Mendy

My husband also had a reaction to taxol during the first few minutes of his first infusion. They waited a couple of hours and challanged him and he did fine. The second round he was only given oral benedryl and had no problems. He is going for his third round today and is going by himself. We are confident there will be no problems and if we are wrong, I will just have to leave work to pick him up. I wish your mom well. According to our oncologist the likelihood of a second reaction is slim. Mendy

Cindi, What a month you have had! Thank goodness you are not going this alone. I am glad you are home and hopefully improving everyday. Pourous bones are no joke. Be careful walking...even a stumble could lead to a broken bone (happened to my mom a couple of months ago). Now, I would like to buy a drink for Nushka. White Russians are good, but I bet she has never had a nuts and berry. So I'll have one for Nushka and myself please. Take care, Mendy

Maryanne, I am so sorry that Joel is having a rough go of the chemo. What a hard weekend you must have had. I know I would rather be the one suffering than watching my dh not feeling well. Hopefully the next go around won't be so rough. Mendy

Candy, I am so glad that the chemo is working for your mom. Wonderful news. I hope hope her anemia gets under control quickly. Mendy

Thanks!

A LITTLE Game Mendy

Maybe she convinced someone to donate a significant amount of money towards finding a cure for lung cancer. Mendy

Flowergirlie, I am so sorry for what you and your family are dealing with. It is hard enough knowing you are dealing with a terminal illness and want to make the most of your time together. But dealing with the anger and feeling that fighting isn't worth it is worse. My husband prognosis is better than your husband's, yet during the first 8 days of each chemo treatment I get the anger and bitterness directed at me. He feels that I get to escape and live my normal life when I go to work. I too have two young kids who don't really know what is going on except that sometimes dad doesn't feel well and is fighting a bad bug. It is hard. I finally talked my husband into getting his oncologist to give him a happy pill. Amazingly, he taken it on occasion and it sure does help. Having visits from family members gives him something to look forward to. On the really bad days (which are becoming fewer), I just send my husband up to our room to rest and watch tv. I make sure to remind him all the time that he needs to stay strong and how important treatment is to be there for his kids. When he was questioning whether chemo was worth it, I asked him if he wanted another man raising his kids. That motivated him. I hope you are able to stay strong and not get too upset when your husband makes hurtful comments. Remember what he was like before the cancer diagnosis to get through it. I wish you and your husband lots of strength. Mendy

How wonderful! Your family must be overjoyed. Such a beautiful name. Will you be meeting your great-granddaughter soon? Mendy

Hi Betty, I have seen others here who were dx 3b and went through chemo and I think radiation. Their tumors shrunk enough and then they had surgery. Look at Ursol. She went through radiation and chemo recently then had surgery this month. Good luck! I hope you get good news soon. Mendy

Thanks for updating on how you are doing. I was concerned when I saw your post the other day. I hope you continue to get through every day ok. You will probably surprise yourself with the amount you can handle. Hang in there! Mendy

I think that only your surgeon can give you an accurate answer on how healthy you have to be. You should have a Pulmonary function test prior to surgery to determine if and how much lung you can stand to lose. You will have bloodwork taken to make sure your levels are good. Your temperature will be taken before they take you to the o.r. My husband had an xray taken in the o.r. as well as another bronchoscopy before the thoracotomy so any infection should show itself. If you are concerned the week before your surgery, call your surgeon for peace of mind. HTH Mendy

My husband's pulmonary function test was 98% prior to sugery, even with copd. He just went today for the same pft and he is so discouraged that his capacity is down to 71%. As you can imagine, he is short of breath frequently. He is supposed to begin pulmonary rehabilitation in 2 weeks. Are there any others here that had their pft drop significantly after surgery and how long did it take to regain your breathing capacity? Mendy

I am heartbroken for her children. She never even had a chance to fight.

I am sorry you are experiencing such uncertainty. Sounds like you surgeon will be using a minimally invasive approach. Surgeons in my experience are very precise and do not like to speculate. My husband was bronched 3 times during all the testing and surgery and only once did he have a sore throat. The epidural used after his thoracotomy to remove his left upper lobe took away most of his pain and the pain medication he had when he went home 3 days post surgery really helped him be able to sleep, take walks, and cough. His incision was under his left shoulder and is about 6 inches long. It healed very nicely in a few weeks. He actually had more pain from where the chest tubes were. I wish you lots of luck and if it does turn out to be cancer a speedy recovery and no lymph node involvement. Mendy

I understand your pain, anger, and frustration. While at the grocery store yesterday, there at the checkout was a prominent display to donate to breat cancer research (which my husband did). I asked the cashier if they were going to collect for lung cancer awareness and she proceeded to list a variety of illnesses that they support throughout the year-of course, lung cancer not being one of them. I will be writing Safeway to ask them to help raise money for lung cancer research as it still does not have early detection tests, is not curable, and has such a high mortality rate. I hate lung cancer as well. Mendy (who is taking her dh to his first chemo treatment this morning)

Jody, I am so sorry you have had to say goodbye to your dad for now. It is very hard to lose a loved one. I hope you and your mom are able to find peace. My sincere condolences. Mendy

What a nice story. I was surprised to see that it was my local newspaper so he probably lives in my town.

Happy Anniversary! I hope you have something nice planned. Enjoy your day. Mendy

Hi Barb, No history of heart problems. His surgeon called and thought part of his difficulty could be related to laying on his back this afternoon for an MRI of his brain (hoping he will be a member of the empty head club )and to try sitting upright which seems to be helping. A shower also helped. We are to watch for fever and if he is struggling to breath go directly to the ER. I feel so helpless watching him struggle. Sure would be nice to be able to turn the clock back a few months or maybe a few months forward with the idea he will completely recover from surgery, chemo, and radiation. Thanks for reading. Mendy (who would like to be able to make everything better for her dh)

I am not sure if this is the correct forum. My husband is 4 weeks post surgery (left upper lobe removed) and he started coughing a lot yesterday and it has continued today (first time since surgery). It is a productive cough. He is very short of breath today and concerned. Now he did see his oncologist and radiology oncologist today and they both thought his lungs sounded good and his treatment related CT looked fine. He has no fever but his pulse-ox was 94/95. We have a call in to his thoracic surgeon to see what his thoughts are and if he needs any meds to help. I do wonder if anxiety over the doctor visits and upcoming chemo/radiation are causing him to have s.o.b. Do any of you who have experience with this scenario have recommendations to help him breath easier? He is also going to start pulmonary rehab. therapy next week so hopefully that will help. TIA Mendy

I was in the hospital having just given birth to my first child the evening before. A cleaning staff lady came in my room and asked me why I didn't have the tv on and proceeded to turn it on for me. I saw the footage of the first plane and then saw the second plane hit. At that point I called my husband who said he was leaving work to be with us just in case the attacks were so bad that he needed to take us out of the hospital. It was such a surreal experience. I remember turning off the tv thinking I can't deal with this and just wanted to experience being a new mom. It was a difficult Sept. and we seriously debated moving to be further away for Wash. DC (we are about 40 miles away).

Tracy, I am sooo happy that you are getting good news. Keep it up! Have a great weekend. Mendy

Debi, Your reaction and concern was justified. I wish I had a bit of your aggressiveness, it seems to get results. My husband would have reacted exactly like you (I am hoping he will mellow just a bit now). Glad your son is ok and I hope the busdriver sticks to the schedule in the future. Here's to celebrating another grade with your son! Hooray! Mendy

I am so relieved right now that I have to share our experience and hope to provide inspiration for those who may be in a similar situation. My dh had his upper left lobe removed today and came through it beautifully thanks to a great thoracic surgeon and his overall good health. He had emphysema which made it a bit tougher to remove his lobe. The surgery took four painfully long hours to complete but shortly after he was set up in SICU I got to see him and he was in much better shape than I expected. He has an epidural that has completely numbed the whole area so he is hardly feeling any pain and he is getting doses of fentanol (sp?). Four hours post surgery and the nurse already removed the oxygen and his levels on his own are high and he is already pushing 2000 on the spirometer. I am so encouraged that he is going to pull through this and maybe be in better shape than he was going into it. The margins around the tumor where clear but he did find a couple of suspicious looking lymph nodes and removed them so we are awaiting biopsy results. It looks like we will be meeting with an oncologist which is great by me because I would be worrying that there could be cancer cells floating around in his body if he didn't receive chemo. So, bottom line is that we are looking good so far. Thanks for your support and words of wisdom. Mendy