Following up with the UCSF doctors

Today I'm thankful for...
Very loving kids
Wonderful wife that is living life freely
Great medical care
God

Lulu and I made a trip down to the UCSF cancer clinic yesterday. Lulu had a scheduled appointment to see all the doctors that have been caring for her so far. We left after dropping the boys off at Our Lady of the Snows school. I knew the drive was going to be difficult, because the weather had turned cold and snowy one day prior to this trip. The weather didn't disappoint either. We needed to pass through two chain controls stations; one at Gold ranch and the other in Truckee. It looked as if mother nature had dumped 2 to 3 feet of snow in areas over the pass? Lucky though there weren't too many cars or trucks making the trip to Sacramento on a snowy Wednesday morning. I was glad that we had driven the All wheel drive van, and not the Prius, because if we had, I think that we might still be trying to cross the Sierra Nevada mountains? I really hope that this is the last time that we need to be worried about wintry weather when Lulu and I are to be driving over to San Francisco?

Lulu and I arrived at the clinic just in time to make her first appointment scheduled for 1 PM. She was scheduled to see the breast surgeon, the plastic surgeon, the radiation oncologist, and the much anticipated appointment with the oncologist (she was to talk about the next steps in Lulu's treatment, and what to expect in the next phase of battling this disease?) Given the chance Lulu was thinking about expanding her chest size, and I took that as a good sign that she was thinking about vanity and not so much about severity of her condition? She told the plastic surgeon that after going through all this cancer treatment this last year, she was going to get something out of it all, and since she couldn't be a DD (porno boobs), she was "going as large as I can get". I think that she was looking good and didn't need to increase in size, but the choice is making her happy, so I keep quiet.

After Lulu received her 50 cc of saline to expand her breasts to a "full C cup", we spent a good 40 minutes with the oncologist on the how far she's come, and what more is ahead? The oncologist explained that because the cancer wasn't very responsive to the chemotherapy that Lulu needs to have total estrogen suppression for the rest of her life, and there was talk about the removal of the ovaries if her cycle returns and the estrogen levels in her body increase. The oncologist explained that the chance of the cancer reappearing is directly related to the amounts of estrogen that Lulu's body is producing, so every that can be done to stop it is needed. Also, there was discussion on the chance of cancer cells in the blood and the bone marrow (where the blood cells are produced), so Lulu will undergo a bone marrow biopsy to find out if she has enough cancer cells invading her bone marrow to qualify Lulu for a experimental drug treatment to eliminate these cancer cells? So once the consents were discussed and signed Lulu was scheduled for a Bone Marrow Biopsy procedure in mid-May.

Once our stressful day of consultations with a half dozen health care providers, we were done and could start our 4.5 hours drive back to Reno. It donned on me that either all the UCSF medical providers were very caring individuals, or that Lulu feel into that very high risk cancer category and they were really feeling sorry for her? Lulu stated that she really likes all the medical team that is caring for her, but she wished that she didn't have to see them anymore? That really summed up my feelings too.

If Lulu is a candidate for the drug trial for the bone marrow treatment, she would need to be seen in the clinic for blood tests and follow ups once per month, and that would last for 6 months starting in June. Lulu is to have a second surgery to replace the tissue expanders that she now has with saline implants that will be her final breast fillers. So as much as she's been through there's still more trips to San Francisco and more meetings with her health care providers.

As we made are way back home, Lulu and I talked, cried, and discussed where we were at in our life's. It was nice to have her alone to share our feelings with each other, and secretly hoped that we would have many more of these ride together to share each other's company?