In the words of my doctor, “We are going for the cure.”

What does this mean?

The four rounds of chemotherapy that I have already endured have done wonders for the visible cancer. The cancer had attached itself to my chest wall and was hard and locally spread. Not only was a lymph node involved as well as multiple tumours, the cancer had also spread to multiple local areas within the skin itself. It was a very aggressive cancer. However all of that visible sign of cancer is now gone and only some blemishes on the skin are left to show where the cancer existed. But cancer is a malicious thing that is not necessarily “gone” until there are no cancerous cells left. My doctor thinks I have a chance at a cure, and he wants to take me through a process that could give me a complete cure, but there are problems.

Problem #1

I could die from the treatment. The next set of chemo medications are very harsh and they could cause my death from many different kinds of complications. I still have high liver enzymes from the shots that were given to me to force my bones to produce white blood cells. Having high liver enzymes can raise the possibility of death significantly. In this case, death usually happens in the first 30 days of treatment. My next treatment starts November 14, 2013. My doctor told me that the treatments are a gamble and he would not give them to me unless I understand that I could die.

Problem #2

The cancer doctors want me to go through a second set of radiation treatments after the chemo is done. The first time I had radiation in the same area was 1995, and I ended up very burnt and with severe pain that I lived with for 10 years. By the 10 year mark the pain finally subsided and last year the bone pain finally left my rib. I cannot even imagine going through that pain again. Also radiating the area a second time would cause worse symptoms than the last time. It is only in recent years that doctors were even willing to experiment doing radiation a second time. Years ago it was considered something that could not be repeated.

Right now I am set to go through some very harsh treatments in the hope of a cure. If there was ever a time that I could use prayer, it is right now. I am asking the Lord Jesus to keep me safe through these treatments and to heal me completely. I am asking Him to give me many more years of service in the ministry that He has given me. If it is His will, I would like to live.

If you would like to follow my progress, I invite you to click on the subscribe to my blog button on the right to receive notifications of new posts by email.