Relay time!

We had our first team meeting with our Relay for Life team today. The turnout was very good with nine team members present and, with families there, a total of 17 here for the meal. Tracy made chili for lunch and afterward she went over all of the information with the team. She really did a great job with everything and I think everyone was ready to go after the meeting. Like most Relay teams, our team is primarily made up of family and friends. Our team, the Hair Raisers, has several members whose families have also had to deal with cancer so it is as personal for them as it is for us.

Relay for Life is a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. The money goes toward cancer research as well as other cancer related services such as cancer patient care. Team member raise money for their team through donations and fund raisers. Then on July 24, our team will take turns walking between the hours of 7 pm to 7 am at Haymarket Park. It is a great activity for a wonderful cause. Cancer touches everyone, and we have a long, long way to go in the fight against cancer. Nobody knows who will be affected by this deadly disease in the future. Money we raise this year could save lives in the future.

If you are interested in donating to the cause, check out my fund raising webpage! On the site, you can make a quick, convenient online donation to our team. You can also navigate to Tracy's page, our team's page, or find out more on this great fund raiser.

Update on New Year's Resolutions

How are your New Year's resolutions going? Last year, I came up with a list of 10 things I wanted to accomplish. I achieved none of them. In fact, by February I could not remember most of them. Of course, the major focus of 2008 was the wedding and Tracy's diagnosis. But this is a new year. So this is my official resolution update to anyone that cares.

My two goals for 2009 are to finish 10 books and to dunk a basketball at the age of 40. Despite my height, I haven't been able to jump high enough to dunk for several years. So that goal is fitness related and I'm getting closer but haven't got there yet. As for my reading goal, I have finished two books so far. One was The Last Juror by one of my favorite authors, John Grisham. The other book that I've read is The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch, which is the story of a college professor who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and was asked to give a final lecture at his school. It's a quick read and a very touching story. I would recommend it to anyone and I think that book brings to light just how far we have to go in the fight against cancer. Pancreatic cancer, I'm told, has only a 5% survival rate beyond five years.

A Bad Day

Well, I suppose many of you may know this already by reading Tracy's blog, but yesterday did not go as planned. Her MUGA test showed that her heart was functioning at a significantly lower level than it had before she started chemo. It appears that the herceptin she is taking has caused it.

To back up just a bit, Tracy's cancer tested high for the HER2 protein. Only one in five test high for it and Tracy falls into that category. HER2 can cause cancer to spread faster and make it more likely to reoccur. Herceptin has proven in studies to lessen the likelihood of reoccurrance and also make chemotherapy more effective in treating existing cancers for women with HER2. However, in about 30% of people that take herceptin, it can affect the heart and Tracy falls into that category as well.

So yesterday she finished up with her chemo except for the herceptin. The big thing we're worried about is her being able to get back on it and in all likelihood, she should be able to get back on it once her heart shows some recovery. From what I've heard and read, the heart could recover quickly on its own and it may or may not require some heart medication before getting back on it.

So we're worried about her heart and we're worried about cancer. Not a fun place to be in right now. We had been getting some pretty good momentum of progress, and this kinda pulled us out of that mindset and returns some feelings of uncertainty. But we will meet with our oncologist when he gets back in town and we'll see what he says. Everybody is different, so since Tracy's cancer appears to not have spread, they may be a bit more conservative with her. Generally speaking though, from what I've read, doctors would rather take a chance and go after the cancer rather than take too many precautions with the heart. But as Dr. Langdon said, we all want to live long healthy lives and we certainly need healthy hearts to do that. In the meantime, we will wait and try to do as much as we can to live "heart healthy" lives. And this only adds fuel to the fire for the need for more fundraising for cancer research. We're going to do the Relay For Life fundraiser this year. I'm hoping that everyone can chip in and help us raise money for more progress to be made.

Relay time

I am excited about relay for life. We're going to get friends and family from both sides involved. It's cool that Tracy's team has gotten off to a good early start! I'm going to get my own webpage set up and hopefully I'll be able to help with the cause. Cancer research is such an important cause. So many people are affected by it. And who knows what the future will hold? With Tracy, we're hoping for a successful treatment and then we'll worry about reoccurrence. But what about the rest of us too? How many others of us will have this to deal with in our future? It's not something we want to think about, but the more money we can raise for cancer research, the better off we all could be. With the economy expected to have a negative impact on charities this year, our relay for life team's contribution becomes even more important.

Round Six

Tomorrow Tracy goes to her sixth and final chemo treatment. I can't truthfully say that the time has "flown by". It's been a long road. Yesterday, I got a little taste of what it must feel like to go through chemotherapy in that I had food poisoning-- losing six pounds in 24 hours. It was tough, every minute of it. But today I'm feeling better. It reminded me of how Tracy must be feeling the week after she goes through chemo. This particular treatment, the last one, should be the toughest. Tracy's really handed things quite well considering everything. I had a tough time with the 24 hour flu and Tracy's basically been sick for 18 weeks.

It's been tough, but both of us are glad to be going through this for the last time. Of course, I've had the much easier job of the two. But I can't wait for things to get back to "normal". We didn't really have much of a chance for things to settle down from the wedding before the diagnosis. Cancer will always be on our minds, or maybe in the back of our minds. But at least my wife won't have to be suffering from these side effects and we'll have other things to worry about, like the landscaping in front of the house or planning our next family get together.