About the Cancer & the Treatment

About the Cancer - Multiple Myeloma

Myeloma is a type of cancer that begins in the bone marrow. It is a cancer of plasma cells. Plasma cells normally make antibodies that help fight infection. Myeloma starts with a change to a single B cell. With myeloma, the change in the B cell causes it to become a myeloma cell instead of a normal plasma cell. As the myeloma cells grow in the marrow, they crowd out the normal plasma cells. They also crowd out normal white cells and red cells. Myeloma that is found in the marrow of many bones in the body is often called multiple myeloma. Most patients with myeloma have this form of the disease.*

The Treatment Plan:

Step One: 

Drug Therapy, including Chemotherapy

Four rounds (about a month each) taken orally and with infusion. I started my first treatment on 8-12-13. 

Step Two: 

Stem Cell Transplantation (using my own stem cells) with High Dose Chemotherapy and Radiation in Omaha (possibly December of 2013)

This is a condensed and general overview for a very complicated treatment. Suffice it to say, that this type of cancer is very serious, complicated, unpredictable and not curable at this point. The goals for me will be to try to keep the cancer at bay as much as possible, and therefore increase longevity and quality of life. 

  

*For more information, please visit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society website

http://www.lls.org/

Grace is Waiting

Round 1 – Day 9

I’m officially on the journey “leaving normal.” I think being nine days into my chemo and facing my first infusion counts as that. It’s been a fairly smooth start, but I can’t help looking in the rearview mirror at what I’m leaving behind: things like privacy, a certain amount of freedom, consistently feeling good, normal energy and yes, eventually, my hair!

But there’s more than just what I’m leaving, it’s also about what’s left. Ordinary everyday things are now altered. I will never do laundry the same because now I’m grateful, just to be able to do it. Dishes are now a task to look forward to, and exercise is a huge accomplishment. Going to work is a privilege and a blessing, more than it ever was. A cup of coffee tastes richer and laughter is more genuine. Friends are now dearer and hugs are sweeter. In fact, many ordinary, average everyday things, some of which used to go unnoticed, are now precious to me.

Nothing is the same once cancer touches your life. It takes away your normal, but it’s not all bad - at least not in my case.

I guess some of us have to leave normal, in order see “grace” more clearly and to embrace it more fully. I will be looking for it and letting you know when I find it on this journey.

Somewhere outside of normal, grace is waiting to be discovered, embraced, breathed in . . .

I don’t want to miss the grace.