April 15th

Hi All,

Today is a milestone of sorts because we’ve tried to break Shaun’s treatment down into small, more manageable chunks of time rather than looking at this as a grueling 3 month process. So today we’re half way through April – and April is the only month that contains 2 ‘full weeks on’. In other words, we’re half way through the most intense month! (Note: for those of you facing anything unpleasant, I highly recommend this approach).

So how is Shaun? Well, the effects are definitely becoming more apparent. Hair loss aside, he’s experiencing intermittent high-pitched ringing in his ears, a ‘spaced out’ feeling and exhaustion (all typical). His appetite remains pretty solid – although while he usually eats just about anything I’ve actually heard, “nope… don’t feel like that” on more than one occasion. He’s only lost about 4 pounds so far, which we’re told is pretty good.

We finally got his AFP results back today – it decreased 50% to 2,375 at the end of his first cycle. This obviously doesn’t sound as impressive as the 86% drop in his HCG levels, but I’m told the half-life of AFP is significantly longer than that of HCG which might provide some context. For those who may not know, half-life is the length of time it takes a decaying substance to decline by half (in this case, assuming no more of the substance is being made by the tumour).

As far as what all this means, any marker elevation over normal indicates cancerous activity taking place in the body. So these declining numbers simply mean that the cancer isn’t as active/aggressive as it was when we started. Having said all this, I’m told any decline after Cycle 1 is good as you can sometimes even see a spike after the first cycle. We should have a better sense of how well things are progressing when we review the Cycle 2 blood results with the oncologist next Friday.

For now, I leave you with this (double click to see a larger version):

Can’t. Stop. Laughing!!!

As always, keep checking in, passing it on & thinking good thoughts. It really does help 🙂

xo J & S