Mri

[NedClocker]

My wife goes again tomorrow to MD Anderson for another mri of the brain and spine. Got to be there at 7:30 for the first one. Doctor appointment at 1:30. I'm sure you'll all wish us well.

[muddocktor]

I hope everything goes OK, NedClocker. I'll pass it along to my wife and get her to say a few prayers.

[NedClocker]

Thanks, muddocktor. God has brought us this far. All prayers are welcomed and appreciated.

[Ebola]

good luck ned.

[Loud]

Best wishes, Ned. Hug your wife.

[JetMech]

Originally posted by NedClocker
My wife goes again tomorrow to MD Anderson for another mri of the brain and spine. Got to be there at 7:30 for the first one. Doctor appointment at 1:30. I'm sure you'll all wish us well. Wishing you and yours all the best Jeff. God bless you both.

[Tweaked!]

Hope everything goes ok, My families prayers are with you. Just keep a positive outlook;)

[belorsch]

Good Luck!

[Ploaf]

Good Luck. Hope things turn out OK.

[walaka7]

Good luck Ned..you've got our prayers too.. Keep your chin up, everything will turn out ok

[Jeff Bolton]

hello nedclocker. i wish you guys good luck on the mri...but i'm wondering, if you don't minde me asking, what your wife has? my mother has alzheimer's and that is the biggest reason that i am folding. she has had to get a few mri's over the past year when they were trying to decide what it was that she had. now that they've finally narrowed it down to alzheimer's, it sucks but you've just got to go on with life, you know? well best of luck, and fold on.

jeff

[Dragonbud]

Good luck on the mri Ned.
Regards to your family and hope everything will turn out ok.

[David]

Good Luck Ned. Needless to say the thoughts and prayers of everyone here are with you.

[Roger24]

Good luck, I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.

[robertm]

My thoughts and prayers are with you and your wife.

[NASsoccer]

hey i will be praying for you and your wife.

[Oni]

Originally posted by NedClocker
My wife goes again tomorrow to MD Anderson for another mri of the brain and spine. Got to be there at 7:30 for the first one. Doctor appointment at 1:30. I'm sure you'll all wish us well.

This is the reason we fold . . . . Wish your wife the best for me.

Karl

[Jeff Bolton]

yep just read my signature :) . can there really be a better cause than folding? i don't think so.

jeff

[NedClocker]

Thanks, guys. This has got to be one of the best groups of people there is.

ok. Good news, or, at least, not really bad news. The tumors only grew a little, maybe 5%, so the chemo is keeping it slowed down.

Here's what's wrong. I know some already know. I'll just copy it from a PM I sent to someone who inquired, so I don't have to type it all again. It's a little long, but it started 4 years ago.

Breast cancer that has spread to the protective lining of the brain and spinal cord. Leptomeningeal disease, Leptomeningeal Carcinomatosis, Leptomeningeal metastases of Breast Cancer. All mean the same thing. You've heard of bacterial or viral meningitis? You could call this cancer meningitis, I guess. It's in the meninges, the protective lining of the brain and spinal cord. Terminal diagnosis. And, it has paralized her from the bottom of the ribs on down.

Late July, 2000, we were told she had 6 to 8 weeks without treatment, maybe 3 or 4 months if there was a treatment that would help her. Might be able to extend her life, but there is no cure.

Well, 20 months later, she's doing pretty well. MRI yesterday showed about a 5% growth in tumor size.

The tumors had completely disappeared from the mri, but they took her off of her chemo because it gave her diahrea. (She was in the hospital 1.5 weeks for diahrea. That's serious diahrea.)

4 weeks off of the chemo, and you could see the tumors in the mri again. Came back pretty quickly. . So, doctor put her back on the chemo, dose reduced to 90%. Tumors grew a little. Up dose to 95%. Tumors grew a little. Now he's uped dose to 100%. Hopefully this will knock them out again.

The 2 drugs that have worked for her, Herceptin at first, and now Xeloda, were both approved for use in 1998. They are both "Smart" drugs, attacking primarily cancer cells and leaving normal tissue alone.

No way to tell this story in short form. It's a long story. I forget what I've told who. Considered creating a web site to detail it all but figured she wouldn't live that long. Might as well go ahead and do it. Looks like she'll be with us a while longer.

Oh, yeah. I'm 41. She's 39. We have a 4 year old son. She discovered the lump after she stopped breast feeding. She was 35 then; I was 37.

[Jeff Bolton]

damn man, i've so sorry to hear of your wife's ailment. there's not much that i can say that hasn't probably already been said to you. i don't know how life threatening my mom's alzheimer's is, but regardless it is something that hits home hard and i'd rather not deal with. well you know that we're here for you and we can support each other. hope everything turns out for the best.

jeff

[muddocktor]

Ned,
I'm sorry to hear about your wife's fight for her life; if you would, PM me your wife's name so my wife and I can add you to our prayer list. Some may laugh at this, but I've personally seen things happen through the power of prayer. Four years ago, my younger brother's wife had 2 heart attacks about 8-10 months apart when she was around 34 years old. The second one was real bad and the prognosis wasn't good at all for her to live and they were saying that she had "significant" heart muscle damage. After about 3 days, she started feeling much better and when she was checked again, there was almost no damage to be seen. We had been praying like crazy during this time. The doctors were totally amazed in her recovery and they couldn't find what was causing the problems either. After that episode, she was determined to find out what was happening to her heart. After doing much research, both on the web and by talking to doctors, they were able to pin her problem down to a little known disease called Prinzmetal's Angina, which causes the heart to go into spasms. She also correlated her good days to her bad days and found that the trigger was hormonally related. She now wears estrogen patches and she has had minimal problems.

These new chemo drugs seem to be much better than what they used to treat with. My father-in-law is presently undergoing chemo for colon cancer and he's even putting on weight and eating like a horse.:)

Our prayers are with you guys.
muddocktor