Hope on the Horizon

This weekend, my daughter emailed a copy of a newspaper article to me. She knows I like to keep up with all things cancer related and would definitely be interested in this miraculous news.

As I opened the email and began reading, my jaw dropped. I could barely believe my eyes.
The email contained an article about a small clinical trial involving a dozen rectal cancer patients. The trial participants were given a monoclonal antibody, Dostarlimab, every three weeks for a period of six months. (This drug is sold under the name, Jemperli, by GlaxoSmithKline and has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use in treating some types of endometrial cancer.)
During the trial, diagnostic tests were performed on each patientand the results were almost impossible to believe- the rectal cancers were gone! This was remarkable news and oncologist, Luis Diaz, Jr., MD, with Memorial Sloan Kettering, said: “I believe this is the first time this has happened in the history of cancer.”

All I could say was, “Wow!!!” The news was so exciting and all I could think was, “Now there’s real hope on the horizon.”

For the past 8 years, I’ve prayed for a cure for breast cancer. I’d always hoped for a cure for cancer since my first brush with it over forty years ago, when a dear friend was diagnosed and I’d watched her succumb to the disease, but when it entered my life, I took it personally. That’s one reason I’ve read and studied everything I could related to breast cancer. But breast cancer isn’t the only cancer out there. There are so many types of cancers and all cancer, in my humble opinion, needs to be eradicated.

Of course, there’s big money in cancer treatment and I’ve often wondered if that’s why we haven’t found a cure for many cancers yet, but this clinical trial is so promising, I hope people will understand the magnitude of it.

Though promising, the trial authors cautioned more research needs to be conducted on the effects of Dostarlimab. They hope to increase the size of the study by adding participants but are optimistic that this drug will prove safe and effective.

The medication is extremely expensive, running about $11,000 per dose, but many experimental drugs are very costly in the beginning and hopefully, as studies continue, the cost of the medication will be lowered.

The study indicated there was a low evidence of side effects and seemed to be well tolerated when compared to other types of conventional treatments for cancer.

All in all, it sounds like this clinical study was a huge success.

As a cancer survivor, I am extremely happy to read about a successful study. More often than not, we only hear about the bad news with regard to cancer treatments. There are so many negative side effects from chemotherapy, radiation, and even anti-hormone therapies.

The possibility of new drugs with few side effects able to cure cancers is almost too good to be true, but this small study proves it can be done.

There is hope and we must cling to that. We need more survivors in the world today, ones who will join us in hoping soon that we won’t have to fight cancer anymore because there won’t be any cancer to fight

Sometimes I just want to pull my hair out

Sometimes I just want to pull my hair out, especially when I read a friend's blog post and I just can't wrap my head around it. This morning, I was reading a post from a fellow breast cancer survivor. She said her cancer has returned and is growing in her spine. As soon as I read the words, I burst into tears. I just didn't understand! We'd been diagnosed with the same type of cancer in the same year. How could it be that her cancer had returned and mine had not? And what made it even more difficult to understand and accept was the fact that she'd chosen to go the traditional treatment route. I'd opted not to do that. She'd endured chemotherapy, radiation, and the anti-hormone therapy afterward. I'd refused chemo, had done 28 rounds of radiation, and had only taken the anti-hormone drugs for a couple of months. It just didn't compute and it certainly didn't seem fair. But that's what sucks about cancer. It doesn't follow the rules.

Cancer the gift that keeps on giving - the high cost of cancer

There's a basket of bills sitting in the corner of my bedroom. I try not to look at it as I enter the room but I know it's there. Its contents spill out onto the floor whenever my husband stuffs another bill into the basket. Usually, when the mail comes, he gets it first so he can filter what I see and what I don't see. Since he's the only one working, he takes care of our financial responsibilities and while I'm thankful for that, I'm not ignorant about our mounting bills. Cancer is expensive. Even if you've reached maintenance phase, it's costly. There are always tests to be run, blood to be taken, doctors to see. It never ends. Just knowing this will be a continual process for the rest of my life frustrates me and the alternative, death, will be my only way out. It would be nice to know that cancer could be a once and done kind of thing but that's only wishful thinking. Everyone knows cancer is a long and very involved illness. I had no id

Incoming!

When I was a kid, I remember listening to my Daddy occasionally talk about being in the service. Those occasions were very rare so whenever he'd talk, I'd really listen. Once he told about being outside a bunker in Japan. He said planes were flying overhead and he heard a guy yell, "Incoming!" They knew that meant it was imperative to take cover and they did, but some of the soldiers weren't fast enough. They lost their lives in a split second. That one word was a very serious warning and one I never forgot. I think my eyes bugged out of my head when he first said it although he didn't say it in a frightening way. I imagined the sounds of aircraft overhead as the warning went out. And imagined how I'd have felt if I'd been right there with him. I'd have been petrified, probably unable to move. No wonder so many soldiers came back from war with post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD). And when they were freshly home, it didn't take much to set t

Journey Out of Pink

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