Here's How It Was Supposed to Work

Platelet Count: 38

So the lads are doing their job. Hurrah for them! And this on 0 steroids. We're all back to "normal" there.

Got the MRI results back. Hip fracture? Torn ligament? Nerve pinch -- just tell me it's MS; I figure I'll catch everything that I charity walked for. Feck, I guess that includes AIDS. Great. Well, I do have that autoimmune thing, so we'll count that. All that's missing from the charity walk diseases is MS. Tell me it's MS.

Nope, just the same old cancer -- oh wait! There are new lesions. Let's see ... that's 5 just on the pelvis and 1, 2, 3, ... well, let's just call them "multiple new enhancing lesions" on my lumbar spine. So it's spreading - and this is just on my lower spine. The MRI didn't go up to the spot on my neck or upper spine, so who knows what's happening up there.

So, Bitey is shrinking and the bones spots are spreading. Is this normal? Pfft, honestly, what do I have that's normal? Cancer with ITP has already put me in a lonely place, now I've got half good/half bad responses to treatment. I can shrink one and grow the others, or grow one and shrink the others. Captain Kirk, is there a way to win the Kobayashi Maru?

It's not so bad as all that. It just means we move from treatment 1 to treatment 2. So long arimidex. Hello old friend tamoxifin. I get 2 months of this and if that doesn't work, then I get to worry (just in time for the holidays!) because then I have to move into chemo. With my platelet levels ... I don't want to think about it. So I won't.

Now, why haven't I called you? Why am I positing it here instead? Well, let's try this. You pick up the phone and call someone you love. Go ahead. I'll wait.

Okay, so chances are they've answered "hello" and you'll say "hi/hey/hello, loved one" and they say "how are you?" and then you'll sit there ... and sit there ... and you're trying to figure out how to tell them, but by the time 3 minutes have gone by of this they'll have figured out something's wrong anyway and will ask you "Uh-oh, what's wrong?" and then you'll either blurt it out "thecancerisspreading" or you'll start with a lie "Nothing. I ... it's just ... well ... we went to the doctor today and..." And the whole time you'll feel like you're bringing them down and asking for something --- asking for sympathy, asking for help, asking them to drop everything and fly up and hug you --- and I can't go through that person-to-person. It requires crying about 15 times and it's too much. I don't have enough anti-anxiety medication to cover it.

That said, I was given the task to keep everyone informed and this is painless for you and for me. It is. If you call me you'll see that I'm right. This is still me telling you, just without the irritating crying bits. If you want to call me, well, tonight I'm going out for cocktails (a lot of them) and Friday I'm getting shot up with Zometa, which means Saturday and Sunday I'll be throwing up in the toilet all day. That leaves you Thursday. Or you can drop me a line here or by email. I'm a lot less pathetic in print.

No. Really.