The Next Step/Top Fifteen Cancer Centers

Lately I've thought alot about Alison's care, the Marine Corps, and how I am due to move in June of 2007, etc. I'm facing some tough decisions about what to do. Like everything else, any potential move is subject to job positions available at the time we're scheduled to move. Anyways, I've got to get in touch with the guy that sends me where I go. So tonight I was researching possible places to take Alison, and I came across the 2006 Top Cancer Hospitals Listing. I thought it might be good to post here. I am going to work on either staying put or going near one of these:

Top 15 Cancer Hospitals - U.S. News & World Report
U.S. News & World report ranked the Top Cancer Hospitals in the United States:

1. Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center - New York, NY
2. University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center - Houston, TX
3. Johns Hopkins Hospital - Baltimore, MD
4. Mayo Clinic - Rochester, MN
5. Dana-Farber Cancer Institute - Boston, MA
6. University of Washington Medical Center - Seattle, WA
7. Duke University Medical Center - Durham, NC
8. University of Chicago Hospitals - Chicago, IL
9. UCLA Medical Center - Los Angeles, CA
10. University of California, San Francisco Medical Center - San Francisco, CA
11. H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute - Tampa, FL
12. University of Pittsburgh Medical Center - Pittsburgh, PA
13. Cleveland Clinic - Cleveland, OH
14. Stanford Hospital and Clinics - Palo Alto, CA
15. Massachusetts General Hospital - Boston, MA

And finally, caringforcarcinoid.org lists the following as treatment centers that treat Carcinoids:

Cedars-Sinai
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Fox Chase Cancer Center
Johns Hopkins University - Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center
Louisiana State University - Stanley S. Scott Cancer Center
Mayo Clinic
MD Anderson Cancer Center
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Moffitt Cancer Center
Mount Sinai Medical Center
Stanford University
University of Iowa - Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center
University of Maryland - Greenebaum Cancer Center
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
Yale University

Wanna Change Your Diet? You Will...

All you need to do is have your blood drawn. If you've had fried chicken, there'll be little rice-size chunks of fat just-a-swimmin' around your blood stream. Take a look in that vile of blood. There it is. Fat floating. Ready to cause you major heart failure. Ready to lodge into the back of our arms. Into our bellies.

It makes me think, "Wait, I thought that stuff stayed in the digestive tract, and nutrients are extracted along the way."

BIG FAT NUTRIENTS. Bits of hamburger. Bits of those oreos. Bits of fat ready to lodge themselves into our arteries.

I saw it this morning. Alison and I are going to change our diets. Right now.

As for her current health, she's been in fairly severe pain since last Wednesday. The blood test showed she needs blood; we'll get some tomorrow. She's also mid-stride in another chemotherapy session.

We're hanging in there. Hanging in there with strawberries and blackberries. With lettuce and carrots. We're not going back for a big bucket of extra-crispy KFC for a long time. Though it's so good. So, so good.

State of My Woman Address

Today we met with Dr. Chahin. He informed us that our CT scan showed reduction in the size of the main tumor. That means the chemotherapy is working. However, the radiologist noted several small lesions (cancerous) in her liver. Dr. Chahin believed, however, that those lesions had developed after our last CT scan (14 Jun 06) and before we started chemotherapy in late July.

My thoughts were mixed. I was thrilled to hear the chemotherapy had reduced the main tumor in Alison's belly. Chemotherapy isn't normally effective with Neuroendocrine tumors at all. I was concerned that her liver shows some cancer. So happy and concerned and hopeful. That's what I am. So's she, I think. We're both glad to know what's happening.

The next step is to continue with another four sessions of chemotherapy and then recheck. Dr. Chahin is going to remain in communication with Duke University Oncologist, Michael Morse M.D. about his radioisotope radiation plan, but we need to get Alison a little further in her recovery first.

So for now we breathe relief and try to get motivated for more treatments, and pray and hope. I've learned to be more thankful to wake up and see each day. They certainly are not promised to any of us.

News

Monday at 1:45 we will find out the results of Alison's latest CT scan, seeing the effectiveness of her therapy thus-far, and hearing the next move for her from our Oncologist. It goes with out saying that I am nervous.

My boat is what we call in aviation maintenance 'long-term down' after I found a cut in the u-joint bellows (a rubber sleeve that keeps the sea water from filling your boat up but allows the engine to turn the propeller.) A huge cut. Alison's Dad, brother and I are going to try and repair it ourselves this week. It goes without saying that I am nervous.

And finally, Alison, Penny, Colin, Brian, and I (and Matt and Jenn) had a good day at the beach today. Alison especially had a good time I think. The girls read underneath a palm tree while us boys waded through the lagoon hunting the fishes and trying not to hit fallen trees hidden under the muddy water. Thanks for the photo's Colin.

Our Chemical Romance

Alison began her fourth round of chemotherapy today. When she's completed on Wednesday, we're going to head to the hospital for a CT scan and possibly a bone scan. It's time to see if it's working. That's exciting and scary. I pray it is. I sense that it's halted the cancer's growth, and I am praying that it's forced it back some too.

One of our rituals for post-chemo is getting a bite at Sonic. We really go there for a cherry-coke or vanilla-coke for Alison. But today we decided to stop in at the movie store too! We bought 'Hoodwinked,' 'V for Vendetta,' 'Crash,' 'Eight Below,' 'Chronicles of Narnia,' 'Elf,' and 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.' That's a treat! So we're going to have some movie nights this week.

And I began a new painting today. Actually painting, not priming or making the canvas. I haven't painted since '04, and that was only one painting, and a poor example at that. Painting is good therapy, but it's also a hard language to communicate with. I am sure if I could vocalize my part of the language today, at first I would have sounded much like 'Sloth' from the Goonies. And at the end I probably was speaking with decent monosyllable words like 'blue,' and 'sky,' and such. But it felt good. Now I have to let it dry for about 3 days before I resume.

I remembered September 11th today with the rest of the nation. Hearing Newscast recollections of the entire Airspace being shutdown, of the NFL cancelling all games the following week, etc. really brought back the memories. I remember my little sister calling me crying and franticly asking if I was going to war. It seems like everyone with me then now has, but I guess up till now God has had a different plan for me. Anyways, if you see a service member, police officer, or fireman, know that they've done as much as they can thus far, and that their families have been worried sick for many a night in the last five years. And to them I say thanks for everything, warriors.

Stormy Morning at the Beach

Memory and Small Changes

Last night Alison and I watched 'Empire Falls' on HBO. In piecing together collected childhood memories, the lead character finds himself compelled to make changes in his own character. That's only a sub-plot of course, but I thought, "well, if my memory worked that well, I would replay stuff to figure out what 'really happened' too." And Penny and I have talked about this lately: I don't remember anything from our childhoods. Just things I've told myself happened. But then I thought about remembering. Now I think that's for the best. My recorder didn't work until I was ready for it. If it's even working now. I still have a touch of oblivious.

Alison and I made a few changes around the house in the last few days. We put away spring and summer decorations, and brought out our autumn 'novelties.' Then today we went and bought some new pillows for the couches, a new floor lamp, and I converted the trunk that I originally built as a coffee table into an actual coffee table. (It was way too big for the last year) Small changes make a big difference sometimes. It feels a lot more comfortable in our living room right now. All new.

Grounding and Throwing Hammers

I've been thwarted by a new set of trailer lights for two weeks.

They just were'nt working right. They'd pop on, then not work. Then not work and then blink once. It drove me mad. So I thought that set I bought was faulty, not good product. I bought it on ebay afterall, for a fraction of the price.

So yesterday I bought two new lights at Walmart. I didn't figure I needed new wire since my little voltmeter was showing it had juice. It was supposed to work!!! Anyways, out stumbles me into the garage this morning, with the idea of mounting the new lights and forever putting this problem behind me. When I began reading the new lights' packaging, I noticed they said "GROUNDED BY MOUNTING BOLT."

I thought, "Woah, I bet the old-new lights are too, only I have them mounted 6 feet in the air on PVC piping." So, I went out and ran a wire to ground the lights.

They work as we say, "5.0" Let me just say that I HAD tried to ground them with what I thought was their ground wire. But I discovered that the wire in question, though white and normally a 'ground', was in fact, the running lights wire. And let me also say that the old-new wiring kit's directions were completely un-useable. They just read "Connect the wires."

Out steps Dad in his Sunday best. I turn to him and say, "Guess who's the big dummy?" Then I told him about my grounding mistake.

He asked, "Church starts in 10 minutes, do you want to go?"

And though I declined, while he pulled away I realized I'd already received my message for the day. Even if you have power you won't work right until you're grounded. I was really glad I caught that message, because the next step for God would be to throw hammers from the sky towards me.

So in all this I learned three things:

1) See sentence in italics again.

2) I have atleast one saving grace: reading directions.

3) God speaks to us; we just need to catch on it. There is no English-God Dictionary. But I've scheduled in a translator next Sunday at 08:50.