Six Month Reflections

The earth has traveled halfway around the sun since I started treatment.

As we wait for the next round to commence and pass the six month mark for treatment, I think it's appropriate to take a look back at from where we've come.

Nine months ago I was feeling off. I had a persistent hacking cough, my joints hurt terribly, my appetite was waning and my energy level felt completely drained. I went to the Doctor, and at my request -- and only at my request -- she took some blood tests as an afterthought, looking for Lymes Disease or West Nile Virus.

The tests found that my blood counts were way off. I was anemic and my white blood cell count was low. She set up an appointment for me with a hematologist "just as a precautionary measure." I had to wait a month before there was an opening.

Eight months ago, I was really starting to feel bad. I had frequent night sweats, nightly fevers, complete loss of appetite, couldn't handle my alcohol, and was losing weight rapidly. My visit to the hematologist, however, showed that my blood counts had risen. "It's probably just a virus," he said. "Come back in a month and we'll test you again."

One month later, my blood counts had stayed the same. It was only then that he thought it best to do a bone marrow biopsy. This was one day before the presidential election.

That Wednesday he called and said "you're bone marrow shows some blasts, but there aren't many. This really doesn't look like cancer, but we'll know more tomorrow when the final report comes in."

What a relief...

The next day I was having a terrific day at work when he called back around four o'clock. "You need to come in and talk," he said. "This looks like leukemia."

Two weeks later, six months ago today, I was in the hospital starting treatment. I can say definitively that the two week interim between diagnosis and commencing treatment were the scariest two weeks of my life.

For four months, through induction and consolidation, I seemed to grow weaker every day. Despite efforts to keep it up, my weight fell to 115, far below my normal 130-140 range. There were days when it took every ounce of determination I had to get up, ride my trainer for ten minutes, eat and shower -- those simple things would exhaust every bit of energy I had for the day.

It felt like an abyss. Every day grew worse than the day before and it felt as if there was no way out. "How much more can I possible take?" I found myself asking.

Then stage 4 came around. My neutrophils rose, so I could once again eat the foods that I enjoy (healthy food). Slowly I started to pick up my old habits -- the first bike ride was short (and shaky), I left the Madison area for the first time in months, I went fishing and felt the tug of a fish at the end of the line, I went hiking in Upper Michigan, went out to eat with Katie and with friends, got back to the office, and the list goes on. These were things that I could only dream of doing during the rough first few months of treatment -- things that I had feared I would never be able to do again.

I also regained a great deal of strength during the last two months. I'm back to 135, although it's admittedly a much softer 135 than in years past. I'm also able to bike or hike a fair distance -- I won't be riding a century anytime soon, but today I biked 15-20 miles with relative ease.

On December 22nd, I rode my trainer and wrote: "Today I spent a half hour on my bike and could shut my eyes and envision I was riding my bike down Wilson street in the Sun to work at Clean Wisconsin." Today, that dream was realized as I road my bike down East Wilson in the bright sunshine to work at Clean Wisconsin. I must admit that I cheated a bit and went around capital square to avoid the big hill.

As we get ready to ramp things up again I know that we are not even close to being out of the woods yet (or perhaps more appropriatly for me -- I know that there will be much time spent outside of the woods, where I'd rather be). But now as things get worse I will at least know that things do get easier, that better days lie ahead.

This insight will help transform days that feel like an abyss to feel more like a really painful bike ride -- one that you keep pedaling for home knowing that a hot grill and cold beer awaits you at the finish.

Thanks for stickin' with me and following my adventures over the last six months.

-Sam