A Big Day

We spent a good part of the day up at OHSU today. After spending two days at the clinic, meeting doctors and having great discussions, we decided to switch Marc's care to OHSU. We feel very good about this move. We feel that the medical oncologist we met with today is very attentive and is willing to turn over every stone with us to help us beat this disease. He is starting with a fresh slate -- looking at the pathology, the biopsy slides, doing additional testing, a new CT scan, new baseline tumor markers, etc. This doctor is not making any assumptions and is "leaving all the cards on the table" right now. He doesn't want to rule anything out.

We felt especially good about the impression we had that everyone there treated Marc like a unique person with a unique cancer. We also found it encouraging that they worked hard to accommodate our life and family (i.e., working appointments around school and work). They were willing to teach us about everything from nutrition to instructing us on how to unhook his pump at the end of treatment (instead of driving two hours round trip to have a nurse do it). These are the little things that make life between treatments so much more pleasant.

We left the clinic today feeling much more educated and comfortable about his future care. After a week of stress and emotion, it was a great way to go into the weekend. We have a plan and, more importantly, we understand the plan. That's huge!

So, the bummer is that Marc will be starting on chemo again on September 2nd. We kind of knew that was coming, but it seems so soon; however, this will be a different regimen...hopefully with less side effects. We are hopeful that this treatment will not just keep the cancer from progressing, but actually shrink it. We shall see...

Again and again, we must thank you for your continued prayer and support. Today was like a breath of fresh air and we are so grateful for a new direction and opportunity.

With much love and gratitude...