Well, Fuck.

Well, Fuck.

After a successful surgery(surgeries) and a pretty great recovery overall, I had my follow up CT scan and meeting with my oncologist today. It was not the news I wanted or to be honest, was expecting.

I have more cancer on my liver. My colon, where the primary cancer originated, looks good. But the liver has at least 4 spots again. They’re obviously much smaller than what I was looking at when I was first diagnosed but they sure did grow fast since I stopped chemo to prepare for surgery. The spots weren’t there when I had surgery, as the surgeon would have dealt with them. The cancer cells were obviously there, growing, but not noticeable to the naked eye and also didn’t show up in the PET scan.

So here I am. My dreams and thoughts of returning to normal life, returning to work, returning to not feeling like shit from chemo are all pretty crushed. In the next week or 2, I will once again begin active treatment to continue my fight against this relentless disease.

We’re going to remove 1 of the 3 chemo drugs I was on – Oxaliplatin and add in a biologic called Cetuximab. The removal of Oxaliplatin should help with preventing the same level of fatigue and the neuropathy I experienced in my first go with chemo, but the new Cetuximab comes with its own nastiness – mainly in the form of terrible skin irritations/rashes/acne.

We’re hoping I’ll continue to have a good reaction to treatment and then we’ll try targeted radiation or something of the sort to try and remove the new cancer.

I can’t lie, I’m very bummed about this news. I was just starting to feel better and really looking for to some more time without being on all these disgusting poisons, but the reality happens to be what it happens to be and I’ll just keep dealing with it as it comes.

Please continue to keep me in your thoughts if you have the space. Thank you again for all the support you’ve already given and hopefully good news will come.

I’ll keep you updated as I learn more and start treatment. You know you kind of miss me reminding you every 2 weeks how terrible chemo is 🙂

Much love,

Matt