Remembering Dave

Beth, after we talked last night I tried to figure out what to post on here. I could not think of anything though. Percocet fog. This morning I woke up with "Oh, Black Betty, Bam-a-lam" going through my head. You know when you get a song stuck in your head and can't stop singing it? Usually these dazys it is songs from the Wiggles or Shrek or other 3 year old show tunes so I have no explanation for Black Betty. Look, I know it is easy for me to say but hang in there and try and keep the worry factor to a minimum until you see the Onc. You know it may be time to go up to Johns Hopkins or somewhere for a 2nd opinion. I know you are on your 2nd Onc here in Richmond but going up to Johns Hopkins may be something you should think about. Let me know what the Onc. says. David C

Little house on the prairie! Nice house, I like the style. I bet the mud will turn to beautiful green grass this spring KAREN

treebywater and calintay, I love both those ideas! I am so glad I posted. I feel like I vent every little problem we have here, but there are some really creative and experienced folks here! one thing we did tell her is if she'd good all week she can go to IHOP with Daddy and reminders of this seems to have some impact. she loves going to IHOP for breakfast with daddy but she hates pancakes! Dave orders extra eggs for her instead of pancakes and she eats every bite! anyway, she had a GREAT day yesterday. I do think talking to the counselor helped so much. she talked about it yesterday evening, kept asking when she could go back and play with our new friend. but the teacher said she was flawless yesterday, all cooperation, no backtalking, no terrorizing the other kids. funny, the other kids do love her despite it all. three year olds are so forgiving. Itook a bunch of stuff to school yesterday for Chinese New Year, including some children's books about it I found on Amazon, and they celebrated it all day and learned about it, the teacher had them make paper lanterns, and I think that was good, too, Faith knew it was sort of for her although she doesn't really understand why. so hopefully we're on the right track. I will suggest to the teacher about the warning thing. I wonder if she does that anyway. she's around 50, I guess, and has been doing this for a long time. she's pretty good. thanks so much everyone, Karen

Hey - Andrea - I have heard that, too, about using gamma knife on LUNG tumors. Beth - ASK, OK? and call us tonight. Karen

I have GOT to get back to work, but if you haven't seen this yet, take a look. My brain damaged hubbie . . . Karen

What a colorful life he lived! And yes, from your Mom's avatar, I always thought he looked like a pretty handsome dude! Karen

TAnn - that is just terrible. I don't think this Director is that bad - it's a church daycare and I know they have a limited budget and are not for profit - but she just thinks that at "this age" they should be able to behave themselves without alot of adult supervision and I don't agree. But we'll see. Kimblanchard - I meant to say I liked your idea of calling Faith every day and I think I will set that up with the teacher. I know there is a certain part of the day that she keeps the cordless phone in her classroom. I think Faith just needs the attention. we'll see. and yes, don't you love Dave's new picture? I didn't know a thing about it until I logged on here today. what a hoot. he's either got some really serious brain damage, or he just needs a big humorous vent. maybe a little of both . . .! KC

Well, met with the Director and Teacher when I picked Faith up yesterday. She's attacking different kids, and it's always right after a transition - they go from lunchtime to reading and she won't sit down, etc. so the teacher corrects her and tells her to sit down, etc., and then a few minutes later Faith is attacking some kid (retaliation to the teacher). Anyway, met with the counselor this morning - most of the time was spent with her in her office playing with Faith. Dave and I waited out in the hall but Faith kept coming out to show me toys so I went out to the car. She took right to the counselor and opened up to her as much as her limited verbal skills would allow. The counselor gave me a few ideas for helping Faith behave, like an incentive chart at school and I called and talked to the teacher about it while Dave drove Faith back to school and she is definitely on the same page with me. Faith was very very happy to talk to the counselor and even told me she wanted to stay there and play with her. too cute. but she also promised after they talked that she would be a good girl at school. I think Faith was almost relieved to have someone to talk to about it! Maybe it was the non-parental attention she's been wanting to get. I do think that one teacher to ten three/four year olds isn't enough. But I think she needs to stay there, she's been at that daycare since she came home from China and I think she needs the consistency, especially right now. The teacher really wants her to stay. When she was littler, around two, Faith went through a terrible biting stage and at that time, with that age group, they always had a helper in the room so they would get that girl to shadow Faith. It worked pretty well I think. But for some reason they are just not willing to do that right now. Frankly, I don't think they have the extra staff. So, we'll see how it goes. My poor little confused girl! Karen

I don't know what to do. I just got my weekly call from the daycare director, telling me Faith has pulled hair twice today. She said she saved one of the hair pullings in a baggie (she did that last week). I told the Director she did not need to save hair in a baggie for my benefit, I am a grown up and fully understand how bad it is, and franky I didn't need any more drama in my life right now CUT THE DRAMA, I said! We had a FLAWLESS, PLEASANT morning and evening last night. I just don't know what is going on with Faith. There are ten children in her class and one teacher. I'm thinking she needs more attention. maybe I can find a daycare with smaller classes. aaarrrggghhh. Karen

Dave used to be that funny. or at least he used to laugh at all my corny jokes. Now, by the time I get home in the evenings, he's too tired to be funny OR laugh. so I got a real kick out of that! KC

Dave edited my post from yesterday here in General. Check it out. Now I am pretty sure he IS brain damaged, ha. KC

frankly, I've never know how you do it at all, and I think it takes a long time, months and months, to recover from treatment. hang in there! p.s. when Dave was first diagnosed in March 2003 he still worked. his boss gave him a reduced-stress workload, then he started working part time, then he eventually, about half way through treatment, went on disability. this time around, he went on full time disability as soon as he was diagnosed. but he had never fully recovered from the first bout of treatment and then he had his bonkitis biopsy to recover from as well. this is something I've always wondered about, no reason, just wonder, so would like to see others responses. Karen

Maryanne - ha, no way! She's adopted! From China! To see a wonderful photo of our little angel, check out BeckyCW's avatar. Becky's my sister in law, and she has a great photo of Faith up right now. Karen

Peggy has helped me more than I can ever thank her properly for. Thank you Peggy, for being so positive and giving us all such HOPE! My role model! Karen

by the way, Faith seems to be doing alot better and she hasn't even met with the child shrink yet, but we started an incentive chart for the morning and that really works, she takes great pride in putting those smiley face stickers next to the photo of the potty, panties, etc. she even carries the chart around with her in the morning like an instruction sheet. so now I am promising her smiley face stickers if she behaves at school. and if she fills up her chart every week with smiley faces she gets to eat out at IHOP with Daddy, which seems to currently be her favorite thing in the whole world. anyway, Dave isn't screaming anymore, he's really working on that, and the smiley face stickers are helping me be a stricter manager of Faith, so hopefully things will get and stay better with our little angel now. If only Dave were feeling better, I woke up this morning deciding to make the most of the six weeks, try to have some fun - but unfortunately Dave said his head hurts so much all the time he's just not up for much. bummer. Karen

that really does stink, Rick - aren't you diabetic? you take good care of yourself, OK? God Bless, Karen

It's definitely two peas. on the first scan they looked stuck together but on this one they're more separate looking. butno additional growths, just the original two looking a tiny bit bigger. I think I am one step short of crazy. Dave isn't because the peas are affecting the emotional part of his brain. I'm jealous, LOL. Have to see what Dave thinks about a second opinion, but I have no quarrel with the game plan, even though it is driving me nuts, I think it's pretty rational. KC p.s. gotta tell this. there's an RV show this weekend in Richmond and Dave and I really want a new travel trailer. so the assistant came in and put the scans up on the screen and left the room and I said, they look bigger, they are bigger, you're going to have to have surgery, and Dave said, how soon do you think they'd do it and when is that RV show? haha, he wanted to make sure he didn't have surgery until we got to go to the RV show, LOL!

therapy? seriously. I couldn't do this right now without my clinical psychologist. it might help. are you taking antidepressants? I really don't think they're much good without some good talk therapy to back 'em up, but they might help too. and of course eating right and exercise is great for a funk. my shrink really pushes that. KC

Domestication of P. lunatus ( Lima Beans ) appears to have taken place twice. The earliest evidence for this domestication comes from a Peruvian archaeological site (Guitarrero Cave) where Lima Bean seeds were found from levels dating to 6500 BC, 1000 years earlier than P. vulgaris beans found at the same site and earlier than maize domestication. Sieva Bean, Butter Bean and Baby Lima Bean varieties originate from the second domestication which occurred in the brain of David C. probably in Guatemala although the earliest Neurological evidence is from Mexico For both domestications, the earliest archaeological evidence comes from sites that are beyond the present day range of wild P. lunatus suggesting that domestication did not begin in the brain where these beans are now situated. Wild P. lunatus seeds have high levels of glucosides which break down to toxic hydrocyanic acid when the seeds are bruised or chewed. However, modern domesticated varieties, particularly those with white seeds, have minimal quantities and are not dangerous unless located in the brain. Cooking in boiling water also destroys the cyanogens, unfortunately a boiled brain is not an option for David C as his brain has been fried too many times in the past. Now for straight talk from Karen: I thought Dave might go home from the brain surgeon's office at the Big Impressive Cancer Center and post an update, but he probably went to sleep instead. So here I go. He can come in and update/correct me if necessary. Dave's peas have grown to lima beans it seems. A little bit of growth on the peas, and alot of growth with the inflammation/swelling stuff. However, the brain surgeon says he's still not convinced it's tumor. He said it could be radiation damage continuing to grow. So, we wait six more weeks, do another brain MRI and then he'll decide (I hope ). He said if it is radiation damage, and it doesn't stop growing (which happens sometimes) the only way to get it out of there and stop growing is to cut it out. So if he has a growth of 20% or more in 6 weeks, we're looking at surgery. If he's got 50% more growth then we're looking at some real problems - obviously, he doesn't anticipate it growing that much in six more weeks, but the point is, we will have to do SOMETHING to stop it before it grows that much. I know all this sounds pathetically iffy and not sure, but this guy knows what he's doing and of course expressed alot more opinion and expertise than what I'm repeating here. I'm pretty good at getting the gist of things but not collecting every bit of technical stuff in my noggin'. Dave said, hey, why not just cut it out now and be done with it, but the good doc said he doesn't want to put Dave through that yet, why subject yourself to major surgery with a slight risk of death if the problem can correct itself with a little time? Makes sense to me, although I started crying. I told him I guess I'm emotional because there are other things going on right now, my mom is fighting Stage IV colon cancer with new liver mets, etc., and I guess I was hoping for some definitive answers here to get this behind us. He was SURPRISINGLY empathetic and said it was only natural for me to feel this way, I have alot on my plate, and then explained how this damage in this part of Dave's brain is probably making him not feel very emotional, that is how it is affecting him, so most of the worry would be on me since he's not capable of it right now, from a physical standpoint. of course I laughed and said, ha, that's the way it is normally! haha. So, that's the update. we wait. Karen C.

My first thought is ditto what Betty said. Then you posted more. Chemo can get the liver mets. ESPECIALLY WITH SCLC, which responds really well to chemo! there are living examples of that on this board! Maybe if you print all of these responses off and have your mother read them it will help? keep us posted! Karen C

OK, it didn't come out right, I admit - it was supposed to be a compliment! I would think Sharon would be the one trying to have a baby, not a grown daughter of hers!! I hope I did better! Andrea - FORGET ABOUT THOSE WACKOS THAT SAY IT IS CHILD ABUSE TO HAVE A CHILD IF YOU ARE OVERWEIGHT. Trust me, I've heard that, too. IT'S CHILD ABUSE TO HAVE A BABY IF YOU DON'T WANT THE BABY OR YOU DON'T PLAN TO LOVE AND TAKE CARE OF THE BABY. You will be a wonderful mother. That stuff just makes me mad! Now, I'll admit I sometimes have trouble keeping up with a three year old, but I'm not sure if it's from being overweight, being old (46) or being stressed. Maybe a combo of all three! But you are young and and want a child and you and Brian will be great parents! Now I'll PM you. KC

Well, I'm a little jealous you sold your house in only nine days, but I am sad that it was something you needed to do. It took probably six months for Dave and to make the decision to sell our house that we built together. Still not sold! Just want to get it over with! And I am sad for the Eagles losing, I was sorta rooting for them! KC

All I have to say here right now is Sharon - you are old enough to have a daughter old enough to need IF treatments! Wow, you look great to be old enough for all that! Andrea - loads of experience here - I'll PM you with my email address. Karen

First of all - Andrea - yes, I love the new photo! Ry - you know, we discussed getting her the line thing - it's actually an infusion pump that's installed into the artery that leads to the liver. That was discussed with the liver surgeon when he was getting ready to take out the first liver met (which we thought/hoped was the only one). My mom resisted it and our onco doc didn't think it was necessary. I brought that back up today. He said that since last summer, that infusion pump to the liver has been pretty much totally discounted. The only two places that are still doing it is Mom's surgeon here in Richmond and Sloan-Kettering. Well, he said he was exaggerating a little, maybe other places are still doing it - but it's been totally disapproved to be any more helpful than regular chemo - which folks get in addition to the pump. The real problem with my mom is that she can't tolerate much chemo at all. she can't have more than the lowest dose possible. she can't tolerate much drugs at all. in fact, she had psychotic episodes in the hospital just taking a regular dose of demerol. quite different from Dave. He says sock it to me and doesn't complain about the side effects. Every little side effect really EFFECTS my mom. So I'm pretty worried about her. I just hope that her low dose of chemo gets the liver tumors. KC

OK, my Mom has Stage IV colon cancer - spread to her liver once, tumors in colon and liver removed last summer, she started chemo then had to stop to get a huge hernia repaired on her colon surgery incision. so she had to stop chemo for three months. so, she started back up and has had two chemo treatments. she had a chest/ab ct scan on Monday and today we saw the onco doc (Dave's onco doc as well) and she now has more mets in her liver. we kinda expected that, but it's disappointing. my mom can barely tolerate the lowest dose of chemo, she can't tolerate hardly any drugs . . . now this. She's 72 and doesn't have the fight in her that Dave has. Guess I'm just whining a little. Sometimes I feel like I'm living in a bad dream. Just hope like heck Dave's brain MRI on Monday shows him to be empty headed . . . KC