Update #73

If you missed the last 71 or so updates I'm not sure what's wrong with your computer, but I swear I've been writing them on like an hourly basis! Ok, I'm lying entirely. It is week #6 ish almost done me thinks (radiation appointment 24 or 25 or so for those keeping score at home). I'm not sure how I'm ranking in the various fantasy drafts and playoff pools you guys had going for me with this season's radiation treatments, but I think I was a good pick for doing pretty good! May you win the office pool of $13 and some coupons is what I'm saying.

HELLO! Blog starts now. Radiation for me ends Wednesday January 26th (next week) which is AWESOME! Not that I'm hugely against radiation or the radiologists at the HSC. They've all been great! I'm just not a fan of the driving down there and back each and every day mixed in with school and all life's other adventures. I get that a "radiation self home kit" is impractical and an overall "bad idea" and I shouldn't complain as I already got off pretty easy with having my chemotherapy pill based instead of IV based but I'm still looking forward to the end of it. I met with the surgeon who cut me open originally earlier this week for a check-up. He showed Nicole and I some brain images of before and after my surgery. It was quite impressive to see how big the tumor was prior to the operation! That thing was like... huge! I can't describe it in real terms (you have to see the picture to get a sense of it) but it shocked me. When I said I had headaches prior to being admitted to the hospital? I wasn't kidding.

So how has me been lately? FANTASTIC! This past week (to a week and a half) have been the best since my treatments started. ZERO illness, ZERO headaches, ZERO anything bad! Even my hair loss has seemed to have found the point it wants to stay at for now. It was pointed out to me that in any past January (2010, 2009, etc) I've felt worse than I do now. I usually have a terrible cold after Christmas (I think for the last 3 or 4 years at least). At best I have allergies that are driving me nuts. No cold, no allergies. I'm breathing fine, sleeping fine, and still have enough energy to get through each day.

How's the apartment lately? FANTASTIC! It's still in one piece. I got tenant insurance so if it breaks into two pieces I'm covered! I think it's time to vacuum again, which is totally just an excuse to pull out the Dyson again. Nicole and I have almost finished our interior decorating as we are 98% satisfied with the way things look now. We have a mirror to put up, a plant to buy, and a chair to buy and put in our bedroom. Otherwise I think we're good. Oh, and I want a kitchen counter stand or something. But I'm still working on finding the product in the real world that matches the image I have in my head. Doesn't that suck when you want to buy something that may or may not exist?! I had it happen a while ago with an awesome stick on battery powered fluorescent light. Not some crappy LED touch light like we've all seen on TV, but a real light that works! Turns out it doesn't exist.

How is school lately? FANTASTIC! I'm on week #3 of that now. I'm happy to be there for sure. It is a little bit of a burden with the homework and readings and all, but not anything I can't manage so far. I am in my very last term in the faculty of Management at the Asper School of Business at the U of M, and all going well I will complete the four year degree this April. Truth is I have some pretty easy courses to wrap things up (which was NOT what I was expecting... but I will SO take it). I finished writing all of my final assignments for last term's work so I'm anxiously awaiting the results of 3 or the 4 courses I had yet to complete from last term (and thanks again to the GMGT 4010 group for getting me out of that one with the final project)! I think part of me secretly hopes I get a B in one of the courses to take the self-imposed pressure off of getting A's this term. I had a streak going at one point of about 20 or so straight A's, which I think should have been more had I not slept through a politics mid-term bringing me to a "C" at one point along the way. Too much pressure. I'll be happy just to get my degree at this point. At the same time I feel the need to reverse the low GPA I suffered when I "stopped going to university" which I put in quotations as it is not the same as "withdrawing from the university" which involves TELLING them about it. I simply stopped attending classes at one point and received F's in every class for which I was registered (about 5). Afterward I made some half hearted attempts to repeat the courses with little luck, and probably amassed 8 or so "F - No Paper"s before a couple of years had gone by. Lesson to you kids out there, Don't do drugs, Stay in School, but if you find yourself not going to school, VW from your courses! And if you do find yourself doing drugs, don't share needles?

How are cheap puns and chemical cleaning solutions? FANTASTIC! Sorry for that one.

I few comments at random. I think I'm about the nicest most upbeat person the HSC has ever seen (or maybe tied for first)? The lady at the GB-1 clinic said I was always in a good mood whenever she spoke to me. The receptionists at Radiology always seem to appreciate me stopping by. I think that continues to be my best tool in fighting this cancer thing... ridiculous optimism and a good attitude. Putting modesty aside I love how I'm handling this all so far. I know I'm helped by not having any major side effects, but part of me thinks "maybe that's in part because of my state of mind?" Perhaps the two interact and build off each other? Perhaps it's because of the hand sanitizer Nicole reminds me to apply multiple times daily?

That brings me to the usual Nicole update. SHE'S ALSO FANTASTIC! I keep going on about how great she is, but that's only because she is, and my only way to repay her / embarrass her is to tell the world about it. She thinks she's not really helping me still (the silly girl) but she truly truly is. She's been on top of my diet for the past few weeks and feels guilty about telling me not to eat sweets and deserts knowing how much I love them. The truth? I've gotten quite used to the whole "no sugar" thing and haven't even missed it all that much. It's not as though I eat NO sugar, but compared to "Old Tom" I've significantly reduced the amount of sugar I put into my body. I've actually found myself reading ingredients lists and nutrition information on product packing! Crazy eh? One teaspoon of sugar in the coffee or tea (unless its Tim Horton's in which case saying "double double" just comes out on its own). I've been eating FRUIT (FRUIT?!?) as a snack lately. I think I facebooked the world about when she brought me a bowl of freshly cut pineapple when I was studying the other day. She does nice things like that :)  For supper tonight I had some leftover salad c/o the O'Leary's, as well as an apple and a banana. I've been eating cereal each morning and even added some chopped up fruit to it like the commercials always make it seem like you should do! Truthfully I'm actually rather enjoying the 'new diet challenge' and figure since I plan on living forever and such, I might as well take care of my body eh?

Other random news, I have titanium in my head! The surgeon told me the bone he cut out was put back and held in place with mini titanium plates which shall remain in my head forever. Cool eh?

Kudos also goes out to "the boys" who provided me with a (here comes that word again) FANTASTIC night just last week with the badminton and the near closing Little Caesars and such! That was one of the best times I've had in quite a while. Thanks to Tim for driving me, thanks to Nelson for providing the venue which made me feel like I was 10 years old and could get into trouble at any point, and thanks to Andrew for the points about my receding but potentially returning hair line.

The next week might be busy with school work and the such. Highlights shall involve a consultation with S&M Inc. (top notch people), some time spent with the greatest people Steinbach has to offer, and with any luck the combination of a classy gentleman and some sushi. If I can fit it all in it could even top this past week! Plus I'm turning 27 this coming weekend eh? Shenanigans! 27 and the receding hair line (albeit rather uneven). Should I be complaining about the weather more? Surely I should complain about the "kids these days" and their "rap music"? Back in my days we didn't have iPods that could phone each other! We had compact discs. We used them to illegally download music onto so we could listen to them on our "Disc-mans"!!! Artists like Madonna, U2, R.E.M., Bryan Adams, and Sting were on the radio. Ok, so they still are but they weren't so old back then! And we didn't have 200 Facebook friends! We had a moderate number of MySpace friends... and most of them were just bands we sort-of-liked! Kids these days. How am I doing? I think I'm ready.

Well I think I should end it there before even I get tired of me. Thanks to all of y'all for the continued support and thoughts and hopes and prayers. It all makes a difference eh? CHEERS!!!
--
TOM

PS: FANTASTIC!

Week #4, update #3...

As I like to point out to people, the part the surgeon took out of my head was a mass of cancer cells, not the regular part of my brain the causes me to procrastinate like MAD! They left that part in. C'est la vie (They didn't even ask me if I wanted any tweaks done while they were working in there. I guess medicine isn't as advanced as I'd like to pretend to think it could be.)

HELLO EVERYONE! Yes it is already week #4 said and done. My how time flies when you're having fun ;)

I think I can say with 99% confidence (at the p<0.01 level (joke for Mark (yes I did just embed parenthesis within parenthesis (I have cancer, I can do whatever the hell I want)))) that week #4 has been the BEST week so far for me. I have suffered no major OR minor side effects from any of my treatments this week and have actually accomplished a lot. No headaches, no sore anything, not even a whole lot of fatigue, which leads me to a side note...

SIDE NOTE: I was talking to my awesome sister Robin on the phone and it came to me that when I was in my "Pre-knowing I had a brain tumor days" and was a "regular student" I was actually tired all of the time. I was tired in class, tired on the way home, and tired when I got home. I think most days I woke up tired. So for me to now say "Ya, I was a little tired today" might actually be an IMPROVEMENT over the old me!?! Crazy eh? I think the main differences is that now instead of waking up whenever the hell I need to (through the use of alarms and backup alarms and other alarms) I now wake up around 7 or 8 am without the use of any modern technological sleep aid. That means by 7 or 8 pm, I've been up for a straight 12 hours! Thus, being tired is totally reasonable! Side note ends now.

Plus I have discovered the joys of being a morning person. You can do stuff in the morning! Like, whatever you want! I can clean the apartment, work on school work, watch TV and drink my chocolate Silk. It's bloody good times (though not literally as I'm on blood thinners, and if I started to bleed I'm not sure I'd stop). Nicole and I have done some marvelous shopping for the apartment, and the place is starting to feel more like home every day. I am tres psyched about it. The best part is that we buy in pieces, with more pieces being required with every step of the way. Example: The other day Nicole bought a nice pot to put in the corner where our Christmas tree used to be. Now we have the opportunity, nay OBLIGATION to buy a nice plant to put in that pot! Or take the nice fruit bowl we bought. We now get to have a great time at Sobeys picking out fruit for our new fruit bowl! It's like each thing we buy for the apartment is a gift to ourselves and an excuse to buy future gifts. I think we can keep this up for a while. (The purchasing of windex justified the purchase of a mirror, and while I'm not saying the costs are logical or justified, they work by me).

Ok, so now that I've thrown in my upbeat sense of optimism that I can't seem to get rid of, I think as a cancer patient I'm obligated to throw in some dark serious emotional stuff (I'm afraid if I don't they'll refuse my tax refund or something)...

How is Tom emotionally these days? Actually pretty good (I suck at "dark"). Like I said this week has been awesome. I still get upset, but not nearly as much as I have in previous weeks. I often wonder if I'm just in denial, or just handling it all well. Either way I'm fine with how I'm handling it as it works for me. The part that kills me is knowing that if anything happens to me, Nicole is left on her own. I can't deal with that as a thought. Oddly enough, this is and has always been a possibility even without the whole "Terminal Brain Cancer Shenanigans", I just never gave it much thought. SIDE NOTE UPCOMING...

SIDE NOTE: What I'm trying to say there is that TBCS (see above for how I came up with that clever acronym) is not the only way to die. I saw this show on Spike TV one time that lead me to believe there are literally THOUSANDS of ways to die (if you can believe that). I could get hit by a bus tomorrow. I think it was a few weeks ago when 4 people got hit by busses all in Winnipeg. I think the odds of being hit by a bus are probably higher than getting glioblastoma multiforme (stage 4) brain cancer. As I see it, none of us know when we are going to die... not even me right now. They've given me a better idea than they could give most people (though I doubt they factored in busses), but again it is simply educated guesses. As I think I've mentioned previously, my oncologist threw out a number that "around a year" was what was most realistic in terms of how long I'd live. I read online that "For the most aggressive grade 4 astrocytomas (glioblastoma multiforme) the average life expectancy is less than a year. Fewer than 4 in 100 people (4%) are alive after 5 years". The thing I love about statistics is that they are absolutely meaningless on a single case basis. This fantastic person named Nicole (I think I've mentioned her in my blogs before) once got me this awesome book on probabilities, because she knows I'm a nerd like that, that gave the perfect example. Let's say a sports team (pick your favourite) has won 70% of the games they've played this season. When asked what the odds are that they'll win their next game, you cannot answer by saying "70%". That would be at best a random guess. Which team are they playing? Did they practice this morning? Are the players tired from the bus/plane ride? Is their star player out with an injury? How is the weather today? There are probably countless factors that can go into contributing to the likelihood of the team winning or losing. Statistics work for past historical data, not for future unknowns. I am a future unknown. Statistics mean (if not nothing) VERY LITTLE! At one point I'm sure the "stats" told people with TBCS they'd live for 3 months at most. Then one guy (or girl) made it to 4 months. Then the average became 3.5 months (or at least 3.00001 depending on how many people came between these pretend patients). I think you see where I'm going. So I just have to think "I can be that guy!" Plus I like doing nice things for other people. How nice would it be to raise that average so that everyone diagnosed with my wonderfully aggressive form of cancer could be given an oh so slightly higher average to hear? Or at least the comment "This one guy made it 133 years!" I know that doesn't even make sense, but don't burst my bubble. Side note ends.

Pizza just arrived at the door and I'm ready to start a nice movie night with a very nice Nicole, so my blog entry ends here. More shall come later... likely much later. Until then CHEERS Y'ALL!!!

--

Tom

PS: This isn't really a "Post Script" so much as me returning to this blog after having enjoyed pizza and a movie with my pretty girl. I wanted to make a point that came to me the other day. Over the holidays I was at the O'Leary's for a dinner when a guy named Randy (a guy who really knows how to pack a cube truck) told a story about winning on slot machines at a casino that really got me thinking afterwards. Imagine going to a casino and putting $5 into a machine. You push some buttons and hear some happy ringing noises (and let's say some lights are going off too). You think you've won the $1,000,000 jackpot. This makes you very very happy. A casino employee comes over and tells you you have won. You ask how much. They tell you $1,000. Turns out you were one off from the jackpot. How would you react? I'm sure there are some people out there who would be disappointed. Some would probably even be angry. Why? Because they would feel as though they had just lost $900,000. Or that they "just missed it". It's easy to think of this scenario as it is in terms of potential (if not unrealized) gains. Life must be looked at in these terms as well. Life is a gift. No one tells us ahead of time how long we get to enjoy it. There are no promises, and no guarantees. Most of us naturally make assumptions that we'll live for a very long time (and will try to avoid erratic busses along the way). No one expects to get the kind of news I received in late November of last year. I cannot change the situation I am in. What I can do is choose how I react to it. What I would like to do is look at my life - from this day until my last - as the $1,000 lottery win. I can spend my time thinking about the money I didn't win, but then I'd lose focus on enjoying the $1,000 I've got in front of me. $1,000 is still a lot of money. As I think I mentioned earlier, I was informed that without being brought to the hospital when I was (and having the surgery to remove part of my tumor) I might well have dropped into a coma at any point and that would have been the end of Tom (aka: $0... actually -$5 if you count the money I put in to the machine). So really I haven't lost anything. I have gained at LEAST a year, and more if I have any say in the matter. That also provides me with a nice segue to my next topic...

The owner of the company that makes Segways died after driving one of the machines off a cliff. Seriously. Thanks to Jay shining a light on that story for me. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1315518/Segway-tycoon-Jimi-Heselden-dies-cliff-plunge-scooters.html if you'd like to read. But that's not where I was going with that one (you can replace my being "hit by a bus" with "driving a Segway off a cliff" to make my blog more interesting if you'd like). Back to my segue...

I appreciate people telling me that "I can do this" or "fight this" or "beat this", as it is motivation for me to do so. The only problem is I don't know how. When Rob Schneider says "You can do it!" to Adam Sandler in every movie he's ever been in, he's telling him he can "do" what he already knows how to "do". I get it if I'm a pro golfer and I'm standing on the green holding my putter and someone says to me "you can do it!" as I've already been taught how to sink the white ball into the hole. No one has told me how to fight brain cancer. So hearing "You can do it!" doesn't help me as much as "Here's how you fight this thing". If any of you know the answer please do pass it along. I think my best bet is stay positive and keep my spirits up. That's been my focus thus far (and I think I'm kicking ass at it).

I shall keep you posted world. It is now time for me to hit the sack (by which I mean go to bed for those of you who assumed I was about to leave my computer to go physically assault a large piece of burlap in the other room). Cheers to you all, and have a good night*!

*Replace "night" with "morning", or "day", or "afternoon", or "evening" depending on when you get around to reading this blog.

(REAL) PS: CHEERS AGAIN!