Hi everyone, my name is Kurt, and I am from BC, Canada, and I am 20 years old. My dad has recently been diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. It is also in his lymph nodes, and his spine. I don't know where to being really, but I'm just going to type.
Basically, back in late January, early February, my dad became ill. He was coughing a lot, and had all the pneumonia signs. He went to the doctor where he was sent home with a sinus infection. His cough became so bad he was puking phlegm out of his lungs. He went back to doctor, they said it was the sinus draining, then he went back again, said he had bronchial pneumonia, then back again, he had full on pneumonia. He was not getting better, and was getting frustrated. He was ordered to stay in bed for one week. He did that, and ended up not being able to breathe, and had chest pains. He had a major heart attack in 2000, and knew how it felt, so he went to the hospital. That was in mid march. After checking him out they discovered he had fluid around his heart, so they rushed him to Critical care. They did all their testing after draining nearly 3 litres of blood from the pericardial sac, and tested it. It came back with non-small cell carcinoma. That was on April 9th. (please forgive me for any wrong medical terms, completely new to this). They did all they could at that hospital, and sent him home still ill. At that point he had been in bed for 13 days, plus the week at home and was quite weak. He was on oxygen, and we had a unit set up at home. My dad was walking a little bit, but was mostly sitting all day.
After that my dad was home for about three days, then he felt he couldn't breathe again, and went to the hospital. They treated him for pneumonia, but with little luck. He was there for about four days when he checked himself out because the staff was terrible, the patients in his room were making him depressed, and he no longer wanted to live. He came home after that and was pretty much sitting around still, very weak, very ill. Non stop coughing, spitting up so much phlegm it was unbelievable. Puking, the whole nine yards, terrible to watch. Soon after that my dad was sent to our local cancer clinic, where we found out he had Unknown Primary cancer. The doctor said in my dads condition he would normally not treat, which would give him months, but because of his age (53) and me being young and all, the doctor said he would try everything. He said if treatment worked, he could have a year or more.
A week after that he had his first round of chemo, and because of having no location of the cancer, other than the blood around the heart, they treated him with 5 hours of paclitaxel, and 30 minutes Carboplatin. Within 20 minutes of the paclitaxel, his cough and puking stopped, and to this day about 2-3 months later, he still has MINIMAL coughing.
He came home after that and did quite well. Was feeling better, no cough, no phlegm, good appetite, just some bad joint and muscle pain. 3 days into the chemo he called me down from his room at about 9pm, this was 3-4 weeks ago now, and told me he could not breathe. His oxygen was maxed at 5Litres. I called an ambulance and he ended up being rushed to hospital in an advanced life support ambulance. I stayed at the hospital that night and he was put on a bypass breathing machine, because his o2 level was less than 80% on 100% oxygen with mask. We stayed the night in ER trauma, and eventually he was moved to the High Aucity Unit. He spent a few days in there, and then on the surgical ward where he was just being treated for breathing, pain, and general stuff. He was made stable, oxygen levels were brought right up and he was doing fine.
He was put into the oncology ward, and was looking alright, except the cough came back a little bit, but a lot of phlegm. The oncologist came in on a friday, the friday before fathers day, and told us that my dad was beating the cancer, and everything was going good, and he should have a lot more time. Sunday came, we had a great fathers day at hospital, fish and chips, and lots of gifts. Monday came around and they did a scan, and discovered the cancer had rapidly spread, so fast in one month is was the equivalence to a normal persons spread in 3 months, and that it was in his lungs, airways, lymph nodes, and spine. That was a sad day, but my dad being the most positive person in the world said that's fine, we know where it is now, and we're going to keep fighting. Tuesday morning I went to work and got the phone call from the hospital that my dad was not good, and family had to come immediately because he might not make it. When they checked his vitals in the morning they found his heart rate was at 194. They tried a medicine to lower it, but that only got it to 184. by the time i got there he was being rushed to ICU, where i watched them shock his heart twice to restart it (which was a terrible experience will explain at bottom)*, that did not work, and the cardiologist said there was nothing else that could be done. The oncologist came in and said the cancer was now attacking the heart, and with his heart rate that high they could not treat, told the family to come in to say goodbye, and set him up to go into palliative care. He was put in Cardiac care unit, and given heart slowing drip. After about 7 hours his heart rate was shooting all over the place, and after an hour of that dropped to a steady 87, and has been there ever since.
He stayed in CCU for about a week, until a bed was available back in oncology. He was given a lung cancer specialist, since they were able to diagnose him with proper cancer. He looked at charts, and scans, and said they were not taken at proper times, and far enough apart, and said he wanted to try another round of chemo, except switch paclitaxel dosage with the carboplatin. My dad was slowly improving, except when they shocked his heart they pulled a muscle in his neck, and a nurse ended up jarring it, being completely unprofessional. That mixed with the spine cancer put him in so much pain he was crying, so they upped his pain killers so high that he was super super loopy.
Soon he was moved to oncology, and started a second round of chemo very soon. That was Wednesday June 27. Everything went good, and the next day he was up, his breathing was so good, he had so much energy... He couldn't sit up, or go from bed to wheelchair without having to stop for 20 mins to catch breath, now he was walking, doing everything without losing breath. He ended up pretty grumpy after a few days. about 5 days ago his white cells dropped, and he was put in isolation and was doing fine. a few days ago he became very tired, and had pretty much slept for 3 days straight now, and his breathing is very raspy. I have not been able to see him for three days, due to me being sick, and him having no immune system. This is where I am now. It is a very hard, sad, confusing time. I know u all know the feeling, but i am so new to this is hurts all the time. I just worry...
On top of this, my grandmother (my dads mom) passed away last weeking, and i am dealing with mental/drug issues with my brother. This feels like too much for me sometimes, i don't know.
Thank you so much for reading, feel free to reply with any advice or anything. This is all for now, my wrist's, and brain hurts, im sure i left a lot out, ask ANYTHING, im not sensitive.
**When my dad had his heart shocked in ICU they had a student nurse class of about 15 people there at the time. They filled the whole room with giggling nurses while i cried. They were giggling, joking, saying this is so cool. One student said "I want to do it, I've never seen this before!" and they let her do it. It was such a hard hard day. Ugh...