Had my scans today. Let me first tell you, for some reason I knew things had changed, and progressed. I have no idea why or how I knew that. But something made me do some things that I have never done before. Today, as I was getting ready to head downtown to the scans appointment, I made sure that I had on a special bracelet, a special necklace, a couple of affirmation stones, a small figurine of Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion’s character from Firefly– he’s a total bad a$# who helped me through chemo), a small pin that belonged to my mother (who died of brain cancer) and I wafted a bit of Persian Magic around the house. All of these things were gifts from my first round of treatment, nearly one and half year ago. Somehow I thought they would bring me luck…because somehow, I just knew.

Jack came into the room (it took him awhile to get there, and I speculated , jokingly, to Matt that he was trying to stop crying about what he had to say to me…) and I asked “So, good, bad, indifferent?” to which he replied, “Actually the scans do look a little worse.”

UGH.

Not a lot of progression, but some. Enough to decide that Alimta, although it gave me a good ride for a solid year, isn’t quite up to the task. Alright, what next? I managed to hold it together  through the appointment while we discussed a study that doubles up Avastin and Tarceva, and so that’s what we’re going to do…starting January. Jack told me I could take a break, that I didn’t need to get my Alimta today, but I went ahead with the treatment anyhow (it was also my last chance for that lovely B-12 shot you get with Alimta!!).

While I was down in treatment, feeling a little sorry for myself, but still trying to look on the bright side, Barry came down with a consent form for the study, which is funded by the National Cancer Institue. The study is in it’s third year, and there have been some pretty remarkable results.  He said that with several of the participants, there was an average of 30 percent reduction in their cancer in the first cycle. Hmm. My time on Alimta, although fairly glorious in terms of very few side effects, netted me only stability (which is also pretty glorious, if you think about it) — what if this combo actually gets RID of some of my leftover cancer??

Veeery interesting. So I signed the consent form. I’m in. And actually, I’m excited to try this — I have energy to spare, feel great, think it sounds like a great study that could possibly help many more people — so what started out as a very worrisome morning, a depressing piece of news (although, really, the progression was not huge by any means), a mini, private tearfest in the bathroom after Matt went back to work, turned into a fairly exciting opportunity to try something that sounds very positive.

I’ll keep you posted.