Author: mattkassoff

Well, it's been a long week. I had my CT scan on Wednesday, a dye study on my port Thursday(it's fine) and a meeting with my oncologist today. Good news, my cancer continues to respond to the chemo. In fact, it reduced to a size that my oncologist want me to have a consult with … Continue reading Stay the Course

Tuesday was the last scheduled full round of my originally prescribed 8 rounds of FOLFOXIRI. As always, I'm here to remind you that chemo sucks. As for what's next, we still don't have a firm path or next step yet. This will all be more clear after my next CT scan on 10/21. I then … Continue reading Chemo: Round 8 – What now?

Yesterday was round 7 of chemo. There's really not much of an update - it still sucks and I feel like shit. We met with my oncologist beforehand and there wasn't much news there either. My CEA (cancer protein) numbers continued to drop - down to 65.8 ng/mL. We discussed what this means. What it … Continue reading Chemo: Round 7 – Back to Reality

Here I am, sitting through round 6 of chemo. Spoiler alert - it still sucks. We met this morning before the infusions with one of the PA's here. There wasn't a ton to go over - all my labs are still looking good. One set of numbers did stand out though. My CEA(cancer proteins) numbers … Continue reading Chemo: Round 6 – Good News?

Well, believe it or not, chemo still sucks. We met with my oncologist yesterday before my infusions to check in again on my recent CT scan. There wasn't really too much new stuff to go over - just a few details of how we might proceed after the 8th round of chemo. It's sounding like … Continue reading Chemo: Round 5 – Little bit harder, just a little bit more, a little bit further than you gone before

I received the call from my oncologist this morning to go over the CT scan I had yesterday. Before I go on and explain what we discussed and what he sees, I want to revisit where we're at with my treatment and what my fight against cancer is and means. I have inoperable cancer. That … Continue reading Some Good News Amidst a Bad Reality

Well, here I am, sitting through my fourth round of infusions. Halfway through my originally planned 8 chemo sessions. I have a CT scan scheduled next week, on 8/26 and my oncologist is supposed to call me on 8/27 to go over the results. We'll see which of these 3 things is happening: My cancer … Continue reading Chemo: Round 4 – Woah, we’re half way there… Woah, livin’ on a prayer

Kidding. There's actually quite a bit of crying in cancer. This is not a pity post. Please don't feel the need to reply (and quite the opposite actually, I'm going to ask you right here specifically to not to post or respond with anything like this) "Oh, you cry as often as you want!" or … Continue reading There’s No Crying in Cancer!

Three down, five to go in my initial course of treatment. I had my third set of infusions yesterday, and, after hearing about it, I'm finally experiencing oxaliplatin-induced peripheral neuropathy. I know most of you are asking yourself, what's oxaliplatin-induced peripheral neuropathy? Is it a real thing or just something Matt's trying to get me … Continue reading Chemo: Round 3 – Fun with Oxaliplatin-induced Peripheral Neuropathy!

Numbers are a mindfuck. You can't ignore them but you're also not supposed to read too much into them. Sometimes you want to manipulate an interpretation of that data in one way to support your arguement, other times you'll want to manipulate that very same data in an entirely different way to argue an opposite … Continue reading Numbers Are a Mindfuck.