Round 3

Greetings all!  I trust everyone had a great weekend.  I know I had a good one even if some baseball games didn't go my way.

So here we are on the Tuesday before my 3rd admittance.  I am starting to get myself ready for Thursday morning, because I know it will be another grind.  As I posted before, I need to take some time to plan a menu so that I can avoid the nausea that inevitably accompanies patient dining.  Outside of a few sick days and some other minor side effects I have really felt good over the last few weeks.  I think that is going to make it all the more difficult to go sit in a hospital bed for 5 days.  Now that I am about to get over the hump, there is also the very real possibility that the side effects and sick days start to ramp up, as chemo is such a cumulative process.  I know having talked to a few other survivors who have had similar cocktails, it was really after the 3rd treatment and beyond that they started to succumb to more invasive side effects.

I saw the other day that baseball great Tony Gwynn was recently diagnosed with cancer in his salivary glands.  You think about him, Michael Douglas, Michael C. Hall, et the list goes on and on of famous people/athletes that have been diagnosed with cancer.  It just goes to show that cancer isn't a poor disease or white or black one for that matter.  Cancer can affect even those with the most healthy of lifestyles (Lance Armstrong).  It really is amazing how prevalent this disease is; according to cancer.org men have a 44% chance, and women have a 37% chance of developing cancer over the course of their lifetimes.  That is not meant to scare people, but just help understand that at some point you very likely could be affected by this disease.

Something that a few people ask me about is what you can/can't eat in order to fight off or prevent cancer.  You see so many advertisements these days about how y causes cancer or x wards off cancer.  I am no doctor or nutritionist, but I do know that my doctors haven't said anything about avoiding x or doubling up on y.  I would take any claim with a grain of salt and just focus on eating a balanced diet, as that is all the nutritionist and doctors have told me to do.  I think you should use common sense in regards to your diet and lifestyle, because the other factors (genetics, environment, randomness) are mostly outside of your control.

I can't thank everyone enough for the prayers and support during this fight, they really mean the world to me. I look forward to seeing everyone who has reached out once I receive a clean bill of health, but until then, I am focused on fighting and surviving round 3 at beautiful Emory Midtown.  I have requested a room with a view of downtown, as staring at the Renaissance Hotel wasn't terribly scenic last time.  I will post again from prison the hospital, so hopefully everything goes well and I can report on a successful admittance!

Go Rangers tonight!