treatment, continued

  Hello again! Taking up where we left off, I wanted to explain what happens if, God forbid, your treatment fails, as mine did. It wasn't something I was prepared for. I, like everyone else, want to see a quick, effective resolution to a problem like cancer. And I should say here, that many times that is the case. Cancer treatments are getting more and more effective every year. New therapies come out, there are always trials going on at major university hospitals that you can apply for, and there is much on the horizon to be hopeful about. There are treatments in the mainstream today that were only a possibility 5 years ago. I've had some of them. When the doctor called me into his office after my seed implants, I was on pins and needles waiting for the results. My mind was full of "what if's". Then the doctor told me the treatment had failed. My wife and I sat there stunned. How could this be? I was told that this was my best chance for a cure, and I was a good prospect for success, because the cancer was confined to the prostate. My doctor explained to me that sometimes, due to reaction of the body from this treatment, that a false positive psa could have happened, and that we should wait a couple of weeks, and do the test again. So, we waited, but we saw a high psa come back again. Now, I want to be clear, here. In no way do I blame my doctor for my failed treatment. I have every confidence that he is very skilled at what he does, and as we went over my results, he showed me a graph of my seed placement, which proved beyond a doubt that he had done his job the right way. So the next stage of my treatment plan was to switch to maintenance  of the disease by taking a pill called an androgen blocker, which stops you from producing male hormone, which is what makes cancer grow, among other things. Along with the pill I began taking a treatment of injections every few months, also to stop hormone production. I'm still on the same basic shot and pill to this day, but I've had some other treatments, too. Not long after I began taking these treatments, I began to see that even though I had a good doctor, he had taken me about as far as he could, and I knew I needed someone who didn't view this treatment as all that could be done. We had discussed other options, and he told me that I could try to get into some clinical trials, a good resource for searching those out is clinicaltrials.gov  a public health resource that lists everything going on around the world. It took us a while to decide what our next move was going to be, because I wanted someone handling my health who had their eye on my situation down the road, as well as the present. So we switched to another urologist for about a year, and he suggested a radiologist who might be able to help. We made an appointment to consult with him, and he mapped out a plan for radiation treatments for me. I was shocked, because I had been told I could never have radiation to the prostate again, after my seed placement. Turns out that wasn't true. So for 7 weeks, 5 days a week, I had radiation treatments, in an effort to cure my cancer. In the end, that therapy failed for me too.It was the same story, the psa reading kept climbing up, from 1 to 3 to 5, and we saw what the trend was, so my radiologist sent me to a surgeon, and we discovered that I had 5 infected lymph nodes in my pelvic region. We scheduled surgery, as I was told it was my best chance for a cure. They used the robotic arm surgery, and removed all the infected lymph nodes.Sadly, this treatment failed as well. There are many other things that doctors don't talk about, that enter into the arena of good health. Worry and anxiety are big ones. Anyone who has suffered from a debilitating disease knows the stress these can cause. Add to the mix, trying to keep a job, take care of your children, reassure your family and friends that you are ok, that can wear down your immune system, and overall good health. I would like to suggest to you that prayer really helps, if you find yourself in this condition. It was during this time that I began to question whether God really cared as much as I believed He did. Not enough to make me doubt His love for me, not enough to make me question my salvation, but it just seemed like my prayers were going into a deep dark hole, and they weren't getting through to Him. But I discovered that just because God doesn't answer you in the way, or the time frame that you want from Him, doesn't mean that He isn't listening. I would like to tell you that angels touched me. I would like to be able to say that the skies parted, and my cure was granted to me on a silver platter. But no, that's not the way God chose to work in my life. I began to see that God may have had a different purpose in mind for me. My next move was to a new urologist, who put me back on the shot and pill regimen, which worked, for a good while. Then my numbers started to climb back up again.