Hello!
I have been lurking the past few days and am amazed by the help and support provided here!
As you can hopefully see from my signature, my father has been battling NSCLC for a year. After chemo/lobectomy/adrenal removal, we were hoping to be in the clear. From the neck down, so far so good. They have found no evidence of cancer there.
However in August, the doctors found two small tumors near his cerebellum that resembled the adrenal mass. After much discussion, a treatment of 12 sessions of WBRT followed by Gammaknife surgery was decided on by his team.
For these procedures, he was put on the steroid Decadron. After the Gammaknife, the doctor told him to begin weaning. The way I understand it they increase the time between pills by an hour a day. Currently he is taking 2mg a day down from a peak of 16 during WBR.
Even after the surgeries, Daddy was in great shape. He was actually boxing the day they found the tumors (he got really dizzy and lost his balance). After the WBR, he was tired but holding up ok. No nausea, swelling, headaches or seizures. He had good balance, but still used a walker for longer walks.
His Gamma knife op was 10/1 and when we saw them this weekend, he was super super super weak. He stopped going to the gym daily last week. He seems to have decent balance, but is so weak that standing and walking is a challenge. He has an appetite but is still losing weight (this may be from his diabetes though---decadron is awful on the blood sugars). He also is so exhausted. He is still having trouble sleeping at night, but will fall asleep sitting up. At points he seems deliriously tired.
We are told the procedures were a success and he has a good prognosis, but I have never seen anyone so weak. His friend is a neurologist and told him the weaning schedule his doc prescribed looks good and that this is to be expected before he starts to improve once the decadron is out of his system.
Does anyone have any experience with these treatments? I am just so worried about him.
Thanks so much!
Lorin
