Well Hello Again

Hey now,

It's been a while I know. I think the reason why might have been hinted at in my last couple posts. I pulled inwards a bit while I waited for the MRI. It was a combination of stress and anxiety, a desire to not jinx it, and wanting to be careful about what I say. That's over now though, the medical check's been done. I know a lot of people who read this know me personally and will have seen or heard the news: it's working.

That isn't saying some super-guarantee like cancer is cured now you're officially safe forever. There's still a good bit of tumour in there. However, it does mean a whole fuckin lot. For the basic science, it's shrunk around 10% in the second 3 months of treatment(>3mm on 2 directions, depth change I'm uncertain of), without shrinking at all in the first 3. There are 6 months left. That's pretty damn significant with Temodal. I want to be careful about getting overconfident, but it has a lot of good implications. The effect of this type of chemo often takes a long time to show. They can have successful cycles of chemo where at the end of therapy it doesn't look like the tumor has changed at all, then slowly even after, it shrinks. That's because the chemo works moreso by stopping it from growing and killing its attempts to growth than righteously destroying it. The speed at which it's making progress, and the swift acceleration its showing, both give me great hope and optimism, and further determination to stick to all the support and maintenance I'm bringing in. The other part I found out, is if this works, and keeps it shrunk long enough that my body can recover from its experience, rather than having only radiation therapy as a next step/backup, I can potentially use Temodal again. Knowing radiation therapy was going to destroy my speech center and at least for a couple years render me unable to talk was a terrifying concept, and one that felt just around the corner with my prior conception of this chemotherapy. The fact that's being considered had some pretty heavy implications about what kinds of times they're thinking of in their own plan of attack from the medical side, and they felt pretty damn good.

As for my side, I do think that the medical marijuana is playing a big role in this, and I'm going to try to build my understanding of that better so when I try to talk about it I can be careful to not accidentally outright lie to people or falsely mislead them. I know some people will view marijuana as a cure on its own and in doing so often discredit it, and others view it as purely recreational, or purely therapeutic. My interpretation so far is it is more of an enabler than a direct cause of effect. It can help someone who feels like being lazy get more lazy. But it seems to me like it can help a determined S.O.B. make it through chemo in a pretty fun fashion. Shark fishing, zensaw time, quad runs, scallop diving, surveying and planning my new property... I haven't been too lazy, I promise. My hypothesis thus far is that rather than carrying out the act of destroying the tumour on its own, it moreso enables other agents to do so, whether that be the foreign body of chemo brought into the system, or your body's natural systems of resistance.

The other hypothesis that I've been developing that has seen some reinforcement with these results, is the big picture of physical and mental status can have great sway and influence on seemingly not directly related things. I've put a huge amount of focus and energy into both confronting some of my hidden childhood psych issues and repressed bullshit, as well as trying to deal with cleaning up after a bunch of old injuries, and re-working my posture and spinal alignment. I'll never try to quantify or objectively measure the contribution of all of those parts, but I do think components that would not be directly espoused within the regulated medical system stand a chance of playing a real role. That isn't to complain or speak badly about my doctors though. They are definitely doing a great job, and I've been very lucky to get such kind, compassionate, and intelligent people to help and support me through all this.


I'm still a bit in shock over the news, trying to figure out how happy I can let myself be with it, how optimistic I can go, and I'll be able to express myself a lot more clearly and have a lot more to say as this all clears up in my head. I just felt like it was time to get back on here and say something.