Well, we were all excited about the new drug. This was the first PARP inhibitor that she qualified for, but unfortunately we’ve already thrown it out (Not literally…each month’s supply costs $14K!). Over the past week, the spots on Lori’s head have increased in number. She found three new spots this week alone, and there have been a few spikes in pain as well. She saw Dr. S today, and he confirmed that it looks like Olaparib won’t work for her. So, he changed her back to a chemo: Xeloda. This one is pill form, so it’s nice she won’t have to sit in an infusion chair every week. The side effects are fairly tame as well. She should be able to keep her unbelievable streak alive of not losing her hair! Seriously, she might break some kind of record. I shaved my head in “solidarity” like a year and a half ago. She never lost her hair!
Category: Update (page 3 of 9)
As Andy Dufresne got his library so WE GOT OUR MEDICINE!
This is Lori writing this update! I got a call last night (Thursday) from the pharmacy providing the Olaparib, and she said insurance approved the drug! It is being shipped directly to our house and will arrive Monday!
The past few months have been awesome. We took a vacation to San Blas, FL and before that, Lori spent a week in D.C. touring with her dad. We just returned from IL where we spent a great Thanksgiving with Lori’s family in Springfield. That’s the man version of what you’ve missed for 3 months. Deal with it ladies.
Last month, Lori noticed a small bump forming on her skull about the size of a pimple. It didn’t hurt but it was strange and of course we thought it might be cancer-related. Recently, we noticed that it had grown in size. Also, she noticed two new nodules forming, one on each breast. Finally, her pain, particularly in her lower back, was increasing and waking her at times in the night. To us, those are all signs of disease progression, so I made an appointment to see Dr. Marinella in Dayton. We got in to see him that afternoon (last Tuesday).
I haven’t needed to update these care pages in nearly two months, and we’re happy about that! “No news is good news” still holds true. Yesterday, Lori had a brain MRI and body CT scans accomplished. The MRI results haven’t been read yet, but the CT scans came back showing improvement everywhere. Her liver is clearing up, and her chest is totally clear. The bones haven’t shown any progression of disease either. We expect to hear that her brain is clear as well! From the outside, her breast tumor is very small now. I don’t typically prefer small breasts but I have to admit I’m loving her new size. Wink.
I forgot to post about the PET scan results from last week. We met with Dr. M, and there weren’t any surprises either positively or negatively. The problem is that we don’t have any previous PETs to compare this one to, so this is a new baseline.
We finally got all of the details together for Lori’s party.
It’s an open invitation to any/all who can attend on July 11th at
my parent’s house in Lafayette, IN. Lori’s cousin put together a
nice invitation. It has also been posted on Lori’s Facebook
page.
It’s a whole weekend of events, but the main attraction is her
actual party on Saturday night, 11 July. The party begins at 5 PM
with games/drinks/appetizers/,…
A couple of months ago, one of our awesome neighbors nominated Lori for a trip sponsored through the Karen Wellington Foundation (KWF) for LIVING with breast cancer. Their motto is #FunNow and they gather funds/resources and organize all-expenses-paid vacations for women living with breast cancer and their families. Karen Wellington, the namesake, was diagnosed with breast cancer when she was 30 and she passed away at age 40 in 2007. Apparently, she was even spunkier than Lori in life, and she had a dream of setting up a foundation like this.
Last week, we had an appointment with Lori’s new oncologist at our local hospital, Dr. Marinella. He seemed very knowledgeable, and he knew Lori’s history well. His recommendation was to stay on the Cisplatin, but he also wanted her to visit a local radiation doc to look at her brain metastases again. That was great news to us because we had all but given up hope on her being well enough again to even consider getting that treatment. She has really been looking well lately, and Dr. M was actually surprised by her condition when he met her. He told us that he didn’t know what he would see at this initial appointment, but he expected much worse after reviewing her discharge papers from IU (she was in such bad shape). Oh, and he specifically remarked about how amazed he was that he had a patient who had been seen by so many popular oncologists.
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This past week, Lori has been doing well. Her pain is still a zero so I think we have that whooped for now. She is tired however, and this means she naps, and she can’t lift much weight. People scold her all the time about how she does too much, but she’s kind of annoyed by that and doesn’t listen anyhow. I almost never tell her to slow down anymore because I just prefer to let her live however she wants to live. Her mind is strong and has adjusted to the Oxy so she thinks clearly unless she’s very tired. These are good days for her though, and we never take these good days for granted!
Posted May 25, 2015 10:00pm
On Saturday morning, we met earl with the team of doctors taking over Lori’s care for the weekend. We expected them to want to drain the fluid from her right lung just as they had for the left the day prior. Surprisingly, they presented her with various choices all of which sounded pretty good. They talked with us both to find out our goals and motivations, and after our chat, they recommended that we either remove the fluid and stay an extra day in the hospital or leave the fluid and discharge within hours. Their opinion was that the fluid around the right lung wasn’t hurting her ability to breathe. The left lung was fully expanding by then, and her ability to breathe seemed normal. The amount of fluid around the right lung was much less than the left according to the scans and the risks of the procedure (potential lung collapse, bleeding, infection, etc) didn’t seem to outweigh the small advantage to-be gained.
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