November 19th, 2014 §
Nothing poetic here today. Just a report.
The past week was already one of the most challenging I’ve had this year: my first infusion last week of a triple dose of Cisplatin had me down for the count while I was also digesting the news of the growing liver metastases and what needs to be done to try to reduce those. This week I had a PET scan and CT angiogram of the liver scheduled to assist in my pre-surgical requirements for the Y90 Yttrium radioembolization I talked about in my latest update (the Y90 process is also called SIRT: selective internal radiation therapy).
As a result of the PET scan we got some additional information and what we got was not good. Obviously that isn’t a surprise given that my bloodwork had already told us the prior chemos had stopped working and the cancer has been progressing. The PET confirmed that my liver is an area of increasing trouble with tumors multiplying and growing in size. Not surprising. Also as we suspected, the fluid around my heart appears to be malignant. Then there were surprises: apparently at least one malignant lesion in my brain and new cancerous areas throughout my skull and jaw.
The PET is not a good way to identify exact size and precise location of specific tumors, however. Therefore, on Friday I will need a brain MRI to get good imaging and see exactly what is going on. Then we will see what needs attention, what is watch and wait. Not all brain lesions should be radiated with gamma knife surgery immediately; it is a risk/benefit assessment when you’re shooting radiation into the brain. Obviously, though, gamma knife surgery is a treatment that will be considered once we have details on what we are looking at.
Skull metastases, despite sounding scary, are just bony mets. This is what systemic chemotherapies (treatments that are given orally or through IV that work throughout the whole body) are designed to work on. Brain lesions often need different therapy because many/most drugs do not cross the blood/brain barrier (or do so in an indirect or imperfect way) and so are not effective in counteracting metastases to the brain. Metastases to the brain often require a change in therapy to address this issue.
For now we proceed with the liver plan because that is a local therapy designed to work on just that issue. It needs attention now and isn’t changed (yet) by this new information. As for the rest, I will just have to see what the brain scan shows and go from there. It will be a long week of tests and waiting. Sometimes I wonder how I walk around knowing what is in me and what it is doing to me and still manage to get through the day. I have seen the roller coaster of what this disease does. Some things that sound terrifying end up being able to be managed.
We will be scheduling chemo intermixed with my liver procedures (day before, or maybe a few days after), adjusting the chemo doses to lower ones so that there is time for my blood counts to rise in the time needed. It will be an art and science to balance. By then we will know if the Cisplatin is working. I can only hope that it is and that it will. We have a few choices lined up for if it isn’t.
While all of this goes on I still search for that laugh, I still appreciate the small things.
Most people know my “bit of beauty” tweet by now (“Find a bit of beauty in the world today. Share it. If you can’t find it, create it. Some days this may be hard to do. Persevere.”). Judy Clement Wall has made this into notecards and a print and is donating all funds from sales through 2014 to my research fund at Sloan-Kettering. If interested, go here to her Etsy shop. I know that this is the quote many people will remember me for most. But I have another tweet I like to send out. Some days this one just feels right. It is:
Make the most of this day. Whatever that means to you, whatever you can do, no matter how small it seems.
For now, and again, I say: Onward.
(A housekeeping note: for anyone who has signed up to receive these posts by email but sees that posts aren’t arriving: you must confirm your subscription by clicking the verification option in the first email you will receive. If you have been wondering why you aren’t getting the emails, please re-sign up from the home page at www.lisabadams.com, upper right corner, and make sure to verify. There are loads of unverified requests and only you can do this part!)
November 2nd, 2014 §
Last week didn’t quite go as planned. I was hoping to post more pieces here to finish out October with some of my favorites. I will still try to get those up in the coming weeks. What prevented me from doing so was a week that became dominated with medical appointments.
Monday I saw my cardiologist to try to get some information about some symptoms I’d been having. My echo (and later in the week, the CT scan) showed there is some excess fluid around my heart. For now it is not causing any effect on heart function but we can’t rule out that it is a problem. I’ll have to repeat tests in a few weeks to try to see if it grows in volume (this would indicate a more sinister issue, and we would need to rule out a malignancy). For now, though, that goes on the back burner.
Tuesday I had bloodwork and IV fluids. The bloodwork is still a bit unclear about if the current chemo (Navelbine) is working. The rise in tumor markers is slowing but we need some definitive results this week, I think, to feel confident in interpreting them. The bloodwork also revealed I was anemic again, so on Thursday I went to New York City and got a transfusion of two units of blood.
On Friday I had a CT scan to compare to my last scan and help us make decisions about treatment. The CT showed both some good news and some concerns. While the lymph nodes and malignant tissue in my chest have resolved (chemotherapy in the last six months has worked and reduced those areas), my liver unfortunately shows two tumors.
The best thing at this time would be to biopsy portions of them (to gather tissue for future testing; my cancer has rarely been in areas that we can actually get samples, so this presents a rare chance to grab some) and also do ablation on them. Ablation is a localized procedure that when successful, destroys tumors of a particular size with very few side effects.
So, a lot is up in the air at the moment.
Because it is only Monday morning I don’t know what this week will bring in regards to chemo. We also don’t yet know if the interventional radiologists will decide that I am a good candidate for the ablation. For now, I wait.
Palbociclib, a drug I received through the expanded access (formerly “compassionate use”) program from Pfizer should arrive this week. That process took approximately 9 weeks and usually takes longer than that. I am fortunate my oncologist kept the process moving in such a timely manner (all applications and documents for such use must be done by the physician, not the patient).
I’m not feeling that well and have been primarily staying home for the last month. Now that I think about it, though, I’ve been basically staying home for the last ten months. Many days my half hour in the morning driving the older two kids to school is my only outing of the day. But I am patient.
At this point the options are still very reasonable and typical for this stage of the disease. I’m waiting for the next treatment proposal and then onward we go.
December 18th, 2013 §
“This one has to work,” she says, “It just has to.”
These are the words my phlebotomist says to me every time I see her. She says it strongly, willing it to be so.
I wish it were that easy. If wanting it could make it so… all of the people who send their support in prayers, thoughts, hopes, vibes, whatever it is they hope will help… all of those would work. And yet, here we are. Through no fault of theirs, or mine.
It is important to see the larger picture here, aside from my own life. It is important for everyone reading this blogpost to know that despite all of the hype and exclamation points and strong language about a cure or the promise of successful long-term targeted agents for metastatic breast cancer so that it can be more like a “chronic disease,” we are not there yet. The number who can live like that are the minority. Most live in this life and death game of Whack-a-Mole that I do now: metastases (“mets”) pop up, and you try to bash them back down but as you do they pop up somewhere else.
The state of metastatic breast cancer care is that you can’t just test your breast cancer, look on a chart to find the drug that will work and always shut it down. Metastatic breast cancer has eluded this formula so far. We don’t have drugs yet to even target every mutation. And we don’t know which inhibitors work. Most work best in combination with other treatments and we have to have clinical trials to test all of those options. All of those things take something those of us living with MBC don’t necessarily have: the luxury of time. In my case, I have a type of mutation called Pi3k-alpha in my cancer. I took an investigational drug that was a Pi3k-alpha inhibitor (along with another drug). On paper it should have worked. It was the most advanced type of targeted treatment I could get for that mutation.
Cancer is complicated. It has multiple pathways to get fuel. Block one? It finds another. And even when you have a drug that shows results in mice or in a few other people, you don’t know if it will work for you. There are too many variables, too many drivers of cancer in complicated feedback loops.
You can see where this is going. I have come out on the wrong end of the equation yet again. The trial drug combination did not work.
I’m no longer continuing on the clinical trial of GDC-0032 and Faslodex that I’ve been on for 8 weeks. The trial is required to drop me and we (my team and I) agree it’s not wise to stay anyway.
My CT scan showed stability in my disease in the bones, lymph nodes and lung nodules. That’s good.
But we have other more serious concerns now. The breathing problems I was having we knew were due to a pleural effusion which initially worsened 6-8 weeks ago and then seemed to improve about a month ago. I have still been aware of breathing issues throughout the day but it hasn’t had too much impact on daily functioning so I have just pushed through.
We now have confirmation that the pleural effusion is larger than in the last scan. The fluid that is causing the trouble is from metastases to the pleura (not to be confused with metastases to the actual lungs, the pleura is the sac that the lungs sit in. They usually have a trace amount of fluid present. This amount is a lot more. The fluid associated with the cancer has settled in the left lower lobe and has displaced the lung upward). In plain terms, there is cancer in the pleura that is producing fluid that builds up in that normally thin sac beyond what can be drained by the normal body process.
Additionally, my liver is now affected as well, unfortunately. There are mulitiple lesions that are metastases as well. This is obviously something I was hoping to avoid for a while longer.
The nature of metastatic breast cancer is that you don’t know how fast things will move or where the cancer cells will settle and thrive. They like the environment of soft tissues (liver, brain, etc.) so these developments are not surprising nor what I want to be hearing.
We need to get aggressive in a new way now. Anti-hormonal agents and inhibitors have not been working for me even though on paper they “should.” Treatments that logically should work might not. And that’s why I get angry when some very visible people in breast cancer care want to keep talking about how “close” we are to personalized treatments and even cures. The research has yet to support that idea. In fact, the latest research has repeatedly shown how complex the interactions are. We now know there are more than 30 subtypes of breast cancer. And even those subtypes don’t always respond alike to treatments.
Cancer is wily. And I hope I’m wrong about how far away we are from true leaps and bounds in MBC care. But I know I won’t see it in my lifetime. For how many decades now have we been hearing about those “breakthroughs” and “miracle drugs”? Yes, they’ve come in some cancers. But not MBC. Reporters and health care professionals in the public eye need to monitor how they spin info about the current state of metastatic breast cancer treatments. Let’s not send the message out about how “close” we are to a cure when there isn’t research to back it up. Let’s not send a falsely reassuring message out there that metastatic breast cancer doesn’t need much attention because soon we’ll be able to make it like a chronic disease anyway. Until we have actually done that, we must push full steam ahead and not encourage complacency in research.
Stepping off my soapbox to come back down to my life, what does that mean for me now? We must choose a new game plan. The one we talked about only days ago doesn’t seem the best option anymore (that’s one reason I don’t take the time to go into my plan B here when it’s still a hypothetical. You always have to be ready to adjust based on new information). We’re huddling and tossing around some options. I should know by Friday when I go back to my last clinic appointment on the trial. In all likelihood I’ll be going to traditional chemotherapy.
For now, it’s hard news to hear, especially at the holidays. I was originally diagnosed with early breast cancer on December 20, 2006. That anniversary approaches. I search for the beauty each day. I make myself find it. I won’t give up these days even when they are so hard. Today as I drove the kids to school the full moon sat above the horizon. It was beautiful in the blue sky after our gray day of snow and rain yesterday. We all looked at it. And I was glad to be able to see it with them.
As many of you already know, my first tweet of each day is a mantra I’ve written: “Find a bit of beauty in the world today. Share it. If you can’t find it, create it. Some days this may be hard to do. Persevere.” I love to start my day with that saying each morning. It centers me. And so many have responded that they like it too.
This news is not good. But as always, I go forward. As I’ve written elsewhere:
Cellular biology is King,
But paired to that fateful ruler I shall be a rebellious, argumentative Queen.
……………………..
One side note: with the popularity of my Twitter feed and the New York Times feature, my volume of email has soared in the past few months. I get so much mail, often with long stories and also requests for advice and guidance about cancer treatment and coping. I am so sorry to say that I cannot always respond to these letters. I hope everyone understands this. I am flattered but the time it takes to fully respond would be like writing a blogpost to each person. If the requests are easy, I try to answer as many as I can. I read every email that comes in and every comment on the blogposts. Any answers to emails come only from me. So I just am hoping that everyone understands that during these turbulent times, I won’t be able to reply to individual requests for advice and care. Thank you for understanding.
October 18th, 2013 §
I confess I have putting off writing this post. After getting results of my scans I needed a few days to just sit with the information. I have also been dealing with some physical issues during my washout period (an interval where you must be chemo-free) before my clinical trial starts on October 28th.
I had CT scans of my chest, abdomen, and pelvis. I also had a bone scan of my body. I had bloodwork and an EKG and a urine test. These are all tests that need to be done before I can start the clinical trial and will be used as my baselines. Monitoring will happen at frequent points throughout my treatment. Bone scans and CT scans will be done every 8 weeks for the first 6 months and every 3 months thereafter for as long as I am on the protocol. I’ll write more about the trial and the drugs (fulvestrant and GDC-0032) when I get underway on the 28th. I had a lot of trouble with with the blood portion as I only have my right hand and forearm for blood. It took six needles in that area (which included two blown veins) to get all of the radioactive tracers in and blood out. I will be discussing the option of putting in a port at my next appointment.
So the short story is that results were not as I’d have hoped. I wanted it to be clear that the cancer was still confined to my bones and lymph nodes, even if it were in more bony locations. This, however, is not what it seems to be.
First I need to explain about the tests. I’m going to briefly try to explain why it’s a bit of apples and oranges to compare my test from August with my tests last week and why all of it is a bit jumbled. In August I had a PET scan. In oversimplified terms this test picks up on high activity metabolic areas. So, cancerous tumors (and also some false positive areas on occasion) “light up” because they have a high number of rapidly dividing cells. It measures activity. CT tests, on the other hand, are static. They are like x-rays. They just take a picture without regard to whether the nodule/lump/tumor etc. is malignant. It shows there is something there but can’t necessarily tell you what it is in terms of metastatic breast cancer. CTs are very precise visually. PETs are not necessarily so. CTs in my case can’t tell us for sure if a spot is malignant.
I now have a small spot showing up on my liver that wasn’t visible on the PET in August. So is it a new metastasis? Or is it a benign spot that just didn’t show up on the PET because it’s not cancer? Who knows. We will have to wait and see if it changes when we do the next scans 8 weeks after the trial start (10 weeks from now). There are also nodules in my lungs and pleura. These are potentially (likely) malignant but the ones in my lungs have not changed size in 8 weeks.
I think that’s as much detail as I need to go into. The worst spots in my bones are my T12 vertebrae and my first rib/clavicle area. There are many spots but those are the ones that cause the most pain.
Unfortunately and most significantly at the moment, the scans also showed that the small pleural effusion (fluid in the lining around the lungs) has grown.
So we have many question marks with a few new areas of concern. For now we watch and wait. The pleural effusion will need to be drained if it grows or continues to cause breathing problems. For now any physical exertion gives me trouble. I need rest throughout the day but am trying to conserve energy for activities with the kids.
None of this news changes anything about my planned start of the clinical trial. Whatever these spots are and wherever the metastases are, the drugs I will start in ten days have the best chance to keep the spots stable and eventually perhaps shrink them. Reports from the phase 1 trial participants showed that often there was a stability period of about 8 weeks before some achieved some tumor shrinkage. I have ten more days to go chemo-free before I begin. I am counting the days. That start day is the most important day I have. A few of us in the trial are starting on that day so hopefully I will get to meet some of the other participants. There are 60 nationally in this phase 2 trial, approximately ten people will be at my location. There is relief in knowing there is no placebo in this trial. I may not respond but it won’t be because I received a placebo.
I wish I had better news about the scans but I also am resigned. This is what this disease does. I must do the best I can given my daily symptoms. There are questions marks and only time will give us answers. I try to have as much normalcy as I can, which often just feels like sleepwalking through the days and a bit of play-acting. But it’s important.
I keep coming back to a few lines I wrote recently:
Cellular biology is King.
But paired to that fateful ruler
I shall be an argumentative, rebellious Queen.
Wring the most out of each day.
Find those bits of joy and beauty,
Make sure that what I’m doing isn’t waiting around to die.
For truly, that would be a waste.
I can’t do anything more to change what’s happening inside. I have a plan and I just need the days to go by to get started. My quality of life is suffering at the moment but I hope that this will change. It is a rollercoaster, one I have been strapped inside unwillingly. Some days are good, some days are not. These happen to be some of the icky ones, but as always, I press onward.
Every morning I say to myself:
Find a bit of beauty in the world today. Share it. If you can’t find it, create it. Some days this may be tough to do. Persevere.
April 11th, 2013 §
A quick update. I’m sorry to say that my hand-wringing and concern in my last post were met with unfavorable results yesterday. My tumor markers were again slightly higher. In and of itself (an isolated rise) it would be acceptable. But this has been a trend for long enough that it’s evidence my current chemo has failed. Goodbye Xeloda. I’m sorry to see you go. I’d hoped for longer than six months on it for sure.
I’ve got a PET scan early this morning (Thursday). It is being used as much to see how much progression there is as to be used as a baseline before starting the next treatment.
I’m still talking with my oncologists about what the next treatment should be (options include oral anti-hormonals and various IV chemotherapies). Whatever I choose will be ripe with new side effects and demand monitoring. My hands will improve; much as I am happy about that, I am truly sorry to see the Xeloda go. I think you always want to hope that the first thing you throw at this disease will keep you stable for longer than this. But, the Xeloda did good work for six months. But we knew this day would come: on to the next.
I am glad there are still things to try. But of course, for now, I’m sad.
I’m still grieving and angry and all of those emotions. But I’m also learning new skills of compartmentalization and recovery. I move forward, I move on, I live. There is no choice. I change treatments and see what I can get from it. My life has become a puzzle shifting pieces; we move and mix them around until they fit. That fit won’t last, but hopefully it lasts for a while.
Do not be concerned if you don’t see a post for a bit. I’m going into research and decision-making mode. I appreciate all of the support from everyone. I know that if hopes and wishes and hugs could cure my cancer I’d be healthy for sure. I can’t acknowledge all of the messages right now and even the thank you notes for Tristan’s birthday party are sitting half-done. For now this is what I am focusing on and being every bit the mom and wife that I can be at every other moment.
Nothing poetic here today. Just a report.
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