board review stuff. That's excellent, but it means that I need to stay away from your laps. If I don't see you again until late July or August, it's been an unbelievable trip working with you. Especially, Boyce who completely I missed his birthday (damn)! If all goes as planned, I'll be back in August to audit the classes then take them for real in January.

My plan thus far is to go on Thursday or Friday out to South Dakota and Wyoming to see some very rural areas and then head south to Boulder, CO for my Grandma's birthday. My poor grandmother hasn't seen me since all of this happened. Anyhow, hopefully I'll get to see the entire Colorado contingent of my family who I miss an aweful lot.

Then I'll need to be back here on May 10 to routinely chat with my oncologist here. I don't expect anything to be a problem there. After a day or two I'd like to head back and spend some time with the family and my brother who will be in West Virginia. I've got to say I still cannot believe I haven't been up to see him at school (in Pennsylvania)... but I guess there'll be time for everthing. I'd also like to spend some time out the Seattle with my sister, who I also haven't seen in her Seattle self. Anyway... that'll be for the roughly 1 month after I see the oncologist.

From there on, I'll have another MRI around the beginning of the month (of June) at Loyola, have lots of appointment, and go to a great wedding; congrats Jenn! I'll also go back down to Houston to see what this neurosugeon has to say again... I don't know what he's going to say, but that's an aweful long way off to be thinking about it.

After June 10th ish, I don't really know. Surgery looks like a good possibility, but so does another big road trip. Who'da ever thought I'd ever say that? Hopefully everything will all be peachy and I'll go on from there. I'll probably be slowing down on these blogs as an update for my GBM... it's just not too exciting right now. Hopefully, I'll keep it like that!

Peace, and all the best!

Mike

P.S. If you're one of the poor, unfortunate souls who lent me some items way, way, way back in January as a generous giving but expected them back... you'll have them shortly. I'll put them in my Loyola locker... which I think is #20 in Curie. I'll let you know when they get there.

PPS!!! The Loyola locker is loaded, but it is #40 in Curie. Thanks a bunch!

Irregularly Irregular

I've come to realize that I bunch you don't know how the treatment process is supposed to work. Please allow me to explain. We'll use a completely normal Glioblastoma Multiforme in the Sylvian Fissure to explain it first and then we'll move on up into mine.

The Sylvian Fissure is the groove that runs horizontally along either size of your head. It separates several of the lobes of the your head from the temporal lobe. Most importantly, it ends towards the back end in the Broca's Area. Inside the Sylvian Fissure if you go deeply, you'll find the middle cerebral artery, any one of the branches of which can cause a major stroke. Back to this shortly....

Now, imagine yourself hopping along one day and you have a funny feeling in your arm. It doesn't hurt; it isn't numb; it's just this kindof strange sensation. Furthermore, it just lasts 15 or so seconds then goes away. It happens two or three times a day. You embarrassingly go to your doctor, quite sure that this is a problem about your tests coming up in December but you're scared enough that you want to talk to him anyway. He gives you a thorough exam and he tells you that he does't think he should do something now, but if you have more problems come back in roughly a month. I can't imagine anywhere he could have done better.

A month later he sends you off into neurology clinic. Here's where I'll deviate from my story a little bit. All the drama happens just like mine, but on Wed. they decide to go ahead and take the tumor out. The tumor is clean and they appear to have all of it and they close the head back up. The patient continues to go on radiation as well as chemo and after one month the MRI appears good. This patient will still continue on 23 days off and 5 day on temodar pulses for the forseeable future. The pulse is double and/or triple what the temodar was during the radiation.

During the patient's surgery, the tumor appeared to be before the MCA and entirely within the Sylvian Fissure. That made it super easy to take out. Mine, unfortunatly, is below the MCA, is large, and is difficult to take out. It has several groups receive branches from the MCA, which it's behind. In order to take it out, you'd have to split that fissure wide and risk damaging Broca Area, as well as taking the chance or damaging or stroking the MCA.

I haven't found which direction I'm going to go. I didn't have the surgery, but I did have the radiation and the chemotherepy. I even had my first pulse! I can have the surgery if I wan't to... but I just don't know yet. I probably repeated everthing I said before, but I really don't care... maybe this is just a good way to go out and vent!

Peace,

Mike

Back at it again!

Hey all...

I dropped my parents off at the airport a little while ago and I'm sitting back here for the rest of this Thursday afternoon. My sister also came into town, which I think was the best thing for all of us because the tension was so high as we waited for the MRI Monday and Tuesday morning. Katie (my sister) makes us laugh so much that it was a riot to have her in town.

Anyhow... the MRI went spectacular, both in my execution (ah thank you), and in the doctor's reading it. They said that the darker brain mass... that is the glioblastoma multiforme... had shrunk down to nearly 1 cm in diameter from just over 3 cm in diameter. Heck yeah that was exciting. Even Dr. Barton who never says anything positive was excited about that. For comparison, usually on the unresected tumors, there's either some minor shrinkage, no change, or growth. That can be sad... and that's what I was kindof preparing myself for. Fortunately, I have the above situation.

For those of you who are wondering what that 1 cm block is, it's still GBM, we just haven't any idea whether it's still alive or shrinking or completely dead. I guess we'll get a good look at the next MRI in 8 weeks.

Unfortunately, that doesn't mean I'm off the big gallows yet, but I sure as shoot am happy for right now!

Mike

Easter & Them Egg Layin' Bunnies...

Hi all!

I've taken these two days off before Easter Weekend to take a road trip out West. Hopefully, this'll be the first of many! I really enjoy road trips and this is the first one where I have no idea where in the world I'm going. Usually, there is some semblance of a destination in mind, but I haven't the foggiest idea of where I'm going tomorrow. Shoot... other than La Something, Wisconsin or Coreanything, Iowa.... I don't even know where I am now. I really kindof like it... who'da thought?

Anyhow, I should be back on Saturday to get my folks at the airport. After Easter we have a handful of tests Monday, then we meet with doctors on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then, I'll be back at school Thursday or Friday next week.

The handful of test are the MRI and some associated blood work. The standard of treatment is to give the radiation and chemo, then follow it with an MRI a month after to see where you are. The reason being that you want your radiation to have plenty of time to settle with regards to the swelling as well as to give it time to work.

The reason I really don't particularly care what this one says is that 1: according to the first one, I should have been on the floor drooling, and 2: I already saw the one that they took at MD Anderson and it looked pretty good. Perhaps I should be a little more nervous, but I'm just not.

All the best!

Mike