Happy Columbus Day, everyone! October 12, 1492 was a Friday, according to the Julian calendar that was still in effect then (the Gregorian calendar wouldn't be adopted in Continental Europe until Friday, October 15, 1582, 420 years to the day before my wonderful nephew Garrett Collins Greenly was born, whose first decadal or 10th birthday is only 3 days away, and who has the same middle name that I have, my Mother's and Garrett's Grandmother's maiden name!)! I suppose Columbus Day is officially celebrated on the second Monday of October for the sake of convenience!
This Columbus Day 2012 has been an interesting one for us! I had my most recent CT scan at MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) two days ago on Wednesday, October 10, 2012. Yesterday, my wonderful surgeon, Dr. Paul Mansfield, went over the results of the CT scan and the tumor markers from my most recent blood work with us (Caroline, Burr, Cynthia, and me) and the results were not encouraging, to say the least! The tumor markers, both CA19-9 and CEA, continue to grow exponentially, clearly trending up up and away! The good news is that there are still no signs of tumors outside of my abdominal cavity! However, the tumors on my peritoneum, which are very hard to image precisely, definitely appear to be growing and sending out spindly processes that would eventually cause bowel obstructions if they were left to grow unhindered! It seems clear that my rather aggressive appendiceal adenocarcinoma tumor cells are no longer being kept in check by my current chemo cocktail, FOLFIRI plus Avastin! Dr. Mansfield said that he was sorry, but that there's really nothing that could be done surgically at this point, like another round of Cytoreduction ("debulking") plus HIPEC, for example! In some ways that's a relief, given that 12 hour surgeries tend to be somewhat grueling, even though I recovered miraculously well and quickly from mine of a year and a half ag !
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