Work the plan

Hi everybody.  Keri does most of the posting, but occasionally I like to chime in.

So for those keeping score at home, a bit of a recap;

I had an upper respiratory infection in August of last year.  The medicine that the immediate care physician gave me didn’t get the job done, so I visited my family doctor.  He said it sounded like a bit of walking pneumonia and ordered a baseline chest x-ray.  It was, but he also wanted to keep an eye on a lung spot (likely nothing) he saw on the x-ray and had me come back for a CT in a couple months.  That’s when they found the 17cm “football” in the left side of my abdomen and multiple lung lesions in both lungs.  No symptoms.  175#, how was this thing hiding!?!?  The doctors ruled out Lymphoma (because you would do chemo before surgery) and thought it was cancer of the kidney or adrenal, with a very slight possibility of soft tissue sarcoma (rare).  They didn’t biopsy as they said it needed to come out regardless.  So I had surgery on November 16^th by Dr. Rick Birhle (IU Urology) who removed an 8 pound mass along with my left kidney and adrenal.  He is a magician according to my oncologist.  Turns out it is the rare stuff – Leiomyosarcoma.  Less than 1% of all cancers are sarcoma, and Leiomyosarcoma is approximately 10% of the 1%.  The cell division rate was pretty low, so that’s good, but it had spread, so that’s bad - stage 4, whoops!

This past January I went on a phase 3 chemotherapy clinical trial after consulting IU, University of Michigan, and MD Anderson via Community.  The Phase 3 clinical trial was Adriamycin (Doxorubicin) and TH-302.  Adriamycin is one of the nasty drugs that results in fatigue, hair loss, etc.  After six 21 day cycles, I was seeing benefit (slight aggregate reduction in many lung lesions), so I was able to stay on the TH-302 only for another six cycles.  TH-302 only “turns on” where there are low oxygen areas, which are often present in solid tumors due to their erratic vascular formations.  As such, TH302 doesn’t attack all fast-growing cells like typical chemo drugs, so I felt great, got my hair back, good blood counts, etc.   The latest CT scan on the 25^th of September showed that about half of the lesions were starting to progress, so I have to switch to another set of drugs with nasty side-effects (Gemcitabine and Taxotere).  This was expected as I was told that all the lesions would not likely respond to one single agent, so it was just a matter of "when" on going to the second line drug.  Based on the Phase 1/2 clinical trial, I actually did really well - better than 80% of the other lab rats w/r/t progression.  The gold standard for getting rid of the bad guys is surgery with clear margins.  In my case, there are really too many active lesions and too many in the central part of the lungs.  As such, we have to use drugs and try to kill off as much as we can and then likely have some sort of surgery down the road.

So that’s it really.  I’ve had a great support network with family, friends, coworkers that I can’t thank enough - Keri in particular.  She is amazing with her strength and support.  So, onto more drugs.  The good news is I am not trying to recover from major surgery like before, and I was hoping to go as Heisenberg (Breaking Bad) for Halloween – always an upside.

Keep the prayers coming, they work!

As Keri mentioned in the last post, it was a great summer.  I’ve added some summer pictures as well as some pics from the spring that I am way overdue in posting.  We will probably post status after the next CT - sometime in early December, I expect.

By the way….I am long on the maker of TH-302, Threshold Pharmaceuticals (THLD).

God bless.
Christian

There are some people and events missing.  Once I clean up the camera I will post some more pictures, but here are some from our phones:

My peeps......Luke (4), Lily (almost 7), nephew Graham (almost 2)
 

John Board - UK work friend showing support!

Good college friend Chuck Denning ran a 1/2 marathon and had a special shirt made - awesome.

We had a Sigma Alpha Epsilon founders day gala in April that Keri and I attended with a bunch of my good friends from the fraternity.

My beautiful wife!  13 years married.  She looks like she belongs in college still....)

Good friend and college roommate Hash.  He has great hair.

Thor flew in from Texas, Joe flew in from Baltimore.  Great friends.

[Back] Pat, Thor, Joe, John [Front] Ajit, me, Hash, Chuck.  The sum is dumber than the parts.  Much college stupidity, but yet we all turned out pretty darn well.

Took the annual golf trip south with high school friends in late April.  Charleston this time.  Windy by the ocean.

The magician.  My surgeon Rick Bihrle.  Yes, he would look at home with a water bong and a surf board.

My favorite infusion nurse - Millicent.

My oncologist - Dr. Rushing, great man.

My clinical trial nurse - Michele, great woman.

Lily's lemonade stand.  Proceeds to cancer patients and their families.  She raised over $600!!!!

Kindergarten graduation!  Lily is a great student!

Bill - Former boss of 5 years and a great friend.

Mike Young - Excellent friend from 1st grade living in Atlanta.  Summer road trip made our way to visit.

Kids and the bikes.

Indians game!

Summer road trip to many places, including Hilton Head.

A state fair tradition.

The Louisville hot rod show with Luke, Graham, and my sister Trinity.

Coworker has a boat on the Ohio.  Crusing and watching fireworks after a Reds game.

The county fair.  Love me some carnies.

Second year in a row dad and I went to the Bristol night race.

Surprise trip to Key West with Keri.

Keri was unaware of the bi-plane ride just before the flight home....)  She was a trooper, even when the pilot turned the plane upside down.

Beautiful Key West trip, great scenery, great room.

Do it.  Awesome flight.

Every year a great pal puts on a scavenger hunt/bar crawl.  About 12 tasks that takes you around the city for about 2-3 hours.  Keri and I won by 9 minutes.  13 teams of two.

Chuck and Emerson.  John and Beau (missing Reed).  Me with Luke and Lily.  Hash with Angelie (missing Nik).  Sol with Revv, Traft, and Eastyn.  Pat (and Mallory) left early!

Homecomeing at Purdue this last weekend.

We stopped by "The Lodge" on the way home.  The kids got to see where dad lived in college.  I spent a few hours behind that bar when I was a pledge.