August 28, 2009 Life as a Bachelor

For the last week and a half the boys and I have lived as only bachelors should. We haven’t been eating vegetables and will only clean the house the day that Julia arrives home after visiting her mother and the rest of the family. I suppose I should wash the sheets, but that will probably be that last thing on the way to making the house look like humans actually reside there.

Despite not knowing how to find my way around the kitchen, I somehow kept everyone alive without a great deal of weight loss. Of course, we didn’t exactly dine like kings, but I do know how to unfreeze things and throw a pizza in the oven. We actually did have an evening of frozen pot roast, frozen corn and pre-manufactured mashed potatoes from the refrigerated section.

It hasn’t been the cooking that has worn me out, it is the laundry. The day after Julia left, I had the boys bring up their clothes and added to the pile that already existed. That took me four loads. We go through enough towels in two days to do a load and when you add that to the seven or eight towels that the boys had hoarded, I had another two loads to do. Then just two days later, I had another four loads of clothes to do. I swear, they hide dirty clothes for special occasions.

However, it is the endless football washing that is driving me nuts. Before the season, I bought Jason two girdles (for the unfootball people out there, this is a protective pair of tight fitting shorts that hold the leg pads under the football pants) so that we wouldn’t have to do laundry every night. Instead, he has decided to wear the school supplied girdle. With football six days a week, I have had to wash this thing 8 times since Julia left. In addition, Jason no longer wears a white practice jersey. The first string defense wears red for practice. So now I wear red just about every day so I have something to wash with the practice jersey.

Luckily, I have until late in the afternoon on Saturday to get this place inhabitable. Jason has to be at practice at 7:15 in the morning so I have already warned Justin he will be up early to tackle the house cleaning. Too bad I can’t clean like Mr. Clean; lord knows I have the hair style down pat.

August 26, 2009 The Last of the Kennedys

I’m going to go completely off topic tonight. I was going to write about baching it for the last week, but I’ll save that for tomorrow. Earlier today, Ted Kennedy passed away. It was truly the end of an era and I just felt that I needed to say something about it.

Growing up Catholic was a unique experience but there was nothing as exciting as when John Kennedy was elected the first and only Catholic president. My parents were Democrats and I followed in their footsteps. I vaguely remember Kennedy getting elected. I completely missed the Bay of Pigs, but the Cuban Missile Crisis was very real to me. I remember being worried about a potential nuclear war. Our neighbors actually had a fallout shelter built in their basement, the threat was so real. It was during this crisis that Kennedy showed, Cuba, Russia and the rest of the world that the United States could not be bullied.

I remember thinking at one time that there could be 24 consecutive years of Kennedys being president. I, like so many others, know exactly where I was when we heard that John Kennedy was assassinated. When Robert Kennedy ran for president, I was very much in his corner. Watching him being assassinated was another of those memories that will never leave me.

I was so infatuated with the Kennedys that I wrote a fifty page paper my junior year in high school about John Kennedy’s life. We still lived in a world that didn’t pry into the lives of the famous as we do today. There was no talk of John and Bobby sleeping with every woman in sight. The Kennedys were saints.

That all changed the night that Mary Jo Kopechne died in a pond on Chappaquiddick Island. From that moment on, Ted Kennedy, the last of the Kennedy brothers, was a changed man. From that point on, he had to fight demons. His life was never the same as he fought alcohol, the Kennedy weakness for women, divorce, a failed presidential run and finally, cancer.

As I grew older, I changed my political views and often disagreed with the views of Ted Kennedy, but I never lost sight of his desire to help his fellow man. Despite his enormous wealth and fame, he was a man for the little guy. He dedicated much of his time in the Senate to fight for civil rights, better health care and the rescue of the impoverished.

In the end, he was no different that the rest of us. He had to fight for his life against a disease that is relentless. Despite his gallant efforts, he eventually lost to the demon called cancer. It plays no favorites. It strikes young and old, rich and poor. Some day it will be beaten, just not today.

The United States and the rest of the world is very different because of the Kennedys. They were driven men. They enjoyed the power, but they also made it there life work to serve others. Despite their flaws, they made a difference, something that we should all strive to do while we can. Make a difference with the gifts God has given you.

August 19, 2009 Fourth Quarter

I have officially entered the last quarter of my 100 day experience. Because I am such a huge baseball fan and lover of the underdog (Cincinnati Reds), I am going to put this experience into baseball terms verses football despite the fourth quarter reference.

My season started off in a real slump—Fourteen days in the hospital in which I lost 15 pounds. I came home and proceeded to want to throw up anytime I tried to take a pill for the next few weeks. This is not the way to start a season. Sometimes you start off so badly that no matter what you do later, you still end up out of the playoffs. I didn’t like starting the year in the minors, but hoped for a promotion to the majors later in the season.

As the weather started to warm up, I started to feel better---Like a lot of good teams, it just took me a while to start playing up to my abilities. We had about 15 consecutive days of over 110 degrees and it actually felt good to get outside a little bit. I started to increase my activity and despite feeling a little tired, I started feeling stronger. I was ready for the call up to the majors.

As the trading deadline approached, I felt I needed to strengthen my bullpen---It was getting close to my big tests early in August and I felt it was time to really start getting my body in better shape. At the end of July, I started walking in the pool. I traded time on the couch for time in the pool. This was a deadline deal that helped me get back in the pennant race.

My big road trip to play the first place team---On August 6th, I met with Dr. Mikhael. He is the guy in first place and I am ready to meet with him to see just how good I really am. Just like when the second place team visits the first place team for a three game series to see who was the best. I won 2 out of 3 games (tests) on that road trip. I held my own and kept myself in position to make a run at the end of the season.

Bad feet, sore legs and still a bit weak would put some on the disabled list, but I said pour it on---The good thing about the trip to the doctor was that he let me go back to work. I felt much better than I had just one month earlier, so I decided to go back to work despite the occasional limp. I’ve now worked seven days and am ecstatic. It feels good to be back in the starting rotation after spending time in the bullpen. I had to skip a start on Friday, but came back strong on Monday.

Stretch drive---We are now down to the last few days of the season and I feel better than ever. I have been able to stretch work out to four hours on some days. Despite nagging foot problems, I am ready for the big final series in the battle for first place. It is still 25 days away, but I have a good fastball to go along with my curveball so I feel like I can take anything the doctor has to throw at me. Like all major leaguers, I will have to take a urine test before I am cleared to play full time. Instead of the $20 million players who have to provide just a small cup worth, I will have to provide a jug of the stuff. That is what happens when you start the season in the minors.

August 10, 2009 Hi Ho, Hi Ho

After being away for over two months, I actually found my way back to work today. However, the equipment in my office wasn’t so happy to see me. Shortly before I left for my extended vacation, I was given a nice new HP laptop. It is small and light, but it has given me a few fits in its lifetime. For whatever reason, it just doesn’t like me working from home. There were times that it would take over ten minutes to come up. If I wanted to utilize Word, it would take another five minutes. No problems at work, just home.

I digress. It seems that the monitor in my office decided to go along with the laptop and its goal of me not doing any work and it decided not to come up this morning. So I thought a quick call to the Help Desk and I would be golden. However, my phone was as dead as a doornail. (This is one of those sayings I learned from my dad and done my best to hand it down to my sons, but as in most things, they have refused to pick it up.) So my cell phone actually worked and I got my call into the Help Desk. Helpful as always, they solved the problem and I was on my way.

After all of this excitement, I decided to have a short meeting with my staff to go over some items that had been nagging at me for some time. Nothing that they were doing incorrectly, just things that we needed to fix. Boy, it felt good to be back in my office, feeling some sense of worth.

However, after about two hours and thirty minutes, I hit a wall. It was time to head home. Not a bad day’s work, 150 minutes. Just enough time to get home and take a nap. I promised my doctor that I would be good and take it easy. Hopefully, that wall is a little further away tomorrow.

August 6, 2009 Close But No Cigar

I did everything that I could but I couldn’t get Dr. Mikhael to say the “R” word. However, I am inching closer. There are three things that they will check before they will label me as in remission and I have to wait another five weeks before they will do the last. The other two are looking pretty good, though.

As I have stated before in this blog, I have watched a million hospital and doctor shows. I feel that for a layman, I can understand a decent amount of what they talk about. Yet, I have managed to get lost in some of the technical lingo with respect to multiple myeloma. This, will, however, make it a little easier for those of you that have not watched nearly as many doctor shows as I have.

MM causes the creation of protein in the bone marrow and bloodstream that just don’t belong. Some of these would be referred to as long chain and others as short chain. Not all Myeloma sufferers are lucky enough to have both. Of course, I am. I didn’t know this, but my first 16 chemo treatments completely wiped out the long chains. Take these numbers as relative, so don’t worry about what unit they represent. Before the chemo, I was at 0.4 and now I am at 0.0 which means that that portion of the cancer is gone at this time.

The short chains are a little tougher. Before my first chemo, these were at 65. After the 16 sessions, it was down to 12. After not taking the chemo for five weeks, this had jumped back up to 40. I didn’t know these exact numbers, but I knew there had been some significant growth. This is what was causing my recent sleep deprived nights. If it grew that fast in five weeks what would it do in nine?

The good news is that it has dropped to 8. A normal person (and I’m not sure how many of you are normal if you are reading this) can be up to about 2.3. The fact that it is that close to normal is great. However, they like to see at least a 90% drop, so I have just a little bit of work to do and Dr. Mikhael stated that it was possible that there could be some additional improvement in the next month.

The last test that I will have to pass is the 24 hour urine collection. This will check to see how much protein there is in mine over a 24 hour period. A healthy person should have none. Before treatment, I had over a full gram in my first test. When I entered the hospital for the transplant, it had dropped to 0.365 grams. It needs to be under 0.1 for the “R” word to be utilized. Again, Dr. Mikhael is very confident that I will be there.

The other big news is that I get to go back to work on a limited basis. So much for sitting around the house in my underwear, unshowered. There always seems to be a price to pay with progress.

August 4, 2009 Two Months Later

It has now been two months since my transplant. Yet, the next couple of days are probably more important than any of the preceding ones. I have a 4 PM appointment to get my blood taken for the biggest test of my life. Much like when I was in college, I have spent little or no time studying for this one. Hopefully, I’ll do better than I did in college.

I would be a liar if I didn’t admit that I have spent a great deal of time thinking and worrying about this test. Unlike the SAT that we all took in high school, there is no real opportunity to retake it and hope for better results. When we met with the doctor four weeks ago, he was very confident that everything was going well and that I had an 80% chance of getting to at least a 90% remission level.

Because there is nothing that can completely wipe out the disease, 90% remission isn’t all that bad. The hope is that in any case, the cancer is knocked on its butt for a while and takes its time getting back to full strength.

If all goes well and I reach this level, I will then take occasional blood tests to check the progress. I am unaware of any medication that I would take while in remission. That is of course other than the regimen of medications that I am taking now to help my immune system. I still have roughly 40 days to go with that.

If things haven’t gone as expected, there are a number of options available. The bad thing about this disease is that it is not curable; the good thing is that the researchers have come up with a number of options if a transplant does not take. In addition, there are a number of clinicals going on that I could also become a part of.

Of course, there is the possibility of another transplant. The stem cells are already harvested, so we could pull this one off rather quickly if it made sense. The doctor would have to do some real convincing on that one. My biggest question would be, “If it didn’t work the first time, why would it work the second time?”

If I am in remission, I will attempt to convince the doctor that I should go back to work on a limited basis (this normally isn’t done until day 100). Never thought I’d be dying (probably poor choice of words) to go back to work, but I am. It’s not just the getting back to normal, but it is hard to feel a real sense of worth when your biggest job of the day is to take your pills and drink 64 ounces of water.

My appointment is at 11:30 on Thursday. I promise that I will get something up on the blog by evening, good or bad. I appreciate all of you accompanying me on this ride. Hopefully, we’ll be able to take our hands off of the roller coaster restraining bar and raise them skyward as we enjoy the ride down that first big hill.