How's Tracy?

I came back from basketball last night and all of the furniture downstairs had been rearranged.

The "Busy Body" is back. When the oncologist said that they were going to be "aggressive" with their treatment, my natural reaction was "good, let's get this cancer." But what I didn't realize is how long it would take for Tracy to recover. The example I use is hair growth. Just as I takes hair a long time to grow back, it takes the rest of the body just as long.

Yesterday was the best evidence that I have had to date that Tracy is getting back to her old self. We went to the early church service and had lunch at her Mom's house. She walked/ran three or four miles at the gym, cleaned the house for several hours, and rearranged the furniture. My busy body wife is officially back. The most telling sign was her being able to work out without feeling ill or some sort of physical ailment.

I get asked about her all the time. Many people have prayed for us and kept her in their thoughts. It's a long road back. But we are getting there!

Beaten by the Tracys

Well, that was interesting! Last Sunday's 10 K in Omaha wasn't what I expected it to be. Since circumstances had gotten in the way of actually training for it, I was led to believe that we would be walking most of the way. Piece of cake, right? Wrong.

We ran almost the entire way. Once we got out there, my wife's competitive juices got going and, well, so did we! I'm proud to say that I kept up. Tracy and I ran together the whole way. With Tracy's background running half marathons, she seemed to handle things pretty well. I'm in basketball shape, but distance running is a different thing altogether. After about four miles, parts of my body that I haven't heard from in years were starting to "talk back" to me in protest! But we kept going.

A ways ahead of us was Tracy's childhood friend, Tracy H., who also has run some half marathons before. Tracy H. ran without the benefit of training as well, but unlike my Tracy, Tracy H. is currently undergoing chemotherapy for her cancer. How hardcore is that? Running a 10K while going through chemo? Unreal. I doubt that many have accomplished that feat.

And by the way, both Tracys beat me Sunday. Guess after battling cancer, beating me was a piece of cake...

The 10 K

I ran five miles once. My brother and I challenged ourselves to run around the entire section. A county road section is normally a total of four miles, but the one that we ran was actually five. You could definitely say that we took it slow! But we made it. And I was pretty sore the next day.

I'm thinking back on that experience because early tomorrow morning, Tracy and I are going to do the Omaha 10 K. We signed up months ago figuring that this would be a good challenge for us as we celebrate a return to normal after the conclusion of Tracy's chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

Or so we thought.

We vastly underestimated the time that it would take Tracy to recover from her cancer treatment. Everybody's different, of course. But in Tracy's case, she has tried to get back to where she was before the diagnosis. She used to work out regularly. She's even run a couple half marathons. But Tracy experienced light-headedness during or after workouts. One night, her symptoms were so bad that we went to the emergency room. Given her history with herceptin and the way that it affected her heart, we were very concerned. We wound up spending the night in the hospital that night, but in the end we were relieved that the tests showed that her heart was fine. We found out that she had been having trouble with low potassium. Since then, she's been able to manage that problem, but we decided against training for the 10 K.

One thing that we learned from all of this is that, cancer treatment is not easy to come back from. It takes a long time for things to even start to feel normal again. But we will be there tomorrow and we will participate.

We will take it as a small victory.

Never forget

Today my wife has only two radiation treatments left. Her cancer is officially in remission. Radiation is no walk in the park. It has not been easy. We've had some tough times. But it's unlike chemo in that it didn't take her hair. It didn't leave her sick for a week or more at a time. And it's almost over. But to me, the unspoken thought that comes to mind when you hear the word "remission" is that remission may not last forever. We can take comfort in the statistics that indicate it's highly unlikely that the cancer will come back. But to me, the fight against cancer is only beginning. We both have a long fight ahead of us. I read a statistic that said that I personally have a coin flip's chance to get cancer myself. We're going try to do everything we can to "live strong"-- fight cancer, raise money to fight it, live a healthy life style, exercise, educate ourselves. It's already taken too much from us. We can never forget. And we will never forgive. Cancer.

I went with Tracy to the Midwest Cancer clinic on Monday. We were disappointed to learn that she could not get Herceptin because of the decreased function of her heart. That's a serious deal in itself when you're talking about the heart, nothing to be messed with. But everyone expects her to bounce back in three weeks and be able to receive treatment again. And the thing is, we both realized from the people around us that we're lucky to be where we're at in her treatment.

I'll share one story that I heard while I was in a waiting room Monday. Three people were sharing their cancer story with each other when one man said, "You know, you can work hard your whole life. Pay off the house. Get your kids through college. Retire. And then when you're ready to live the good life, you get cancer." He later said that he was 56 when he was diagnosed and from the sound of things, his prognosis is not good.

They shared their philosophies with each other on how they deal with cancer. One lady, said her husband was diagnosed when he was 65, simply said, "we don't let it bother us", explaining that they try to have as many good days as they can.

One woman shared the story of how she finally convinced her husband to go to the hospital after she finally would not take "I'm fine" as an answer as she watched her husband struggle with pain.

The whole experience made me sad. But it also made me a little angry. It just re-energizes me as we continue our fight against cancer. My feeling is captured in the Livestrong video that is posted above. I will not forget what cancer did and what it's doing to my wife and I. I will not forget what it's done to others that I've met. There's a resolve there. We've got to find a cure.