Willie's cancer

After a one week delay due to low WBC (white blood count), Willie went in today for his infusion of FLOT (refer to prior blog post). Hairs the difference. Last Thursday’s labs had his WBC at 2.5 which is way too low for chemo so instead of doing it last Friday, he got a shot of Zarxio 300 instead to boost his WBC count. And amazingly, yesterday’s labs showed his count at 10.1 so that’s in the high side of normal. Those $15,000 shots really work! He went in at 11:30 and got out at 3:45. He’ll go back tomorrow at 4pm to take out the pump that puts in the 5-FU (chemo drug) and get another injection of the Xarxio so his WBC doesn’t dip down so low. Nurse today was Emily. Willie really liked her and he got a private room with a tv today. Bonus is Erica (Kramer) Kostenko was also there to give us hugs and make sure he got the best care and snacks too. Update on removing cherry trees; Today they came at 6am to finish chipping the rest of the trees that were pulled out. They finished around 10...

the day after Willie got a hair cut, it started falling out. Now basically he is shedding, and the hair is thinning out, and he keeps complaining to me that I should have let him shave it. I keep hoping that he will keep his hair, eyebrows, leg hairs, etc but it’s just not happening. We tried a lint brush in the arm and leg hairs. It works! Yesterday he looked on MyChart which is the medical scheduling program used by the hospital. It showed that he missed a phone call from Susan Butler,ARPN, NP-C (Advanced Registered Nurse Practicioner, Oncology, Hematology) for 7/28/25. There was no appointment time for this Thursday’s labs & chemo as there should have been when after last Friday’s meeting with her. He got on the phone and sent a message through the portal since it showed his next chemo as August 6th! They called back and said it was a mixup and the is now back on the calendar for labs tomorrow and chemo #2 on Thursday, 7/31. We are a week behind schedule due to the low WBC (whit...

Tuesday, Willie got a hair cut. This was delayed from earlier this month when he had to reschedule but it was time. He didn’t get it buzzed off because I just didn’t think that would be good. So Elise just cut it short. The next day, Wednesday 23rd, he tried seeing if it would come out and sure enough it did! Of course I made him pose for a few photos which he dearly loves. Here’s one …. guess he won’t have hair for long. That said, it was a busy week this week. Willard got someone to provide a bid to pull out all our cherry trees. We are done, but that’s another story. He traded in the sprayer for a Kubota diesel side by side. And finally, when he got his labs yesterday, they cancelled his chemo today due to his white cell counts were just super low. He needs to get those up before they can give him rip d two. So he got a shot today of something that will bring up his white blood cell count to more normal. If that happens, he’s back on the calendar for next week, Thursday the 31st. Th...

Willie has is first Chemo round on Friday, 7/11. He had to be there from noon to 4:45pm and left with a pump. He had to go back on Saturday at 4:45pm to remove the pump after 24 hours. By Sunday morning he was feeling pretty good. No notable side effects to complain about except maybe an annoying sensitivity to cold. He tested that out with an ice cube and it shocked his tongue and also fingers. They warned him about this (see below for list of chemo drugs). Increased sensitivity to the cold Oxaliplatin can make you more sensitive to the cold. It can affect your throat causing it to feel as though it is difficult to breathe and swallow. This can happen whilst you have oxaliplatin or within a few hours of it finishing. It’s only temporary but can feel quite frightening. Opening and closing the fridge or freezer, touching metal, eating or drinking cold foods and changes in temperature from the weather can trigger this. It can help wearing gloves and avoid very cold food and drink before ...

We went back to the Mares Center (clinic) today, 4th floor to get Willie’s pump removed. Appointment exactly 24 hours after it was connected with the 5-FU chemo. The thing was beeping and showed low, and at 4:36 on the dot it was done. Nurse Erica flushed and removed the pump and off we went. The whole thing took about 10 minutes. Next labs 7/24 and next chemo 7/25.

Chemo day is here 7/11! Willie made it through it all with flying colors. His nurse, Justin, hooked him up to all the things that will hopefully shrink the tumors to prepare him for surgery in a few months. He will do 4 rounds of chemo, 14 days apart, with a PET scan after round 3 to see if it’s doing its job. He took some anti-nausea pills yesterday and steroids. The first drug they gave today was more anti-nausea and saline. So I guess nausea is a thing we can expect. We will see. They have big comfy recliners, coffee, pop, cookies, and snacks. But I brought some snacks of our own to eat and hung out with him from noon when we checked in until 4:45 pm when we left with the pump. The pump (CADD-Legacy Plus Pump) will put in final drug for the next 24 hours. He will go back tomorrow at 4:30 to get it taken out. This shows what he got done today. ⬇️ Next up will be labs again on 7/24. Then round #2 🥊 of chemo on 7/25 from 9am - 1:30pm.

Today Willie met with the nurse manager and we got instructions for tomorrow’s first day of chemo which will be a 4-5 hour ordeal. There’s quite a few chemo drugs he will have pushed and infused into his blood through the recently installed port. Then he will leave with a pump that will put chemo drugs into him for 2 1/2 days. They will unhook it after 2 1/2 days and he’ll get a break for 10 days. Then start that process all over again each 14 days for 3 more times (4 total). Today he took a pill that is supposed to help with nausea and he takes another one tonight. It all sounds pretty awful. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes. Some of the side effects don’t sound fun at all. Willie’s least favorite one is that one of the drugs would affect your body in a way that if it senses any cold it could cause your throat to swell or something like that. He really likes ice and ice cream so that pretty much sucks. I guess even opening up a fridge could have this effect. We were provided a bind...

Today we got up bright and early to go to the hospital at 5:30 appointment for Dr. Loewen to put in Willie's port.  They got him settled into a room and ready to go around 7am.  At that point I headed to the office to wait for the call to go get him.  That call was at 9am.  I have to say it was pretty cool that they set me up on text messages too that kept me in the loop each step of the process; 1) 7:34 AM PATIENT IS IN THE OPERATING ROOM 2) PATIENTS PROCEDURE HAS BEGUN, 3) PROCEDURE WENT WELL, FINISHING UP.  PROVIDER WILL CONTACT YOU SHORTLY, 4) THE PATIENT IS NOW IN THE POST ANESTHESIA CARE UNIT.  YOU WILL BE NOTIFIED WHEN THEY ARE READY FOR VISITATION, and finally 5) THE PATIENT IS BEING TRANSPORTED TO THEIR ROOM/BAY.  PLEASE CHECK IN WITH THE RECEPTIONIST.   So, I drove back up to the hospital.  Willie was alert when I got there a little after 9am.  We were on the road home by 9:45.   He's not supposed to do anything strenuous ...

Cancer really sucks! It sucks the energy out of you and those around you. Willie and I are super lucky to be surrounded by many good friends and famiily. For that, we are grateful.  Cherry harvest began on Sunday, 6/29 and we were both up bright and early to greet the crew. It's been hard to find pickers but Pablo came through for us again this year with a small but professional group. It was super exhausting for Willie (and me too) and emotionally draining as well. Tuesday was so hard, they went long, it was 100 degrees out, and the warehouse took 45 minutes to unload the truck while cherries were boiling in the bins on the back of it. Yesterday we called it quits, with 103 bins total (about 32,000 pounds) which is approximately half the orchard. The rest of the fruit will hang on the trees and rot unless anyone comes to take them for free. We will pull the trees out this year and just mow grass from here on out. We have learned that growing...