shineladysue

Thank you to my lc family, Been gone all day to the hospital with Mike. I feel that all the prayers you have sent have been answered. I couldn't believe my eyes when I got to the hospital. Mike was greatly improved over yesterday and improved even more as the day went on. He's eating ( is acquiring a taste for pureed food , alert , excited over football and restless to go home. My guy is amazing and so are all of you. Looks like Mike will be coming home tomorrow. It will be a different Christmas, but it will be my best Christmas present of all to have him home. Thank you for keeping the prayers coming and God Bless all of you this holiday season.. Love you guys. Love, Sue

Pat, I've been at the hospital with Mike (see NSCLC forum) and have missed all this , but know that you and Brian remain in my prayers always. God be with you. Love, Sue

Hi everyone, I have a very short time, but I wanted to let you know that Mike is in the hospital and ask for your prayers. He had his trachea stent, esophagus stent, and feeding tube put in this week and within hours of the last procedure he became very ill with vomiting. Radidly becoming dehydrated, he was put in the hospital on Thursday. We will be there through Christmas and until they get him stable enough to be home. We don't know why this happened at present time. So far all tests show things to be ok. It could be the disease process itself. We don't know. I hope to find time to read the board. I feel so out of touch with everyone, but you are in my prayers always. Praying for miracles for all. Love, Sue

Prayers coming for Joannie.. Love, Sue

Prayers coming ... Love , Sue

Ohhhh Tina, I cried when I saw this. How sweet and thoughtful of you. We did in fact go for the first of two procedures for Mike this week. The tumor in his chest, on the bronchial stump and lymph nodes has grown and caused pressure on the trachea and esophagus. It's not an operable situation, radiation isn't the answer because it could potentially do more harm than good , chemo hasn't shrunk it so far so the only option was to go in and stent it. This afternoon , the pulmonologist did a bronchoscopy and found the trachea to be almost closed shut with the tumor pressing on the outside. This has been causing quite a bit of coughing and shortness of breath. He put in a stent to open it up. He showed us the pictures that he took. It was a dramatic improvement. Mike realized , right away how much better he could breathe. We didn't leave the hospital until a litte over 3 hours ago and he is still quite sleepy from the sedation, his throat is sore and the doc also prescribed him meds to calm his cough and make him rest. He wants him to stay quiet until the stent becomes totally anchored and expanded. He says they expand a little at a time. So he gave him cough med with hydrocodone to take . Okay the next chapter will be on Wednesday when he goes to another hospital and has a procedure with the gastroenterologist to put a stent in his esophagus so he can eat. Poor guy hasn't been able to eat a decent meal in weeks. Anyhow, this is where we are at and appreciate your thoughts and prayers. When I saw Tina has started this for us , I was really touched. Thank you Tina and my love and prayers to you and Charlie. I know you have had a loss in your family to deal with aside from being there for Charlie and trying to continue your holiday plans. You are truly special. Love and prayers to all. Love, Sue

(((Pat & Brian))), Love you and keep you in our prayers. Love, Sue

Kelly, I don't know if you saw it or not , but I inlcuded this link on your last post. http://www.skinsite.com/info_herpes_zoster.htm There is a lot of information on shingles here. There are drugs that can help, but they usually have to be given almost at the very onset of the shingles to stop them. Good Luck. Sue

Prayers for you and your Dad, Nancy. I hope his pain is soon managed. Love, Sue

Bill, I wish I had some words of wisdom or encouragement. I don't know anything about WBR etc., but one thing I do know... your wife is so blessed to have you. May God be with you both in the days ahead. Sue

That's funny Frank, but Charlie D's comment REALLY cracked me up... sue

Thank you for sharing this, Jamie. It is beautiful. Love, Sue

(((Cindy))), Sorry your family is having to go through this. Know that my thoughts and prayers are with you. Love, Sue

Jay, I would just like to welcome you to our group. I'm sorry I don't have any knowledge to add about your son's procedure. I hope in time someone will come along with some experience to share. Stick with us. This is a woderful group and we look forward to knowing you. Sue

Welcome Karen, Glad you found us. Sue

Welcome Brit, We are glad to have you here with us. I hope you will share more information with us and allow us to be of help. This is a wonderful group of caring people who are anxious to help in any way we can. Looking forward to knowing you better. Sue

She's beautiful!!! Love, Sue

Beth, Glad you checked in. You take the time you need. I can only imagine that the holidays ahead are adding to your feeling of loneliness. We look forward to your return. Know that you are in my thoughts and prayers. God be with you. Love, Sue

Ellen, Mike has been on 7 different chemo regimens and each affected him differently , but fatigue was a side effect of all. There are so many factors such as age and his overall health otherwise. What we found helpful was to keep a journal of symptoms each day so we could tell the doctor when and what happened, what medications Mike was on etc etc. Sometimes the fatigue can just be too much to bear, but most of the time the worst of it only lasts a few days. It's hard on patient and caregivers. It is during those times that I would lose it emotionally . It's so hard to see our loved ones in such a weakened condition. Know that we are here for you. Sending prayers for you and Henk. Love, Sue

I would strongly suspect shingles... Here is a site that shows them and gives information about them. http://www.skinsite.com/info_herpes_zoster.htm Mike had them also , as well as many others after chemotherapy due to the immune system being weakened. I would talk to the doctor about this as soon as you can. Sue

Cindi, What a wonderful friend you have in J.C. . Jackie has done for you what noone else could do. She brought you out and made you talk about things and start accepting the things you can't change. Cindi, you are human and you can't always be the lady that runs around cheering others up. It's damn hard to be here, but where else would we be. Can we really turn our backs on all our family here. Only we know what everyone is going through. Your post finds me sitting here with "wet pants legs", but I am thankful for the chance to send you prayers and know what I am praying for. Cindi, never forget the power of prayer. I refuse to have a doctor that doesn't believe in prayers and miracles. If there is any one thing I can find wrong with your doctor's reply is that he must be assuming the role of God to be able to answer you with a flat "no" as to whether you will be better or not. Never lose faith and accept the prayers of others. It's Christmas time and many of us believe that means it is a time of miracles. Praying for one for you. Love you... Now will you get your butt back behind that bar, but get you a cute bartender to help you out. Love and Prayers, Sue

(((Jim))), I'm so sorry to hear this news. I've really been keeping my eye on you and hoping that radiation had taken care of it, but it looks like the fight continues on. You have my prayers... Love, Sue

Thank you all so very much. I'm really tired, but wanted to drop in and give this brief intinerary for this next week... Monday -Mike will have a bronchoscopy (outpatient procedure at hospital)... with biopsies and possible stent to the trachea Wednesday-Mike will have a egd (another outpatient procedure and another hospital in a nearby city) .. the doc will go in and stent open his esophagus and put in a feeding tube port for backup in his stomach. Thursday-will be a doctor appointment to get biopsy results from the bronchoscopy on Monday. Almost sounds like a new version of the 12 days of Christmas. It's not how we would like to spend them , but we will make the best of each of those days. Thank you so much for your love and prayers. I just can't thank you enough. Love, Sue

Mike is having a lot of problems these days. It all started after the 1st dose of his CPT 11 and has gotten worse. Scans on Dec. 8th (as in test time) showed stable tumors and no other progression , but there were a couple of new things. One was that the tumor seemed to encase and compress the esophagus, there was a new area of ground glass opacity in the lung and an area of fibrosis. Mike is having a lot of problems swallowing his food , as well as, coughing. After several doctor visits, this is where he is headed next. Yesterday we were at the pulmonlologist and he set up the following .. Today Dec. 15th- we will be going in for a doctor appointment with the Gastroenterologist.. we hope he will be doing a procedure to dilate the esophagus.. will learn more from him. Dec. 19th- Mike goes in the afternoon for an outpatient bronchoscopy , by his pulmonologist) to see what is going on in his lung and to take some samples etc. Dec. 22nd.-We will learn those results of the bronchoscopy. It's 2:52am and I'm a bit tired , but we are both up because of Mike's coughing. We are praying for the findings to discover simple things with simple solutions. He is so very miserable right now. I just wanted to let you know what is going on and ask for your prayers. Thank you for being there for us. Love, Sue

Silent Night will totally bring me to tears as I remember bringing my youngest son home from the hospital on Christmas eve (born on Dec. 22nd)... my neighbors got together with their relatives and came caroling outside of our living room window and sang Silent Night to me as I stood there with our newborn son in my arms. I will never forget it... Sue