Due to the Thanksgiving holiday this round has the longest duration (and recovery period) at a total of 17 days. The flip side is Round 4 will last 11 days - just enough time to get back to normal before starting over. Round 3 was punctuated by a business trip to LA that took some getting used to. I had a slight scare for the first time during chemo treatment when my temperature strayed more than a degree outside the high side of my normal range (97.6 ± 0.2) in the middle of my trip. Fortunately I was paying attention and managed to slow down just in time. Since then it has been smoother sailing. My daily scores are below.
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| Round 3 Scores |
This Thanksgiving I have found so much to be thankful for, and have taken pause more than any other time in my life to reflect on how fortunate we are. For my loving and endlessly supportive Jen, Chris, David and Alison I am truly thankful. For the unconditional love and constant support from my mom, dad, brother, sister and our extended family I am truly thankful. For our wonderful friends, who are as close to family as a person could imagine, I am truly thankful. For the exceptional care providers who help my family get through each day and week, I am truly thankful. I could go on...
Earlier this morning Jen and I were watching CBS Sunday Morning, one of our favorite weekend "news" programs. The last story on the show this morning was an Opinion piece from Joel Sartore, a National Geographic photographer. Less than a minute into the piece Joel showed a photo from his family gathered around the dinner table. On the left side of the photo was a young man with the same hairstyle that I am currently sporting. I immediately said to Jen "he's fighting cancer." As Joel continued his commentary we learned that his 18-year-old son Cole was diagnosed with Stage 3 Hodgkin's Lymphoma in August of this year. More than any time in my life I truly understood Joel's (and Cole's) perspective. And we soon heard, Cole's fight is in addition to his mom Kathy's ongoing fight because she had a recurrence of breast cancer early this year. As Joel stated at the link below... "Though it may be hard to believe, the Sartore’s are actually thankful."
He continued to talk about how many cancer survivors there are around us. And how fortunate we are at this time in history that medicine has advanced to the point where we can talk in terms of cures. And at the end of the segment I also immediately recognized that 200 ml bottle of red Doxorubicin, aka Adriamycin or the "A" in ABVD chemo regimen, the first chemo drug I get each week that looks like hummingbird food.
The video of Joel's commentary is not yet up on Joel's website or the CBS website but you can read the transcript here:
Last but not least, a shameless plug for a book I read last week. Kellie Larsen Murphy, the undisputed queen of white chocolate chip cookies (that she overnights to me during chemo treatments!), is also an up-and-coming author. Kellie is a dear friend since college and just published her first book. A Guilty Mind is a murder mystery with a touch of psychological thriller. It kept me guessing until the last few chapters and was thoroughly enjoyable. It's available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble and via the popular e-book outlets. Happy reading.
Chemo treatment #4 is tomorrow at 10:30am. Mom and dad are going to accompany me again and I look forward to putting one more treatment in the rear view mirror.
Much love to you all.
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