Less than nuts

What should be my last post

2012-01-17T10:59:00.000-08:00

Like most things, I've put off making a final post on this blog for far longer than I should have.

I received the all-clear from my doc about three-weeks ago after a minor scare. I was scheduled to receive my final CT scan on Dec. 23 - setting myself up for an awesome or glum Christmas - when my onc noticed something on the results...two spots on my pelvis. Looking at them carefully, he said it would be "weird" (I actually like it when docs divert from the standard of using confusing medical terminology. I would have understood him if he said "unlikely" or "uncharacteristic," but him using the word "weird" seemed like something further down on the unlikeliness scale. My odds of having something "unlikely" I would put at 1 in 5, but my odds of having something "weird" I would put at 1 in 200) if the cancer had metastasized in my pelvis during treatment. I took that as good news, but as I would if the situation was reversed, my wife was clearly not satisfied with that answer.

"What's the worst-case scenario if it has metastasized?" my wife asked.

Still staring at the computer, the intellectual side of my oncologist's brain kicked on, and he went off on a rant about further treatments, bone marrow transplants, more intense chemo, etc. By the time his common sense part of his brain caught up with the intellectual side of his brain and, while panting, screamed "What the hell are you doing?" my wife had turned pale from fright and had tears welling up in her eyes. After a swift ass-kicking from the common sense part of his brain, he assured her that was very, very, very unlikely and further emphasized the fact that it would be "weird" for that to happen.

In another God-like move, my oncologist scheduled a bone scan two days AFTER Christmas...he was gonig to be out of town (along with 3/4 of the hospital's docs and surgeons), but he knew I had reached my out-of-pocket deductible with my insurance and that everything I had done before Jan. 1 would be free. So, he squeezed me in a bone scan, a follow-up appointment one hour later with the only oncologist who got finagled into working two days after Christmas, and bid me adieu.

Christmas was somewhat subdued for my family. As usual, I never gave it a second thought...my philosophy has always been that there's no sense worrying about things you can't change, so I put it out of my head and just enjoyed my bald holidays.

I went back for my bone scan after Christmas, and the oncologist that was filling in was an obvious pro when it came to dealing with cancer patients. He walked in the room and merged the good news with his introduction - "Hi Greg, I'm doctor so-and-so and your bone scan is fine." He knew that since he wasn't running a television game show or a television cooking competition, there was no use dragging out the suspense...I thought that was awesome.

The ride home was joyful. My wife was, obviously, excited. I got to call my parents for the first time in four months with good news (Let's recap my phone calls to them up to this point..."It looks like I probably have cancer," "I'm having a testicle cut out of me," "Yeah, that testicle they removed was cancerous," "The cancer has spread to my lymph nodes, so I need chemo," and "my white blood cell count is low, so I may have to be careful around Thanksgiving. Don't get sick."). Everybody at work was super happy...it was much better than two days before Christmas when I returned and everyone was in the front office, hunched over and ready to explode with cheers of happiness for the good news...only for me to tell them, "Uh, it's not entirely over yet." Oddly enough, as everyone was understandably happy, I wasn't "jumping around excited," which is how I normally am for minor things such as finding out that the McRib is back or that a band I like is coming to town. I think this experience has made me realize that when I'm at my happiest, I'm actually a bit subdued and pretty quiet, although I'm not sure finding out I was cancer-free was me at my happiest. After the past five months, I think I could best describe the feeling as "cautiously pleased."

I think that's why it has taken me so long to make a final post on this blog...throughout the past four months, every time I get optimistic about something, I get bad news. Now, I'm not a superstitious person, but I'm also not one to boldly break a mirror while walking under a ladder and kicking a black cat.

My hair is starting to grow back, although it's super-thin and makes me look like a guy that just had cancer. All of my side effects from chemo (which ended in early December) have obviously all disappeared. My appetite is back, my heartburn is gone and I'm almost back at the point where I could probably, cautiously, try Burger King again...the first food I ate after my first chemo treatment which made me cringe to think about for the past three months. I've got a scar from my orchiectomy and from having my port removed, but on the plus side, I've got something to remind me of all of this for the future. (No, I'm not talking about my scar...I'm talking about my port. Fun fact...if you ask nicely and persistently several times, the surgeon removing your port will clean it off for you and let you keep it. "I guess you paid for it," the nurse said as she handed me a biohazard bag with the port in it).

This should all be over, and I hope it is, but I'm hesitant to make a declarative statement about being done with all of this. In all honesty, I'm really not done. I've got years ahead of me of returning to that oncology department, having blood tests to check my tumor markers and meetings with my oncologist and CT scans to make sure that the cancer doesn't return. Many people who have had cancer talk about how this prevents them from living a normal life, but I don't have that feeling...I can put it out of my head and be perfectly happy, but I'm still cautious about raising my hands up and celebrating a definitive victory over a disease that came out of nowhere and brought my life to a standstill in the first place.

So, that's where I am. Five months ago, I was told I have cancer and became initiated into this weird club of people who had gone through an equally weird ordeal. Now, I'm just a guy with baby-fine hair starting to come back in on the top of a head that's still spinning from the speed of my diagnosis, surgery and treatment. I'm fine medically, and my personality hasn't really changed (as my doctors and nurses could attest to), but I'm constantly analyzing every pain, soreness or bump I have and trying to figure out its odds of being cancer (Average of my guesses: about 50%). Life is back to about as normal as it could be, and I'm still the sarcastic, slightly odd person I was when this all started.

This will (hopefully...very hopefully) be my last post on here, but I wanted to thank everyone that's read this blog and e-mailed, called, commented to me on the street or mailed me kind words about this. This has been pretty therapeutic to have an outlet to joke around about this whole "cancer thing." I'll keep writing weird stuff, but I'll likely put it on one of my other sites (if you're interested, check http://www.staticthinking.com/ in the near future. I finally redesigned it and may end up doing some random writing on there again).

Thanks for the encouragement and kind words from friends, family, strangers and neighbors over the past four months...it's made this whole ordeal much easier (albeit somewhat embarassing, but I guess that's what you can expect when you start a blog about getting cancer).

All clear

2012-01-02T09:20:00.000-08:00

I'm cancer-free.

Sorry about the short (and belated) post. More later.

A quick update

2011-12-27T07:00:00.000-08:00

OK, here's where I'm at so far with my whole "cancer thing."

Went for my CT scan last Friday all ready to party after getting the results. It's sad that I wasn't nervous about any part of it, except for drinking the medicine they give me to have everything show up on the scan. I was not particularly happy that it was vanilla-flavored. This is just another example of how I'm a 90-year-old man that's trapped in a 29-year-old's body...I have cancer and go in for tests that could tell me I no longer have cancer, and I'm upset about the flavor of medicine they give me. One could probably describe me as "crotchety."

Waited 1-1/2 hours for the results, and when I saw my doctor, rather than the reaction I expected...pulling a handful of confetti out of his white coat and throwing it up in the air while saying in his trademarked, monotone voice "yeah, it's clear," he instead asked me to come over to his computer to look at my scan.

He informed me that my lymph nodes were clear...the chemo took care of the growth that was on them without a problem. This was great news. However, he also pointed out a couple of white spots on my pelvis that the scan produced. These, he said, were slightly worrisome. He spent 10 minutes on the phone trying to get my CT scan I had taken before I started treatment from another hospital with no luck, and so he finally shrugged and said that either way, I'd need a bone scan.

My wife asked him what would happen if the cancer metastasized and went into my bones, and the doctor part of him immediately kicked in...he began talking about more chemo, surgery, all the processes they'd need to do. Then, noticing the worried look on my wife's face, his brain must have screamed, "What the hell are you doing?" and he explained to us how unlikely it was that the cancer had spread to my bones. In medical terminology, he even said, and I quote, that would be "really weird." It was most nothing, but he scheduled my bone scan (which takes place today) to get it checked out to be sure. I thought about telling the doc that when I had my CT scan done, I had some Skittles in my pocket, but thought better of it.

So, that's where I'm at today. I'm going for a bone scan, which doesn't require me to drink anything, but does require me to get some more dye injected into my veins. After this, however, hopefully all of this will be done and I can quit writing these teenage-esque blog posts about how I'm feeling and what I'm thinking about and mix it all in with pop culture references.

I'll update when I find out more this afternoon. If it's good news, I'll likely high five everybody in the state of Iowa, so if you live here you'll likely see me running down the street with a megaphone.

Chemotherapy is almost exactly like Gene Wilder

2011-12-13T09:27:00.000-08:00

One week from this Friday, I'll take my CT scan. With good results, less than a week after that, the port that I've been receiving my chemo treatments through will be removed, my hair will grow back within six months and this whole "cancer thing" will be over. It's a weird, strange, synonym-describing feeling to nearly have all of this behind me, and that's mainly because it never really started.

Did you ever read a book when you were younger that A.) Hadn't been made into a movie, and B.) If it had been made into a movie, you hadn't yet seen it? If you haven't, I'm surprised you're reading this blog post right now and not arguing with somebody online about which Twilight character is cuter under the the moniker "MrsBieberLOLZ1995." If you have, however, and if that book was fiction, you've likely used your imagination to create something.

I remember reading "Hatchet" by Gary Paulsen when I was younger. I'd never seen a movie about the book (I really, really hope they didn't make one because it would undoubtedly be terrible and it wouldn't force kids that were given the book as an assignment to actually read an awesome book), and when it came to creating an image of what the character looked like and the L-shaped lake he was living on in my mind, I was forced to actually conjure up descriptions of each out of thin air. As the narrative went on, I had to add details to the images that I'd created of this story in my mind, ending with a character and location that likely in no way resembled what somebody else may have created while reading this story.

Now, when you read a book and then see a movie based on that book, everything is destroyed. You can't read "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and then watch the movie "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" and see Willy Wonka in your mind as anybody but Gene Wilder. No matter what crazy person you've created in your mind, and no matter what physical attributes you've made them have that fit with Roahl Dahl's description, when you watch "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," Gene Wilder grabs a candy cane sucked down to a point and stabs your image of Willy Wonka right in the chest, making him evaporate and disappear from your mind forever. Then, if your mind works the way mine does, Gene Wilder looks you in the eye and says, "I'm Willy Wonka. Capiche?" (Why he's suddenly an Italian gangster and why Johnny Depp's character doesn't even play into this equation is completely unknown. This is how my brain works, and I tend not to question its eccentricities.)

This is how cancer and going through chemotherapy has been for me...like reading a book and then watching the movie. As a journalist, stories about people with cancer tend to be like catnip for readers, and so we write a lot of them. Although I'm only 29 and have been in journalism for about 3 years now, I've written probably a dozen stories about people with cancer...whether they're about benefits, a prelude to a cancer walk, etc. While writing all of these, I developed an idea of what having cancer, and going through chemotherapy, would be like. I had no idea what it was like myself, but through interviewing and talking with people that had gone through it, my imagination created this dark, abysmal picture. Then, by some crazy bit of chance, I rode a horse, exacerbated my left testicle and was diagnosed with cancer myself. Who'da thunkit. (Not sure why I correctly used the apostrophe there...that's making a goulash out of several words and a mockery of the English language)

Anyways, after being half-neutered and finding out that I needed chemo, I felt I had a pretty good idea of what to expect: hell. I'd metaphorically "read the book" and had created a nice description of what I was to expect in my head. It wasn't until I started going through it that I realized that everything I had thought about chemo was completely wrong. My idea of chemo had been "Gene Wilder-ed."

For each of my three rounds, the only thing that seemed like legitimate chemo was the first week of each...the week where I was in a chair for five straight hours. First week of round 1 was OK. First week of round 2 was tolerable. First week of round 3 was completely horrible. None of it was how I had imagined chemo to be like, however. Talking with others, I thought it was going to be like having the flu for two straight months. Sometimes I'd feel good, sometimes I'd be throwing up, but it would vary day-to-day. This wasn't the case at all...I was actually able to prepare myself for the worst, and it never got close to being as bad as the scenario I had built up in my head.

Now, being near the end, it feels like I never really even started this whole thing (other than being bald), and I'm really anxious to interview somebody with cancer at this point. I'm interested to see if they've had the same experience...if they went into it with a preconceived notion about what it would be like, and if their idea held any weight whatsoever.

So, now that I've seen the movie, my idea of what treatment would be like for all of this is completely shattered. I guess if I was interviewed about this process, my story would be pretty unremarkable and the journalist that was asking the questions would be sitting there thinking, "Come on, give me something to give this story some oomph" like I have so many times while sitting in that same seat. I supposed that's because there's a huge disconnect between people that have read the book and people that have seen the movie. Once you've seen the movie, your entire perspective on it changes, and there's really not any way to see it any differently, and at this point I'm pretty happy about that.

Done with chemo.

2011-11-29T20:14:00.000-08:00

It's over.

I'm actually hesitant to type that, so I'm going to clarify: I just finished my last chemotherapy session this morning. I now wait a month, take my CAT scan on Dec. 23 (it's actually a family holiday tradition to drink dye, hold our breath while passing through a large machine, and then have diarrhea, so that's actually pretty normal), and then if everything comes up clear, I have my port removed (deported) shortly after Christmas.

In the meantime, my white blood cell count, including my neutrophils, are way low again, so I'm trying to take it easy and not get sick when I'm this close to the finish line. Fortunately, I've got more antibiotics and I don't plan on hanging around any flu-ridden people anytime soon. Actually, that's not entirely true, as I have an ambulance shift for my EMT class this Saturday, but I plan on wearing a mask on the calls until I find out the person isn't some sort of disease carrier. Nothing inspires confidence when you call for an ambulance like a pale bald guy in a surgical mask, huh?

Now, we start the monitoring. Apparently this is far from over, what with tests every 4-6 months for the next five years or so. I've read a lot of personal experiences of other guys having a problem with this, but I'm actually a big fan of it. It's essentially buying insurance that says I will not have to worry about finding out I've had cancer blitz my body for the next five years. Sure, I could get the news that it's returned, but then i just start working on the cure for it again...a hell of a much better option than being told it's Stage IV and having the doctor have to psych himself up to give me updates.

With the chemo treatments behind me, it's nice, but it doesn't feel like the monumental moment I was thinking it might be. I'm still slightly tired, I still don't have the teenager-like-appetite I had before this all started, and I still go to work looking like the principal from Back to the Future that calls everyone "slackers." It feels like, with ongoing treatments and my hair slowly growing back...apparently not likely to return until next April or May...I'm going to be eased back into normal life. Hell, I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to return to life like it was before I started this entire process, and I'm not even entirely sure that I want to. It's not like I'm living carpe diem, running around barefoot and smelling roses and freaking everybody out (which would inevitably come from my barefoot-ness...I have strange feet), but I'm not like I was before, either. I think more about my future and my health, I think more about my life's "to-do list" and what I want to accomplish, and I'm a lot more reflective on what I've done so far in my 29 years of life. I'm not going to lie, initially hearing the words "cancer," even with a high rate of a cure, does make you think of death, and it made me realize how short life is and all that stuff. More than inspiring me to go do heroic deeds, however, this process has made me realize that I'm proud of the life I've lived so far and will hopefully keep me focused on not screwing up what I want to do with my future (items on my life to-do-list still include "Have an organized crime outfit owe me a favor (and use that favor on something meaningless...like the boxed DVD set of Dawson's Creek)," "Reach a point as a father where I realize I've created a sarcastic little monster," and "Write a book that includes a worthless, cleverly hidden message in the final paragraph."

This entire process has been beneficial for me...I just have to make sure that I keep in mind that I conquered testicular cancer when there are many people diagnosed too late to do that, and be grateful for that. Then I can use that thought to motivate me to save a mobster's life or teach my future son or daughter to say, "Well, that's....unique." Or, you know, good stuff.

Fortunately, that reminder won't be hard to keep in mind. I just turned 29 earlier this month, and in the true spirit of awesomeness in my family, my brother and sister-in-law found the perfect, sentimental gift that says more than words ever could. It's subtle, touching and will provide me with a constant reminder of getting past one of the most difficult parts of my life...and it's sure to make my wife feel awkward when she takes the car keys that this is on. That's the gift that keeps on giving.

For those of you keeping count at home...I'm up to three.

Long overdue update

2011-11-22T10:01:00.000-08:00

I apologize for not updating my blog last week like I meant to...the truth is, I tried to write an update several times, but every time I'd try to describe the experience, I'd start feeling sick. Fortunately, I'm feeling much better now and can talk about my last marathon week of chemo without feeling like my stomach is going to revolt on me.

So, the nausea finally hit me last Thursday. I woke up, ate breakfast, threw on my "Chemoutfit" (I kind of hate myself for typing that a little bit), went to the hospital, was led to my little chemo suite, and as soon as the nurse left the room I made a beeline for the bathroom and got violently ill. As I wasn't expecting this to happen, I suspect I ruined Captain Crunch with Crunchberries for me for life. It was like what I imagined chemo might be...horrible and Exorcist-like.

That day, I went through treatment, dozing through quite a bit of it. I was able to keep my stomach under control once I put on my headphones and listened to my iPod, which did a decent job of drowning out the sound of my IV pump. I used to not mind the somewhat rhythmic noises it made, but now it just makes me feel sick (kind of like the band Offspring. How do you go from "Ixnay on the Hombre" to that Weird Al style on "Americana" in one year?). The tough part is, looking back on my early morning ruining of Captain Crunch with Crunchberries, I didn't know what music I could safely listen to without ruining for life by associating it with chemo sickness. I also didn't want music that was super slow or super hard, so I had to find kind of a middle ground...settling with a mix of The Shins, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, and Jack's Mannequin. When I'm going through treatment, I guess I need the type of music that makes for awkward concerts...the music is too slow to rock out, but too fast to just sway, leaving the audience in a weird, bouncing motion.

After treatment Thursday, I was done. I went home, forced myself to eat some mac and cheese, sent off an e-mail to my EMT professor letting him know I'd be missing class that night, and went to sleep. I seemed to drift in and out of sleep all afternoon, evening and through the night. Although spending 18 hours in bed sounds appealing at some points during your day, it's really pretty horrible...especially when your mind is on a constant loop of "OK, think of something besides chemo and foods that make you feel sick. Nope, don't think of that. Nope, don't think of that. OK, think of anything...waves, the ocean...and you're just relaxing on a....where the hell did that Burker King sandwich come from? Stop thinking about that, you're going to make yourself sick!"

The next morning, it was more of the same, but in a different order. Wake up, get violently ill, go to treatment, listen to bop rock for five hours, go home, play "Chicken" with thoughts of foods that make me sick and doze. By Saturday, I was able to move around a bit more, but not much. I watched TV nearly all day and felt pretty successful when I was able to eat some chicken nuggets and tater tots. Sunday was a little better, but definitely not 100%.

Oddly enough, today is probably the first day I feel like I'm back close to normal (or the "new normal" I've been able to redefine through this experience). I had my onc appointment yesterday, and it was nothing but good news: my neutrophil count is back above 2,000, so I don't need to worry as much about getting sick, my white blood cell counts are good, and I'm on the downhill slide for my treatment. My onc even managed to schedule my CT scan and port removal before December ends so that it can all be counted under my "out-of-pocket expenses" on my 2011 insurance, which is huge for me since that'll probably hit my cap and save me some cash.

So, that's where I'm at. I'm nearly back to normal, and I've only got one chemo treatment left now...next Tuesday, and it's only Bleo, which takes me about an hour and the only side effect is jittery legs from putting Benadryl in my IV.

While the past five days have been horrible with nausea, it really hasn't been anything unbearable at all. I noticed that, whenever I worry about throwing up, that all disappears after it happens. I freak out, feeling like crap, not wanting to throw up, and then when it happens, I realize it wasn't that bad and I feel a whole lot better. The only downside is, after I'm done I look in the mirror and see this pale, bony, sweaty bald guy looking back at me and I think I've encountered one of the vampires from "I Am Legend," which is a bit unsettling. Fortunately, now I know that Captain Crunch and Burger King is like garlic for these beasts, so that should be able to keep them at bay.

I'll wait to get really introspective on this entire process until it's officially over, but looking at the point I'm at now and where I've come from, I've been pretty happy with all of it. Cancer is a bit of a roadbump, but it really hasn't been the "show-stopping event" that I thought it might be. Total tally, over the course of my diagnosis, surgery and treatments, I think I've missed four days of work. During that time, I also managed to get through my 135-hour EMT course (although it's not finished...my final test will be a couple weeks after treatment ends), launch a couple of new projects at work and continue the minimum amount of updates on my Civil War-era house that allow me to feel not completely worthless. Of course, nearly all of my productivity happened on weeks where I wasn't going through "marathon chemo," but I'm still happy with how it's been going.

So that's where I'm at right now. Nearly back to normal, excited to eat large amounts of food this Thursday, and counting down the days until my final treatment is over and I can get that last CT scan to see if my cancer is totally gone. If it's not, no biggie...I know now that I can handle chemo (even with some nausea) and if it requires surgery, so be it. It's not like there's anything more I can be doing, and if this experience has taught me anything, it's that you can only do so much with what life deals you. An obstacle isn't made any easier to overcome by worrying, crying, griping or getting angry. The only thing I've found that makes a tough situation easier is laughing about it and doing what you've got to do to put it behind you.

Three down, two to go...

2011-11-16T15:54:00.000-08:00

I got through Wednesday of my marathon chemo week just a few hours ago, and man...it's a journey.

Sitting in that chair for five hours each day is kind of rough. Yesterday, I brought along my iPod, hoping that three seasons of "Breaking Bad" would help me just space out and pretend like I wasn't having poison pumped through my veins. I totally forgot that the main character in the show is also being given chemotherapy, however, and seems to get sick every five minutes. That's like one of the Kardashians watching ESPN to try and forget about a failed relationship.

I've definitely been taking advantage of sleep this week, too. I got home from work yesterday at 5:30, napped on the couch until dinner was ready at 6:30, ate dinner and hung out with my wife until 8, and then slept until this morning. I woke up, went to chemo, did a bit of work on my laptop, and then napped for about 2 hours. That's a crazy amoung of sleep for me, considering I usually operate pretty well with only 6 hours of sleep per night.

Not only that, but apparently this low white blood cell count isn't a great deal for me either. I'm low on neutrophil, which although reminding me of Nutri-Grain bars, is apparently a type of white blood cell. According to some hard-core research I did on Wikipedia, normal people have about 2500-7000 units of these. People going through chemo tend to have levels around 1000. I apparently am sitting pretty with 360.

As a result, I've been forbidden to do much of anything where I have a chance of being exposed to illnesses. So, my normal weekday activities (giving zerberts to babies with runny noses, licking door handles of 24-hour convenient stores and hanging around local pharmacies just breathing in the air) are out. About all I'm risking is going to my EMT class tomorrow, and that's only because I have a test and there are hand sanitizer pumps every 15 feet.

Aside from living the rest of this week in seclusion, I'm constantly battling with my stomach, which is trying to decide whether it hates me and everything I put inside of it, or whether it just wants to chill and go to bed. I haven't thrown up since starting chemo (you can't see me right now, but I'm knocking on wood like crazy since typing that), but my body is definitely giving me some signs that it would very much enjoy doing so. That nasty chemo taste in my mouth, weakness and the fact that any food I think about makes me feel slightly nauseous isn't working in my favor, so I've just kind of got to force whatever food down my gullet that I can and then try to sleep for 12 hours straight.

So, that's where I'm at. I've only got two more freaking days left of this week. If experience is any indicator, once I hit this weekend, I'll still be weak, but I should be steadily improving. Then, it's just a 1-hour treatment on Nov. 22, Thanksgiving on Nov. 24 (which should be perfect timing for my appetite, granted my white blood cell counts rebound or I don't have sick family members at home), and my final chemo treatment on Nov. 29. Then, a mere 3 months after this whole "cancer thing" began, I should be somewhat done with it and can start concentrating on the fun stuff in life - waterfowl hunting in panhandle Nebraska this January, the Iowa Newspaper Association convention in February, and a trip to San Antonio, TX, in March.

Even more than that, however, I'm looking forward to ditching this "new normal" I've created and returning to my "old normal," although slightly tweaked. I can't wait to cook and eat food and actually appreciate the taste of it, I can't wait to hang out with friends without worrying about someone being sick or whether having one or two beers will make me nauseous, and I can't wait to get back to a life where, although appreciative to have beaten the "lowercase C" (I still consider early-stage testicular cancer to be 'bargain bin cancer' compared to others), I can actually base time in terms of doing stuff with my wife and friends, rather than what week in what round I have coming up for chemo.

The nice part is, all that separates me from that "old normal" is just two five-hour sessions this week, and two cakewalk treatments spread out over two weeks with some great family, food and fall weather in-between. If I can just keep myself from puking at the sight of an IV bag, I should be able to coast past this finish line after all.

Let's start the countdown....5 days

2011-11-14T08:21:00.000-08:00

Got some pretty bad news from my doc today. My white blood cell count is way low, so they're putting me on antibiotics. No, that's not the bad news...the bad news is I have to eat two spoonfulls of yogurt with my antibiotics. I freaking hate yogurt. The doc said it, and I glanced at my wife who was shaking with laughter. I could have sworn she paid the doc to say it...but then again, I would respect any doctor who was taking low payouts to hilariously tell people they need to eat food they hate. Force a guy to eat some yogurt and make $20 on the side...respect.

I start my last marathon week today, and I couldn't be happier to get it over with. These marathon weeks are the worst, and by the end of this I should be absolutely dragging, so I'll try and blog each day this week to let people know how it's going.

Today, I went through my usual routine: go in, get my port accessed (read: stick a needle with a tube coming out of it in my chest and let me walk around with that thing dangling out for a while...like a car with its gas tank open), go to a small room and get my weight taken. They have this trick where, before they call the patient back, they set the scale to what your weight was the previous time. This allows you to know within a matter of seconds whether you've gotten fatter, which is nice. Today was weird...I actually lost weight from my last appointment. My wife confirmed how weird this was. "You've eaten nothing but cake this past week," she said. That was entirely accurate...in fact this morning, remembering my doc told me to eat something before chemo, saw the sheet cake (90% eaten by myself this past week) on the table. I quickly cut a piece and, knowing that the daycare kids would be arriving shortly and my wife would give me crap if she saw I was eating cake for breakfast, decided to eat it as quickly as possible. I cut off a huge bite, shoved it in my mouth and chewed it twice before I heard my mother-in-law say from behind me, "Cake for breakfast?" As I was explaining my orders to eat something, my father-in-law came up behind her. "Cake for breakfast?" Next, my wife came out of nowhere, before I even had a chance to swallow my bite. "Cake for breakfast?" Yes. And if we're being honest here, it's the third time in the past week I've done it (once with ice cream) and I still lost three pounds. Maybe I should start marketing a very specific diet...cake and cancer. Sure, it's a give-and-take type of diet, but it gets results. And it makes you feel like you're a 10-year-old living alone like the kid in "Blank Check."

I'm actually feeling pretty good starting my chemo today. I'm trying to start the week with a good attitude so by the time I get to Friday, and the then-25 hours I've spent having chemicals pumped into me, I'll hopefully still be clinging to a fraction of that enthusiasm and not want to just lie in bed and spend all my energy convincing my body not to get sick.

So, I'm preparing for war. I've got my laptop, some coffee, three seasons of "Breaking Bad" on my iPod, work I should get done for my full-time job, and homework I can always do for my EMT class.

For my EMT class, I showed up for my first ambulance shift yesterday wearing a plain, navy blue stocking cap approved by my instructor. On my first call, I impressed the paramedic I was riding with by, after providing care and during our transport back to the ER, engaged our patient, who was 90+, in a lengthy discussion about Canada, the midwest, agronomy and other random subjects. Once we got the lady in a room and situated, he complimented my bedside manner and what I did, but asked "what's up with the stocking cap?" I told him about my chemo and how I figured it didn't inspire confidence in patients to have a bald EMT student responding to help them. He laughed and said that as I long as I kept up a pleasant demeanor, they didn't care what we looked like. "Besides," he said, "look around." Every guy in the room was bald. I may have found the perfect part-time job for a bald dude, however I'll have to see how much cake the cafeteria has.

So, that's where I'm at right now. Five days of five-hour-per-day chemo sessions, then two weeks of the easy stuff - one chemo appointment per week (on Tuesdays) for about an hour, and then I'm done. I'll finish my chemo at the same time I finish my EMT class, and life will go from crazy to an absolute standstill - no appointments, no lab work, no class time, no clinicals. I'm not exactly one to just sit still, so I guess I'll have to find something else to take up my time. Maybe I'll get lucky and catch some other crazy disease. Or maybe I'll just learn Spanish. One of those sounds much more appealing than the other, but we'll see what happens.

Like a cancer patient loves cake...

2011-11-10T07:44:00.000-08:00

I apologize for the lack of blog posts the past week here...this would normally be a situation where I would just blame it on cancer (pulling the C-card), but that's really not the case. To be honest, it's because, cancer-wise, I've felt fine and have been trying to do as much as I can before I start my marathon chemo week next week. I figured that, while I didn't feel like just sleeping all day and fighting with my brain over the urge to get sick, I might as well take advantage of my health and get some freaking work done. Mission partially accomplished...I think I've managed to get half of what I wanted done at work completed, and raked my front yard. By the way, for my friends I make fun of for living in nice, new neighborhoods with no trees, I take it all back....raking my front yard, which is about 1/5 of my lawn = 22 bags of leaves. As my wife would say, "that's a sarcastic amount of yard refuse."

The past two weeks I haven't taken any anti-nausea medication at all, and I've been eating like a horse. They always say that chemo affects your appetite, and on the weeks that I have treatments every day, it does (taking my appetite almost down to nothing), but in these off-weeks I've definitely been making up for it. In fact, during these off-weeks I've actually gained weight (mainly just gaining back weight I lose during the marathon weeks). I chalk this up to me using the C-card to eat whatever I feel like at the time. ("Do I want ice cream? Hell yes I want ice cream...I've got cancer.") If people get ice cream when they have their tonsils removed, I feel like I've earned an entire sheet cake for having a testicle lopped off. (I love describing it like that for people...taking a complicated medical procedure and making it seem like my oncologist just used a butcher knife and removed it like he would a coconut from a tree).

Next week starts my third round, and the end of this whole thing is finally in sight. Well, somewhat. Even if I'm given the "all-clear" after finishing chemo, waiting a month, and getting another CT scan, it sounds like I'm still going to have to go in once a year for pretty much the rest of my life to check my body and make sure it isn't harboring any more cancer. There are really two ways to look at it...the first is that I'm going to be a patient the rest of my life. That's kind of depressing, so I completely disregard that perception and look at it in another way: I've pretty much been given a card that says that odds are very good that I will never be that person that goes into the doctor's office and is told that cancer has taken over my body. With yearly CT scans, it's very unlikely that shortly after a scan, some cancer is just going to "do work" and take over a chunk of my body, catching me completely by surprise the following year. Worst-case scenario, they'll catch cancer that's had 11 months to take hold, and my chances of fighting it off will be much higher. That's like having the Cadillac of cancer prevention plans...and it's a big "take that" to my insurance company, which I'm pretty sure would try to deny me everything but "a gallon of leeches for a transfusion" if they thought they could get away with it.

I haven't really started thinking about what life's going to be like when this is all over...mainly because I'm focused on just getting through next week, and the constant distractions in my life are doing a good job of keeping me focused on the short-term right now. I talked with a guy who has survived a few cancer scares last week, and he told me that with each battle, it's been the same thing. Get cancer, get a new perspective on life, beat it, slip back into just taking life for granted, repeat process. He had cancer at a young age like me, and said it was actually really beneficial, which is kidn of how I've been looking at it, too. It's kind of like taking a life experience that most people don't get until they're 75 and giving it to someone in their 20s...now, in addition to my other old man habits (playing Scrabble, eating Werthers Originals, waking up early, reading the newspaper, making inappropriate jokes about death, griping about how horrible modern music is, etc.) I can add "taking a nonchalant attitude towards having cancer" to the list. Maybe now they'll let me buy a Caprice and join that assisted living center in town. I mean, I'm already bald.

That brings me on to another weird thing...being bald. As part of my EMT classes I'm currently taking, I was required to complete 16 hours of clinical time working in a local emergency room. This is strange...a young bald guy that looks like he has cancer working in an ER. Because of my low white blood cell count, I pretty much wore a mask into each room I went into until I ruled out the possibility that they had something I could catch. With each patient that reported a medical history that included cancer (man, there's a lot of them!), I wanted to mutter a "Yeah, I hear that," without looking up from my clipboard while scrawling notes, but I didnt' feel that was appropriate. I also found out that being bald, pale and wearing a surgical mask scares the hell out of kids. I'm going to keep that in mind for Halloween next year.

So, that's a quick recap. Three weeks left of treatment, I wait one month to make sure everything is out of my system, and then I take a CT scan to make sure the cancer's gone. If it's not, I go in for Retroperitoneal Lymph Node Dissection (RPLND), where they essentially carve off my abdominal lymph nodes....pretty much what my wife does when she cuts the fat off chicken before cooking it. Yep...that's another example of taking a complicated medical procedure and reducing it to a cooking metaphor. Either way, whether the chemo takes care of it or surgery does, it'll be done before next summer. I'm thinking once this is all finished, I'm going to have to throw a "welcome home" party for my hair. You're all invited, and there will be alcohol and wigs involved.

The timing on getting cancer couldn't be worse...

2011-10-31T07:20:00.000-07:00

Of course I get cancer and have to go through chemo at the same time the McRib is released for only a limited time. Man, life sucks.

OK, that's a bit hyperbolic, but the frustration with eating foods I enjoy is definitely being felt.

I haven't updated in a while, and that's because last week was my marathon chemo session - five days in a row, approximately five hours each day, non-stop chemo action. I tried to write a blog entry about it late last week, but I felt nauseous even writing about what I was feeling. For some reason, although I've never been one that's heavily dependant on my senses, when it comes to chemo it's absolutely brutal trying to recall the smells, sounds and tastes of everything. I get a whiff of the blood thinner, or alcohol or even the soap that they use in every freaking hospital bathroom and I just immediately feel sick. I feel like a bloodhound with a super-sensitive nose that has been tied up inside of a Long John Silvers. No variety here...nothing but fried fish and hushpuppies, and it all smells like garbage.

The weird thing is, I haven't even gotten sick yet. I've been close...on Thursday, before they put the needle in my port, I put in a watermelon Jolly Rancher to help me forget about the smells and tastes involved with the chemo and I had to spit it out immediately...I nearly got sick at that moment. That one hard candy triggered some Pavlovian reaction where my body knew when I took a watermelon Jolly Rancher, my body was about to get pumped full of poison. I assume Chad Kroeger's body goes through the same thing when he yells out "Hey *city name*, we're Nickelback. Are you ready to rock?"

So, last week got progressively worse as the week went on until Friday, at which time I went to treatment, listened to my iPod nearly the entire time to drown out the sound of the infusion pump, sprayed cologne on my stocking cap before going in so I had something to put up to my nose when I knew I was going to deal with strong smells from meds and such, and went home to sleep away the rest of the day. Yep...I carried around a cologne-sprayed item like I was in Shakespearean times, and that's because my body is now a smell factory.

I never really realized how much my body identifies smells. In the past, before going on a vacation, my wife and I would do what most people do...go out and buy soap and deodorant because we don't want to be all sweaty in a different location, and like most people, we have an irrational fear that the hotel we're traveling to might be the one hotel in the world that doesn't supply soap and shampoo. We found out after doing this a couple of times that we tended to buy new-smelling deodorants or soaps, and after returning from our vacation we would associate those smells with our trips. That finally hit me after sitting in the chair on Thursday, pulling my stocking cap down over my face and immediately being reminded of Mexico for some reason. It wasn't until I got home later that night that I realized the soap I used on my bald head that morning was the same type I used on our vacation...and that I hadn't used it in a long time since that morning. Surprisingly, it actually helped quite a bit...I was thinking about sandy beaches and fish tacos during a time that I usually try not to think about Burger King (which is something that seriously makes me nauseous now...not fun considering my brain knows that and tries to test my nausea's strength with this knowledge).

This weekend was about par for the course on recovering from the marathon week. Friday I made up a batch of some good soup, which always seems to do well with my stomach. Saturday I watched a "Top Chef" marathon for a good chunk of the afternoon and after getting in a mood to cook, ended up making Hamburger Helper. Yep...that's the only thing that sounded good and didn't allow me to chop, dice or double-broil anything. That's like watching Picasso paint for six hours and then deciding you're going to make something out of dried macaroni and glitter. On the plus side, it allowed me to eat half a pound of food, which is something I haven't accomplished at any point this week.

By now, I feel like I'm pretty close to normal again. I found out that the entire trigger with my nausea is what metaphorically seems like a metallic-tasting drip that is constantly going down the back of my throat, tainting my saliva and anything I eat with this horrible flavor. When I'm going through my marathon week, this taste is stronger, and outside of my marathon week it's much weaker and nearly non-existent. It makes eating, and especially drinking water, a major challenge. It makes me feel like I'm killing any food I eat right now...if I eat a McRib now and associate it with that chemo-ey taste, it will be dead to me forever, and I just don't know if I can live in a world where I'm not brought a great deal of barbecuey joy every 9-12 months. There's a third-world problem for you...worried about your cancer treatment taking away the joy of a semi-annual promotional fast food sandwich.

So, here's the summary: I'm bald (I had the wife take a razor to my skull last night so I wouldn't look, as she so delicately put it, "cancer-ridden." Washing my bald head now feels like I'm petting a fish underwater), I'm full of food that's not gourmet or McRibbed, I'm sleeping a ton, I'm drinking very little, and I'm missing more work than I ever have (I missed two days last week. For me, that's quite a bit...but I do get a kick out of calling in "cancer sick"). Four weeks down, five more to go...with only one more "marathon week" and four "one-treatment weeks," which should be a cakewalk. We'll see how I end this whole treatment thing...running through a finish line or dragging myself across with a dainty hankerchief up to my nose. One of those sounds slightly manlier than the other, and with my "Mr. Clean haircut," that's kind of the option I'd like to choose.

I feel like Joe Rogan is watching me eat a banana

2011-10-26T18:53:00.000-07:00

I felt like calling in sick to my third day in my weeklong chemo marathon today. It was brutal...and the weird part is I don't think it's physical. The sight of the hospital parking lot, the chemo rooms with the rolling IV carts and that little jar of candy makes my stomach turn, and even describing it right now makes me feel sick.

After tomorrow, I'll be more than halfway done with my treatments, even though I'm only a portion of the way done with the first week of my second round. That will feel pretty good, but I know I've still got 5 weeks to go after this week is done...even if only one of those weeks will be treatments 5 days in a row.

In the meantime, I'm just sleeping, working when I can and trying to find any kind of food that I can swallow...so far it's been primarily Jello and applesauce, although I've found that Rice Chex provides that no-taste kind of food option that doesn't make eating feel like a punishment. It's sad when I feel like I'm on Fear Factor when I sit down to eat a banana.

So, there's a quick update. Two more long days to go...I'm probably going to be pretty sick by Friday afternoon, but if this follows the pattern of my first round, I should be OK by the following week and nearly normal by the end of next week. We'll see how it goes and I'll post a more in-depth update when I feel a bit better.

Another marathon week

2011-10-24T11:24:00.000-07:00

I'm back in the chair again today, which means I'm back to finding ways to avoid doing work on my laptop and updating my blog with the crazy journey that cancer is. Well, not really, but it's kind of funny.

I've developed a cold to complement my bloody nose...creating a runny/bloody nose mixture that requires me to blow my nose constantly, lest I bleed all over the floor of wherever I'm currently at. This has gotten a bit tricky, as it resulted in a group of native Americans following my blood trail over the course of this weekend in the hopes that it was a wounded buffalo. After several days of tracking, they turned the corner into my yard hoping to find the majestic animal lying dead in the yard, which would provide them months of meat and a variety of tools. Instead they found a bald, pale, overprivileged white man sitting on his porch Googling "How to cook a goose" on his phone. Disappointed at the decline of mankind into this species that is so entirely dependant on technology, the native Americans gathered up their spears and left. One cried a single tear that rolled down his cheek...I tried to get a picture of it with my Blackberry, but I forgot which hot button I set up for the camera and instead started up my GPS app.

I got an e-mail from my "Cancer Buddy," (my Nana who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer) who half-jokingly talked about friends that keep suggesting "the best doctor" they insist on having you go see.

This is something I can relate to. When I was first diagnosed, I had several people suggest I get second opinions, check out "their oncologist" or drive up to Rochester, which seems to be like the holy grail of cancer treatments. For me, the last option was out due to the fact that everyone I know that has gone up to Rochester has been for the "serious cancers." I'm not saying testicular cancer isn't serious...it can be...but for a cancer that hasn't spread to my brain, I'm not going to go into lifetime debt.

Really, the people that have gone through cancer that suggest oncologists are completely understandable. There's something about going through a cancer diagnosis with a person that makes you feel like they are the greatest human beings on earth, and mine is no exception. If you told me that after leaving the hospital each day, my oncologist puts on a cape and a mask and fights crime across central Iowa, I would completely believe that. My oncologist is awesome, and he's helping me through what is a pretty intensive process for a pretty nasty disease.

Nobody has had cancer, goes through a successful treatment and says, "My oncologist was OK. I could have gotten somebody better, but he got the job done." Hell no...you're not hiring a high school kid to mow your lawn or eating a hotdog when you're really hungry. This is cancer, and if there's even a slight chance that you won't survive, you don't want the friend of a second cousin who really needs the experience doing it for you. You want "Thor, Battler of Cancer," and oncologists know this...that's why they put a lot of effort into getting to know you and answering every single one of your 500 questions during your meetings. Once you get going, you put a lot of faith in your onc, and they end up looking like Superman because of that.

When you're first diagnosed, however, you don't have a lot of time, exactly, to hop on Angie's List and start comparing oncologists like brands of detergent. Things move fast...I went from feeling healthy to having cancer and losing a testicle in 24 hours...I've eaten slices of pizza that have been sitting out longer than that (I'm not proud of that, but it's a true statement). That leaves you no time to go out and shop around, but when you get your oncologist you immediately recognize their awesomeness. It's no doubt that they recommend their doc so strongly. "Oh, you have cancer? I have a cancer guy...he's the best."

When it happens to you, you've got a very small window if you want to shop around, and by shopping around you're likely not going to find someone better. I found out later that someone who had my onc sought a second opinion at Mayo, and everything - prognosis, treatment, etc. - was exactly the same. All oncologists are good...I don't think there are many that just skim through their classes, get wasted on the weekends, and somehow land a job as an onc at a reputable hospital. "Oh, hey bro. Heard you have cancer...bummer. Let's try and 86 it, cool?"

Almost finished for today, and feeling decent so far. We'll see how this goes once I get near the end of the week...by that time the first week, the sight of an IV bag made me feel nauseous.

Cancer is a lot like monkey urine

2011-10-22T10:07:00.000-07:00

You know what's worse than cancer? Cancer with a horrible cold.

The chemo I'm on dries up my nose and causes nosebleeds, and now I've got a cold that continuously makes my nose run a near-water consistency. Also, since my white blood cell count is low, it's likely that it will take my body a longer period of time to beat this cold into submission. So, let's recap...dry, runny, bloody nose that I have to blow every 2 minutes with slight nausea tossed in. I feel like a drugged out rock star, except with less spandex (still some spandex...but less).

Monday I begin my marathon chemo week again...five straight days of sitting in a chair with a needle in my port, sipping coffee and watching Pop Up Video on VH1 in an attempt to prolong doing actualy work. My staff at work has done an amazing job of picking up the very little slack I've given in going through these treatments, but I hate putting additional work on them....which is funny because I pull out the C-card for nearly everything else. They wanted us to check the blood sugar levels on each other in my EMT class and I pulled out the C-card - "Hey, I'm on blood thinners because I'm taking chemo for testicular cancer, so I think I should sit this one out." The instructor almost stumbled over himself agreeing with me...it's like I have a pass to get out of whatever I want. "Ooooh, I'd like to rake the leaves today, honey, but my cancer's kind of acting up."

I joke around about this a lot, but it really has kind of changed my day-to-day quite a bit. I'm taking my temperature constantly, self-evaluating to see if I'm getting sick, and every time I walk in front of a mirror I freak myself out...expecting a blonde-haired guy to be staring back and seeing this sickly bald dude. And I do that every single time...I usually just walk around forgetting I'm bald until someone points it out to me.

I've thought several times about what I'm going to be like when this is all over. Am I going to shrug it off and just go on with my normal routine...working long hours for five days every week, eating a big breakfast on weekends and just wasting away my time on the weekends? I feel like I should be freaking out and going "carpe diem" on everything, but I'm just kind of taking cancer in stride as kind of an inconvenience...something getting in the way of me spending my weekends watching reruns of 30 Rock and putting off a home improvement project. I think that's why I've gotten kind of a kick going through this chemo...it's something different. If everything in my life went according to plan, I'd be bored as hell. At least getting cancer mixed it up a bit.

Six weeks left to go. This whole thing has been much easier knowing the odds I'm facing...98 percent is something I would put some serious money on if I was gambling. I can't imagine how people facing lower odds do this. This is easier for me knowing that it will all be over in another 1-1/2 months...I can't imagine going thorugh chemo and THEN having a doctor say it didn't work and order you to go through more chemo or something. And if you add in lower odds, I would be far from nonchalant about all of this. Don't take my laxidaisical attitude as me saying that cancer isn't scary...it can be, and for a lot of people it is. Even someone else in my position I wouldn't fault with being nervous about all of this...there is always that 2 percent and there are some people far less optimistic than I. All you can really do is just go through your day to day and try to put the fact that there's poison rolling around in your veins out of your mind. It's kind of like having a monkey on your shoulder that urinates every five minutes...it's easy to try and forget about it, but a wet, smelly T-shirt is hard to ignore. There you go...that's an interesting metaphor. Cancer is like monkey urine.

"Hi, my name is GREG. Ask me about my LACK OF HAIR"

2011-10-21T16:38:00.000-07:00

Well, I’m bald, so now comes the awkward part where I make everyone feel like jerks for asking about my head.

Guy – “What’s with the shaved head? Did you lose a bet?”

Me – “No, I just finished my first round of chemo.”

Guy – “*BLAGGHHH*” (The sound of pulling his foot out of his mouth)

I suppose it’s my own fault for not renting a billboard to let everyone know, but it’s an awkward thing…trying to tell people you’re not super close with that you’ve got nut cancer. So I'm left with fielding legitimate questions with awkward answers...which makes me feel a little bad for the person asking. Maybe I should get a T-shirt that proclaims this fact to others. "Cancer-ridden," or something similar.

Anyways, being bald is actually pretty awesome. I'm actually leaving the hats behind now and proudly rocking my bald head in all sorts of situations. Of course, that may change now that the tiny bit of hair I do have on top of my head is shedding, creating awkward situations where people feel it's appropriate to rub the top of my head and then get a handful of hair stuck to their hand, which they try to rub on their pants like they just pet a shedding dog. It's a lot of fun.

Nausea is still at bay, but for some reason now I'm not hungry at all. I'll be sitting at home, watching TV, and all of a sudden realize that I haven't eaten anything since breakfast. I'll try to think of what I'm hungry for and nothing sounds good, so I'm usually forced to eat a sandwich or something. I'm not sure if you've ever forced yourself to eat something when you're not hungry (probably not because that's insane), but it's like forcing yourself to sit down and watch a movie that you know is going to be awful. That's me forcing myself to eat a grilled cheese...it's kind of sad.

As of the end of this weekend, I will officially have one round done (I was counting after Tuesday, but that's not entirely legitimate). This Sunday, I also take my first rounds of practicals at the local hospital's ER room for my EMT class. I can't wait to one-up some sick-o people. They haven't told us how we're supposed to address the patients we assess, so I have a feeling this is going to be fun.

Greg: "OK, I'm just going to probe your lower abdomen to check for any pain."
Patient: "Sounds good. How long have you worked here?"
Greg: "Oh, I don't work here. OK, let's get that shirt off."

Nothing like being probed by a pale bald guy. Not that anyone plans for this sort of thing, but if you do, avoid the ER this Sunday. Otherwise you'll be wondering why the guy that just took your blood pressure shed all over you.

I don't think anyone's ever seen my skull

2011-10-19T06:27:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about it, and I don't think anyone has ever seen my skull. When I was born, I was the only kid in the nursery with a ton of hair, and I've always kept it up there.

I think all guys go through a period where they want to shave their heads. I know I did, but every girl I ever dated growing up told me not to even think about it, so I held off, thinking they knew something I didn't. Turns out they just liked my hair...I thought they somehow knew I had a weird-shaped skull.

Fortunately, I finally got the chance to shave it last night. My hair was coming out in clumps, and rather than wake up sleeping on a hair pillow, I decided to just get it over with...somewhat. My wife and I both had some wine, and I gave her the clippers and my camera and told her to just have fun. She seemed to have a bit too much fun.

Here's a baseline to show you what I looked like prior to the shave. Forgive the lighting...I forgot to change color balance on my camera, so all the pictures have funky lighting.

OK, my wife's first stop was a somewhat seasonal theme. I was shocked she did as well as she did on the unstable canvas that is the back of my head.

Here's a shot that pretty much summarized our evening.

She next attempted to do lightning bolts. They didn't turn out so hot.

This is where she started to get a little weird with it. I'm not sure how to describe the shot below other than how my wife termed it - "A male pattern baldness island."

Following that, she shaved the sides, leaving just the crown of hair and the island patch. Kind of a good look for me...like combining all of the 3 Stooges' haircuts into one. The pose I'm doing I should explain...I was talking to my wife about the little kids' plates she bought with three separate compartments and how her daycare kids eat, and made some reference to how the food just kind of sits there in their own little compartments, patiently waiting to get eaten. Then I made the pose below, which we both refer to as "Patient Potatoes," which is, essentially, a pile of mashed potatoes sitting there, patiently waiting to be eaten. My wife and I are weird.

And, finally, we took off that creepy hairstyle and went back to basics.

Just in time for the cold, Iowa winters. This is going to be interesting.

Enjoying my last full day with hair on my head

2011-10-18T11:36:00.000-07:00

Nothing in your life truly prepares yourself for waking up one morning and pulling out a chunk of your hair.

There's no warning, there's no easing into it...I woke up this morning, scratched my head and noticed that I pulled out a large tuft of Greg hair. That's disturbing...I had to check twice to make sure I wasn't having a nightmare and that any moment Ron Paul wasn't going to emerge from my closet and chase me around the room with a hammer. (Your nightmares don't involve Ron Paul?) It happened extremely suddenly. Last night, after EMT class, the other guy from my department in the class asked me if I'd been losing my hair yet, and I pulled on my hair and showed him my hand as proof...nothing. If I did that today, it would look like I plucked a muppet turd off the top of my skull.

And so it begins. Tonight's the night I'm just shaving it all off, because as my oncologist alluded to earlier, I don't want to sleep in a pile of my own hair like some sort of a mouse. I'm finishing up work, going grocery shopping with my wife, and then the trusty old buzzers will take care of the rest.

I had my oncology appointment this morning, and after getting checked in (which now amounts to me walking in, and the receptionists saying 'Greg!!' like I'm Norm on 'Cheers'), I sat down and did my usual casing of the room. Average age is always 65...I don't care if there are five people or 25 people in the room, that always averages out right. This is made even more obvious by the 1,000-piece jugsaw puzzle on a nearby table that seems to cycle out once per week. That's some serious jig-sawing, and jig-sawing is not a young man's game.

Now that I've had a chance to observe this treatment bit a little more, I've found that oncology departments are nearly exactly the same as prison. You walk in and sit down, and everybody's quiet. You see eyes look at you, but when you make eye contact, they quickly look away. The consensus is obvious - "I wonder what he's in for? He's way too young to be here...it must be bad." Then they avoid eye contact. Why? Respect, that's why. It's all prison-style in oncology.

I've always been the youngest person in these types of situations. Growing up doing archery and fishing tournaments, I was always the youngest; I was the youngest supervisor at my telemarketing job in high school; I was the youngest general manager of a bar in college; the youngest newspaper editor for my company; and now I'm the youngest person in the chemo ward. Unfortunately, I don't see that being anything I can put on my resume, unless I run for political office. That's always seemed strange to me...if you were applying for a job at a respectable company, you'd keep everything job-related, but when politicians run they'll tell you in the first 10 minutes if they've got a dead parent, if they've had cancer before, if they are a foster parent or if they grew up poor. Talk about exploiting a bad situation...maybe I should run for Congress now.

So, bleo treatment went well, and now I'm just waiting for the day to end so I can see how I'd look bald. Growing up, every single girl I ever dated told me not to shave my head, so now I'm a little bit excited to finally have permission to do so (although Lauren never forbid me from shaving my head...just from growing a moustache). By the way, the end of my treatment today essentially marks the end of my first round of chemotherapy. One down, two more rounds to go, and this first round was a cakewalk.

I'll post pics of my bald head when it happens, but until then, don't sit on any of my work furniture unless you want to be lint rolling your clothes all day...I'm shedding like a sheepdog in the summertime.

I've got a cancer buddy!

2011-10-15T17:55:00.000-07:00

As the fates might have it, a mere month and a half (whoa...it hasn't felt like that long) since my diagnosis, my grandmother received a diagnosis for breast cancer. I got an e-mail from her immediately saying she sees my testicle and raises me a breast...I couldn't love my family more.

So, I have company, and although I won't print any of what her e-mail said (as she told me not to, and I assume she still has the ability to put me in a time out), I will say she shares my love of laughing at the absurdity of all of this...from the complete exposure and lack of modesty you get baring your private parts at doctors as they furrow their brows and nod knowingly to the invasive surgeries and complete disruption receiving a cancer diagnosis brings to your life.

One thing that I will never get over in all of this is how people don't know how to react to news that someone they know has cancer. I can't blame them...until I was put in this situation, I didn't know either, and quite frankly I don't think there is a correct response. So many people, however, come up to you to talk about it and whisper the word "cancer" like you can get it if you say it at full volume. It's the unknown for them, and they're concerned. That's always touching, but it's a little bit funny that the word is always whispered.

From some of the first phone calls to friends, I found it funnier and funnier having to tell them about my own diagnosis.

Friend: Hey man, what's happening.
Me: Not much, what's going on?
Friend: Nothing. I just got a dog.
Me: Cool. I just got cancer.
Friend: Awesome. Wait, are you serious?
Me: Serious as my left nut.

It's a surreal experience. There's no correct way to respond, and no correct way to tell people. It's all just a big, weird mess of a situation...so I resulted in telling people the oddest way I could. I'd have somebody pressing me as to why I missed a meeting and I'd tell them I came down with "a slight case of cancer." Or I'd have somebody saying they heard I was in surgery and I'd tell them it was to have a cancerous testicle remove and make a joke about my insurance company only approving for me to go to a vet ("Now, that's half the cost of a neutering, right?").

When the chaotic happens, you aren't left with a lot of choices. You can awkwardly share the news with friends and loved ones and have them stand there in shock not knowing how to react, or you can joke around about it and allow them to stand there in shock not knowing how to react. Either way, it's a weird situation to deal with.

Knowing my grandmother (which is weird to type, because I've always called her "Nana"), and talking with her back and forth via e-mail since she got the news, I'm finally in a position where I know what she's going through and how awkward it is to tell everyone. So, I suggested that we get both of our removed cancerous parts, dip them in bronze and make some sort of a new-age lamp out of it. Being an interior decorator, I'm sure she's on board with the idea.

My "Nana" is one of the most outgoing, social, funniest people out there, and I know she's going to handle this "tough of cancer" with the same flawless grace she handles everything else...and it's going to be easier now with both of us knowing that each of us is going through the same thing.

I'm already a month and a half into this whole ordeal, so I've got a little bit of a lead on her, but still, I'm glad to now have another "cancer buddy" that isn't afraid to laugh with me about something most people won't say out loud at full volume. This is going to be a completely new experience for the both of us, but I know we're going to come out of it with some great stories, great scars and a completely new perspective. That's almost worth going through this in the first place. Almost.

Proof my current job is better than my last one

2011-10-14T11:10:00.001-07:00

For those wondering why I would work all night at my current job, it's because I love it. Take, for example, my last job...selling insurance. Awful. We were sent, at one point, to a leadership retreat at corporate headquarters for some of the worst-constructed icebreakers and leadership building activities ever. At the end of it, they gave us a poker chip with the company logo on it (yay...only 399 more for a full set!) and a card we were supposed to write down two professional goals on. This was mine, and I still keep it to this day to remind me that, now that I have a job I love, never to take a different job only because it pays more.

By the way, I accomplished both of those goals during my remaining 6 months there before I left to take a job in journalism.

Yeah, I think the chemo wore off

2011-10-14T07:44:00.000-07:00

No post for a couple of days, and it's not because I've been nauseous. In fact, I'm pretty convinced the chemo wore off, as I haven't felt sick or had that weird chemo-ey taste in my mouth since my last treatment on Tuesday.

For the past two days, however, I have been working my tail off at work, and it's felt almost normal. I worked a full day Wednesday, went to an open house for a newspaper I used to work at, came back, and worked all night all day the following day - nearly a continuous, 32-hour shift. And I felt pretty good throughout all of it (albeit tired near the tail end of it). Fortunately, this was due to my "work bed."

After finishing my major project (a 24-page special section nearly entirely full with content I had to write), I got a jump on the next day's paper and then remembered my "work bed." If you don't know what I'm talking about, go back a few posts...there's a picture. So I discreetly got up, snuck into the room, set my phone's alarm for 2 hours later and zonked out. I woke up 2 hours later feeling like a million bucks.

After going back to my chair, I worked for about 5 minutes before a hard truth hit me like a slap in the face...I was chewing gum when I feel asleep, and now I wasn't. I went back and checked all over the bed, checked my clothes and carefully checked my hair. I felt like I was in preschool, wanting to catch it before interviewing someone for an article and right after asking them an intelligently-worded question, have them respond with "Is that gum in your hair?" "Just answer the question," I'd say, "And do you happen to have any peanut butter?"

When I'm not acting like I'm 5 years old, I act like I'm 85. After work I had to go straight to my EMT classes from 6-10 p.m., which just added to my 48-hours of no sleep trance I was in. The other firefighter I'm in class with and I were driving to the hospital and he kept talking about wanting to go have a few beers. I kept talking about how much I wanted to go home, eat some soft food and go to sleep. "What are you, 90 years old?" he asked. "No, I'm just tired," I said as I discreetly put the Werther's Originals hard candy I was going to offer him back in my pocket.

Well, I got caught up on my sleep last night, I'm skipping work today and I've got a full weekend in front of me that's looking pretty bright. I haven't felt nauseous, even a little bit, since...Monday maybe? It honestly feels like my chemo has wore off and I'm just waiting to get another shot of bleo next Tuesday. For anyone reading this that's been through chemo before, don't worry, I'm fully aware that I'm the lead character for the first 10 minutes of any horror movie...just happily trudging along, oblivious that anything bad is going to happen. I'm fully prepared for the other shoe to drop, but I'm just trying to get some work done in the meantime.

I need to find a good Frank and tell him about a sweet flash mob

2011-10-11T20:55:00.000-07:00

It's 10:39 p.m. and I haven't been able to sleep at all for like the past 24 hours. Is it chemo-related? Eh, I can't tell anymore. All I know is my body wants to sleep and my brain won't let it.

Last night? Exhausted, and just dozed in a half-sleep all night. Today? Came home for a nap before an evening meeting and just closed my eyes in bed for an hour and a half. Tonight? Same deal...I lie down and just can't get my brain to settle, despite my body begging to just let it shut down. So, with nothing to do but post a blog post while waiting for my Benadryl to kick in, here's what's on my mind.

I want to tell a friend, let's call him "Frank," that I'm organizing a flash mob to take place at a church service where everyone all of a sudden breaks into a musical number. I get together 50 close friends and we rehearse two hours each evening for one week. The musical number is intricate, beginning with one person in the front pew jumping straight up, reaching for the sky and singing the word "Superfreak," holding the "ee" in "freak" as long as possible before breaking into an elaborate dance, synchronized with the 50 people in various pews behind him. The dance number is done in six parts, following the tap solo by the front pew man. Rehearsing gets intense as a week passes. We up the practices to three hours a night, and include weekends. This thing has music video quality choreography, and is more Broadway than clubbing. During the course of this practice, I casually mention to Frank how good his voice and dance moves are several times...a flattering comment to Frank. The day of the flash mob, we're ready, except for one problem...the person who kicks off the whole show is gone. Confident from weeks of flattery, Frank steps up to the challenge. The church service in the megachurch kicks off, and at the given cue (after the first hymn), Frank rockets out of his seat in the front pew in front of hundreds of people wearing their Sunday best outfits, scream-singing "Superfreak," while holding that last note until he's almost out of breath before breaking into his elaborate dance pattern. After the dance, he turns, hands outstretched to the audience for the four strategically-placed groups to begin our dance towards the front of the church for the first musical number....only to find that all of us snuck out shortly after the service started.

This is what's keeping me awake. I want this prank to happen...I just need to find a good "Frank."

Permission to sleep on the job?

2011-10-11T12:32:00.001-07:00

Well, it's official. I have the coolest co-workers ever. They called me back to our conference room today for a surprise - they had created a dark room without a phone specifically for me to nap in. My boss told me if I ever get tired, they want me to stop what I'm doing and either go take a nap or go home.

My office is awesome.

Boo yah sticker!

2011-10-11T06:48:00.001-07:00

Guess what an extra brave boy got after labwork this morning?

Why would I eat a dessert if it's not holiday-themed?

2011-10-10T21:41:00.000-07:00

I feel like what started out as a "chronicle of my cancer-nous" blog has quickly turned into a weight watchers blog once I started chemo. Constantly monitoring what I eat has been weird...like that part in "Jaws" where they cut open that Tiger shark and start pulling all of that weird junk out of its stomach, and today is no exception. I actually felt pretty decent much of today, and here's the junkyard goat diet that helped facilitate that:
- 3/4 of a waffle and four strawberries. Morning was a bit rough, but I was able to get this food down.
- One halloween cupcake. The women in my office like to bake, but I believe they're not allowed to bake unless the food is made into some kind of a theme...hence me devouring a cupcake with orange frosting and tiny chocolate bat sprinkles on it.
- Two slices of gas station pizza. This was....a bold move...for somebody on chemo. It sounded like the correct move at the time, however, and nothing so far has told me otherwise. Time will tell on this one.
- One bag of cookies out of the snack bin at work.
- One ham sandwich, plain, eaten like a ham-eating zombie.
- Three bowls of cottage cheese. That deserves repeating...THREE FREAKING BOWLS OF COTTAGE CHEESE. Oddly enough, someone posted a picture on Facebook of themself happily eating cottage cheese, and my stomach said, "Yeah...I want to be that happy." Fast forward to me driving home from work and plowing through a container of large curds like some sort of dairy vampire (that cupcake put my metaphors in a holiday mood, apparently)
- One package of chocolate donettes. If you think I mistyped, you're incorrect...these are the plastic-coated Donettes because they were generic and thus I couldn't take the brown-coconut looking crumb ones (there's a system).

Aside from monitoring my stomach constantly, sure that if chemo causes nausea on its own that two slices of gas station pizza and three bowls of cottage cheese were going to tango like a 50s street gang, the day was pretty good. It felt good to put in a full day at work, and it's days like today that make me realize how happy, and humbling, it is to be the editor of a small town paper. For tomorrow's edition, and I don't kid at all, I wrote two felony crime stories, one column musing on the lack of choice in our political two-party system (Using "I'm not partisan, but I'm political" compared to people that say "I'm not religious, but I'm spiritual"), included pictures from the homecoming powderpuff game and had one letter to the editor run about a lady who had money stolen from her out of a cooler that she had on the honor system for peopel that wanted to buy eggs. That is freaking variety...and awesome.

For those who are interested, if anyone is diagnosed with cancer in the future and has to cope with chemo (I know you're all keeping your fingers crossed), I've found the cure for the chemo symptoms: terry cloth robes. It's amazing and makes me feel like an early-50s pervo. Oddly, my wife was channeling me today when she called me at work with "something very important" and made me look up a website for adult footy pajamas. This made me second-guess my choice of terry cloth robes, as these pieces of clothing, which they endearingly refer to as "Uni-Lazys" look like you have completely thrown up your hands and given up on the world. I can only hope I don't give off that vibe when I wear my robe. Even better than the horrifying embrace of the public to this product are the testimonials (https://www.orderforeverlazy.com/Testimonials) which can be read from the perspective of the following description: "A group of people who were told that a piece of clothing is available that requires them to remove less while going to the bathroom," or, more specifically, "like wearing diapers you don't have to change." It's truly a disturbing read, and will give you a list of people that have given up on societal norms and decided to forge a path ahead based solely on comfort. That's a dangerous game.

No side effects that they warned me about with the chemo so far other than slight nausea....disappointingly, no "moon face," "Doug Funny legs," or "Leguizamo-nose."

Taking EMT classes for my part-time firefighter gig has made this whole experience much more interesting, however. Today we learned about IVs, and I felt like I had a complete leg-up on the entire class. After all, learning to spike an IV bag is near-instinct when you've watched a nurse do it daily for five days straight, along with checking your blood pressure. I almost offered to let everyone in the class "feel my port," but felt it wouldn't transfer well after being said aloud, so instead I joked about documenting the administration of candy to diabetics ("Do we have to document whether it's 'Fun Size,' 'Regular,' or 'King Size,' and does the dosage double if it's a Twix?")

I've been receiving so many questions from friends, family members, co-workers and random people about having testicular cancer that I've decided to share a few of the Q&A's with the rest of you who haven't had the opportunity to pester a guy with cancer on mundane topics. I'll close out this blog post with "Ask a guy with cancer."

**

Dear Guy with Cancer,

How do you feel?

-
Dear Concerned,

Not bad for a guy who planned on spending the fall finishing up his kitchen renovation and instead had his plans shifted slightly to remove one ball, all of his hair and be given a nine-week hangover.

**

Dear Guy with Cancer,

Are you hanging in there?
-
Dear 'hanging,'

Yes. It's not like I have any other option...despite all the "battle against cancer" metaphors out there, there's not really any way for me to give up (unless it involves order a "Uni-lazy," and shipping takes longer than my chemo will). If anything, chemo has given me permission to be lazier, so I'm hanging even more than usual.

**

Dear Guy with Cancer,

Are you going to shave your head all at once when your hair starts falling out?
-
Dear shaver,

No. My wife is actually really excited with what to do with my hair first...last time I checked, she was opting for a checkerboard pattern. This will raise some eyebrows at work.

**

Dear Guy with Cancer,

Does it feel weird having one testicle?
-
Dear testicularly concerned,

Not really. I never spent a great deal of time in the past taking inventory down there, and surprisingly my posture has improved greatly since my surgery (and I've lost 10 pounds). Coincidence? Unlikely.

**

Dear Guy with Cancer,

There are ribbons for breast cancer, organ donation, domestic violence...is there one for testicular cancer?
-
Dear ribbon touter,

Likely, as without ribbons touting bad stuff like a freaking terror alert code, none of us would ever know how to feel about a subject and we wouldn't have a secret code to let other half-sackers know who we are. These ribbons are like Jesus fish...they used to stand as a code to let others know who was awesome, but now they're freaking everywhere and can be bought in magnet form in gas stations by someone with a buck fifty and low willpower for garbage. It's for this reason that testicular cancer survivors have taken to using "Truck Nutz" as a signal of hope and strength for our movement. Rest be assured...if you see someone driving around with a pair of "Truck Nuts" on their vehicle, they're either a testicular cancer survivor or a redneck...but either way they've got less than two balls.

Sleep, sleep and more sleep

2011-10-09T10:08:00.000-07:00

I think I'm spending a good chunk of my days now trying to not think about food or getting sick.

I'm near the end of my first weekend on chemo now, and it's the first two days I've had without treatments, so I figured it'd be a cakewalk. Not quite. Here's a little summary of my weekend so far: Friday, in bed by 9 p.m. (due to nausea). Awake at 9 a.m. Saturday. Ate two baked potatoes (very slowly), showered, dressed, went out to run some errands. Came home at 2 p.m. because I was tired and feeling a little sick. Took a three-hour nap (pants off nap...there's a critical difference between a pants-on nap and a pants-off nap. While some may say the difference is whether you're wearing pants, and they're smart-asses, it's a world of difference between how refreshing the nap is), ate some ravioli, went on a 2-mile walk with the wife, came home, tried to watch a movie and went to sleep at 9 p.m. I just woke up this morning at 9 a.m. and forced myself to eat breakfast (a Rice Krispie treat, two packages of pudding, half a tin of mandarin oranges and two bites of a banana...I'm like an anorexic goat).

So, let's recap. So far this weekend, I've gotten 24 hours of sleep (27 hours if you count the pants-off nap), and my Sunday just started 2-1/2 hours ago. There were times in college when I would get 24 hours of sleep in a week...and feel rested. I've spent more time sleeping this weekend than I have in forever and I still feel sick and slightly tired.

Not only that, but I have to psych myself up to eat and try and figure out exactly what I can put into my stomach that will likely stay there. This may seem over-dramatic, and it's possible I am overreacting to this, but I'm not convinced. My doctor asked me last Friday if I'd thrown up yet and seemed genuinely impressed when I told him I had not. There have been several times I've felt like throwing up, but haven't, because it just seems pointless. All the reading I've done on chemo has attributed nausea to the affect the medicine has on your brain and messing with your stomach lining. When I've thrown up in the past, it's always been to get something out of my stomach I didn't want in there anymore (alcohol, bad seafood, a spare quarter, etc.). Now, when I feel like throwing up, I think about how it's not to get anything out of my stomach I don't want in there...it's just because I'm on some medicine that's messing with the part of my brain that wants me to get rid of food I put in there for absolutely no reason. That annoys me...hence the reason why I haven't gotten sick yet: spite. I'd say a majority of the decisions I make is based on spite, even when it's me fighting against my brain.

I've got medication to help with the nausea, and it seems to do a halfway decent job when I have it. The fun part is, my insurance company (which previously tried to deny allowing me a port to take chemotherapy because it's a bit more luxurious than stabbing at my veins during 21 separate sessions) decided that my severe nausea medication would only be covered once every 24 days. Not a big deal, right? Well, not really until you take into account that my severe nausea medication is six pills, to be taken once every 8 hours. Now, I'm no mathemagician, but....8 hours x 6 pills = 48 hours = Two days of non-sick Greg every 24 days. I'm just giddy with excitement trying to figure out which two days I'm going to use next month (as I've already used up my allotment this month). I'm thinking Halloween and then maybe save the others to pool around my birthday in November. This is so exciting...I feel like a prison inmate that's been given a few packets of salt to use on whatever prison meal I choose over the next several years!! Insurance companies are the tops!

Despite some overly-dramatic comparisons and the past couple of blog posts on here touching on insanity, this chemo isn't devastating. In fact, if I could just forget I was going through it, I'd likely spend a lot of my day oblivious. My problem is I keep self-assessing myself, paranoid of reaching a point where I'm sick and I dont' realize it (which makes zero sense). I feel like if I don't constantly monitor my body, it's going to do something without my knowledge, and before I know it I'm in the middle of a supermarket perusing the samples of ordinary foods on toothpicks when my body decides to empty my stomach all over the floor. I feel like if I walk around all day constantly monitoring when my stomach feels slightly more or slightly less queasy, however, I can catch any change in momentum before getting sick and have ample time to get home, get medicated and get ready for the sickness...which has yet to show up in the way I've imagined it will. I've prepared myself for war (bent over the toilet, dry heaving and drained of energy) and all I've gotten so far is someone TP'ing my house (feeling slightly nauseous and having to go to bed at 9 p.m.).

I'm quickly adapting to "a new normal." I'm developing new standards for how I should feel on a day-to-day basis, I'm changing my minimum requirements for how much sleep I should get and I'm finally starting to let myself worry slightly less about how my body feels every 5 seconds ("Did my stomach just gurgle a bit? Should I eat some pudding?"). Hopefully these changes will help the next 8 weeks fly by faster than this first week. If not, my body is going to freak me out so much over the next 3 months that I'll either be crazy or have super-human abilities by the time this is over ("Wait...did you hear that? My blood pressure went down slightly. Give me half a piece of toast, I need to get that back to normal.")

Here we go...now THIS is what chemo should feel like

2011-10-07T10:07:00.000-07:00

Ok, yeah, this is what I imagined chemo is supposed to feel like.

I woke up this morning feeling pretty nauseous after waking up an hour before my alarm with feverish thoughts. Have you ever had one of those work dreams where you dream you're handling a monotonous task at work all night, and you wake up mentally exhausted? I had one of those for the last hour of sleep...dreaming that people kept handing me memos and I kept putting them somewhere in my mind, scanning them and trying to keep track of them all. I then woke up feeling nauseous, as someone who spent a good chunk of their morning handling nonsense paperwork might.

After a slow shower, an even slower breakfast and a long nap in the car, I finally made it to my final chemo appointment of the week. The nurse took one look at me and gave me some more anti-nausea medication and some Tylenol.

Fast forward two hours, and here I am, much more chipper and happily snacking on saltine crackers, waiting for this final chemo treatment to be done. After this marathon week, I only have one appointment next Tuesday, one appointment the following Tuesday, and that's it. Well...that's it for round one. I'll be going through three rounds total, but I'm not thinking about another marathon week yet...I'll deal with that one when it comes around.

I'm looking at this whole experience of going through chemo as something that will shock my kids and grandkids in the future. There have been some magnificent advances in cancer research in the past 30 years, and I just know that there are going to be many more in the next 30. It's for this reason that I think when my kids hear I went through chemotherapy treatment where they put a port in me and pumped drugs directly into my veins, it's going to be like hearing I had a relative that was given leeches for a blood transfusion.

I have a feeling in the near future, very few people are going to look back at a time where we pumped drugs into the veins of cancer victims as a team of "breakthrough science." Hopefully in the future, very precise surgery will be developed, pills with few side effects will be developed to be taken (hopefully orally...oh man, hopefully orally) and cancer will be like the yellow plague of my grandparents' generation. Until then, though, I've got to sit in this chair and go through this iron-lung garbage. Fortunately, it's successful, but just a bit miserable.

Sharing this discussion with my nurse this morning, she said when she was involved with administering chemo 20 years ago, they had very few other drugs to help combat the side effects, so people just had to deal with the nausea. She recalled one person she helped out coming up to her years later and telling her that the sight of her still made her nauseous. Man, and I thought back when I worked in the insurance industry it was bad when going into work made myself nauseous...I can't imagine if it had the same effect on other people (besides my then-boss).

On the plus side, I'm done with my fifth-straight chemo session. That's five days down, 58 to go. OR, if you look at it optimistically, that's 5 sessions down, 16 to go (which is a much better way to view it). Now, I've got a weekend full of, for the first time in many months, NOTHING. TV, video games, board games, movies and hanging out with my awesome wife. I'm sure I'll catch up on sleep and hopefully eat some food that tastes like something other than acid, and be ready to hop back into the chair next Tuesday...getting ready to adjust to this new version of normal. Getting used to food tasting differently, feeling weaker, waking up nauseous and having standing appointments for nearly half of the next month.

Well, it could be worse...I could still have a ballsack full of cancer with a nutty center. I'll take the cure over the disease any day.

Chemo is not as much fun as a crayon box full of bees

2011-10-06T07:03:00.000-07:00

For the first time since I've started off my chemo treatment, I woke up a bit nauseous.

It could have been the fact I took an anti-nausea pill last night and went to bed at 9 p.m. It could have been the fact that I'm on chemo and spent each morning this past week having different cocktails of poison pumped into my veins. Or, it could have been the fact that last night I ate half of a large Papa Murphy's pizza, walked two miles and went to bed. I'm not a gambling man, so I won't make a wager on the true cause of my nausea, but I suspect it was going to bed early. I figured tonight I'll take an anti-nausea pill, eat half of a Virginia ham and go to sleep around midnight.

While feeling a bit nauseous this morning, it's actually not all that horrible. It's not exactly like when you're sick with the flu and just keep waiting to throw up...the feeling is constantly there, and it's more from weird stuff, like smells, that triggers the nausea. I can only assume this is what being pregnant is like, but saying "pregnancy is like having cancer" is a phrase that will be misread entirely and likely drop some jaws, so I'll avoid typing that again. I think pregnancy morning sickness could be similar to cancer, however, and that's a fair comparison that won't get me yelled at by every woman I know.

Really, more than the nausea is the monotony of all of this. It's the same routine every morning. Wake up, shower, throw on a T-shirt with a neck I don't mind getting stretched out, force myself to eat something, take my medications and drive 30 minutes to Ames. I check in (they know me by name now, like I'm some sort of chemo VIP), wait 5 minutes and I'm led back to a chemo dorm. They clean the spot around my port, stick me with a needle, we make small talk for 10 minutes and then they start pumping fluid into me for the next 5 hours while I do work on my computer. The smells, the sounds and everything are all intertwining into this big ball of monotony that is just entirely maddening.

Most people that know me well know that I can't handle being bored very well. When I was young, I doodled fairly frequently in class. To break monotony in fifth grade, I spent a recess period with an empty crayon box catching bees and putting them in the box. After I got about 30 of them into this 24-crayon pack that was about the same size as a pack of cigarettes, I closed the lid and brought them with into class. About 30 minutes into our lesson, I started getting bored and shook the box to hear the hum of 30 angry bees stuffed into a small container. The buzz kept growing, which started to concern me. My elementary school in Omaha, Neb. was growing quicker than facility upgrades could keep up, so my classroom was inside one of 30 portables - classroom trailers that were fairly quiet - around the main school. It was peaceful, secluded and easily disturbed by a crayon box full of 30 angry insects. I looked at my limited options - fess up and accept my punishment or release the bees and hopefully dilute the noise. I chose the latter, opening the lid slightly and casually tossing the box into a corner like a grenade. Within 15 minutes, the classroom was in chaos. Occasionally, a bee or two would get into the room and it would distract the students, who were all scared to death of the insects...this fear was amplified when they were required to sit in their desks. Thirty bees roaming a classroom, however, was too much for my teacher to handle. We were given recess and a janitor was brought in with a can of Raid and asked to find an explanation for why our classroom all of a sudden became a honey hole for stinging insects. To my knowledge, he never developed a hypothesis.

The bottom line is, when I get bored, I get somewhat mischevious. In elementary school, I entertained myself with doodling and odd habits. In high school and college I moved onto pranks.

Now, a 28-year-old adult, I know that pretending to fall asleep in my chair and slowly blowing up a surgical glove inside my shirt a little bit more every 10 minutes to make the nurses think my stomach is filling up with air, or chemo, or whatever is childish. I get that entirely, but that's kind of how I'm wired to behave. And when I'm stuck in a room for 5 hours each day with a variety of MacGuyver-like instruments, such as tongue depressers, cotton balls and Q-tips, my mischevious brain just starts pumping and I can't help but thinking about how great it would be to sneak a bird's nest into the potted plant in my room, leaving yet another person scratching their head about how something like that could have happened.

Chemo (and large helpings of pizza) seems to be effectively doing something to me physically, but it doesn't look like it's done much to curb my mischevious side. Let's hope that it does before I bring some red paint to dab on the ears of my nurse's stethoscope.

"Sally, are you bleeding from the ears?"

A remarkable diagnosis (a non-humorous post, for a change)

2011-10-05T09:52:00.000-07:00

I've been using this blog for some pretty light-hearted stuff (If this is the first post you read, this isn't the norm...keep reading after this), but I just wanted to throw this out there as a major component of my cancer diagnosis, and while it may start off a bit depressing here, it's an interesting coincidence nonetheless and can be taken however you'd like to take it - spiritually, as a mere coincidence, intervention, etc. Well, this is an interesting disclaimer, isn't it?

My younger brother, Ryan, died just over three years ago from an accident, which has been tough on my family (that may be the biggest understatement ever!). He was only about 1-1/2 years younger than me, and we were very close growing up. While I'll never completely get over losing a sibling, I've come to terms with what has happened, and part of that involved figuring out what to do on the anniversary of the date he died each year.

The first year I skipped work and went fishing...something both of us enjoyed doing growing up (the fishing part...having my family own a small business, we didn't have much of a chance to skip work!). The second year, I reflected on his life at home. This past year, though, I wanted to start a tradition. I wanted to start doing something new on the anniversary of his death each year - something I hadn't done before. It could be as simple as trying a new type of food or something as dramatic as visiting a new country. I started making plans to skydive, but timing made that a bit of a challenge this year (I plan on it next year, however), so as a result I made plans for my wife and I to go on a full-moon canoe float. I had never gone canoing at night, and it seemed like a perfect way to spend a warm, August night...reflecting on my brother's life out on the lake.

Anyways, as the date started getting closer, I started second-guessing myself. The full-moon float was technically scheduled the night before the anniversary, and it wasn't supposed to last past 10 p.m. (it was a county conservation department sponsored event). As a result, I decided to add another "Neverdunnit" item to this year's calendar for that anniversary - horseback riding.

I've been horseback riding before, when I was young enough to be picked up and put on top of a horse, but they were always trail horses walking in a straight row and couldn't be steered, sped up or slowed down. In essence, I was placed on a smelly, hairy wagon and given a rope to hold until I was told I could get off. I wanted to actually steer a horse and make it go faster than a lazy walk.

The full moon canoe float was amazing...despite the full moon, we were still able to see some fantastic shooting stars in the sky (a meteor shower was peaking that night), and it was awesome, but like I mentioned before, it wasn't on the day of the anniversary of my brother's death, so I was really looking forward to horseback riding.

The following day, I went out to my in-law's farm (they own horses) and was finally able to mark something I'd never done off my list - ride a horse solo and make it gallop. I went out with my wife, Lauren, and my mother in law at first, learning how to steer the stubborn animal I had, and eventually had a chance to take it out on my own, steering it along a pasture, through their backyard and in-between grapevines they have on their property. I even got it going pretty fast, galloping, which jostled me like crazy up and down on the saddle as I mentally checked this year's item off of my list.

The next day was when I first noticed my testicle hurting. It went away the following day and reappeared a couple weeks later, but that jostling up and down on that horse was what first made me go, "Hmmm...that pain seems abnormal." It was that pain that subsequently lead to my testicular cancer diagnosis.

I've gone over the what-ifs since all of this occurred. What if I hadn't gone horseback riding that day? How long would it have taken for that pain to develop? How long would my TC have gone undiagnosed? How far could that cancer, which eventually progressed to my lymph nodes, have gone if left unchecked for another month? Two months? Six months?

I don't care if you're religious or not, something like that will give you pause and ponder the question of how mysterious, and awesome, life can be. For me, just thinking of that makes me shudder, as it rightly should.

Having cancer can cure TV movie limbo

2011-10-05T07:24:00.000-07:00

Soon-to-be three days down, only 60 to go for my chemo treatment.

Today in the chair I brought along my father-in-law, Bruce, to accompany me for this chemo party. I can only imagine he wanted to come along because there's nothing more fun and upbeat to kick off a Wednesday than accompanying a 28-year-old to a chemo appointment.

So far, chemo hasn't been terrible, but I don't really know what to expect. The small army of nurses I've been dealing with are like presidential candidates with their candor. The first one said, "You're doing very well! The first few treatments are the worst, you should be fine!" This is precisely what I wanted to hear. The second one, the few sentences she did end up muttering to me, told me "The first week is a cake walk. You usually don't get an idea of symptoms and side effects until the end of the first week or early next week." Yikes...that's not confidence-inspiring, but I appreciate your directness in letting me know what to expect. The third one today took the middle road, saying that it varies. I feel like some sort of soon-to-be bald Goldilocks trying to read philosophical meaning into the three bears' porridge.

All in all, my side effects haven't been horrible so far. There has been slight nausea, but not anything that has had me close to being physically ill. My wife and I are taking two-mile walks together each night to gripe about our days (I currently have the distinct advantage in griping), and my hair has managed to withstand the first two days of chemo (although it's supposed to do so for 16 days before falling out...at which point I already have a new winter beanie ordered and should arrive at my house with plenty of buffer time. Of course, I'll only be wearing the beanie when my wig is dirty and I need to throw it in the washing machine).

Really, the worst side effect so far has been what chemo is doing to my taste buds. I'll preface this with a short explanation.

My wife, Lauren (I feel the need for explanation since there are a few people reading this blog that don't know me personally), and I are two of the most indecisive people I know when it comes to picking something to make for dinner or a restaurant to eat at. This has become such an issue that I have created a sort of philosophical question to try and elicit a response (it works with 5 percent success). I'll ask "If you had a box with a button on it, and you pushed that button, lifted up the box and the most appealing food in the world would be inside, what would be in it?" With chemo, if I had such a box, nothing would be inside. I wake up and force myself to eat something, and absolutely nothing sounds good. Everything tastes relatively the same (all chemo-y), I'm eating smaller portions and I'm starting to see how people base a lot of their food decisions on consistency...I've never eaten so much pudding, mashed potatoes and other soft foods in my life. Never being a consistency eater (I'm about as non-discriminatory when it comes to food consistency as a catfish), I'm actually looking forward to what this introduction into an "only-food-consistency" mindset will do to me once this chemo is all over. I assume I'll be deep-fat-frying all food from then-on-out in corn flakes just to get away from cottage cheese and whatnot, but who knows? Maybe I'll find a middle ground, like Macaroni Balls at Cheesecake Factory. That doesn't sound good to me now, but I think back fondly on how good that used to sound to me.

So, physically I'm doing good. Mentally, I think, I'm doing even better. I think these horrible kind of experiences need to happen to everyone in medium intervals to just remind us not to be so complacent with our lives. It doesn't matter how much "Carpe Diem" stuff we read or hear...chances are, three weeks after being motivated to make every moment count, you're going to be right back on that couch watching "Jersey Shore" reruns and trying to pinpoint the exact moment that each character lost their mind. With regular, jarring events, I might be able to actually live a carpe diem life and start making the most out of every day. Of course, I'd also be jittery as shit...like a fainting llama owned by by someone with frequent night terrors. There's an extreme to trying to live every day to its fullest potential...my boss would likely get tired of me coming into work barefoot and trying to fly a kite in our parking lot for several hours each day in-between climbing trees. I think going through a cancer thing like this is going to give me that perfect balance...it will make me feel grateful to return to work and be able to work a full day, and it will also motivate me to do stuff on the weekend rather than watch "Shawshank Redemption" on television for 5 hours (because TNT has 5-minute commercial breaks) even though I own the DVD and I'm just too darn lazy to find it, put it in and watch it. That's one of the upsides to cancer...curing TV limbo habits.

The other upside to cancer? It is, no joke, the ultimate excuse for everything you can imagine. I show up to work yesterday 5 hours late wearing shorts and a T-shirt. Why? Because I've got cancer, dammit, that's why...and my co-workers commend me for coming in at all. I eat a bowl of mashed potatoes and my wife praises me for my dedication like I just ran a marathon. I'm pretty sure I could get out of any speeding ticket, talk my way out of any situation or get excused from doing any sort of work just by dropping the "C-card." My nurse, no joke, told me the first day that I needed to stay out of the kitchen while my wife was cooking or after she got done cooking because the smells could make me nauseous. To me, that sounds like permission to not cook or clean for three months (until my wife reads this and makes me empty the dish washer).

It would be really easy to get all bummed out about this "cancer thing" and milk it for sympathy, but that just doesn't seem reasonable. My cure rate with chemo is 95-98%. My hair will grow back, but I've always wondered what I would look like bald (now I just need to catch a disease that forces me to grow a creepy moustache...something I think would be hysterical, but my wife absolutely vetoes). I've always wondered what going through chemo would be like, and now I'm able to get a first-hand experience. I've never been given so many baskets of candy and cookies in my life, and I'm a huge fan of sweets. I'd have to say, if you're able to look past the nausea and uncertainty and fear and everything of cancer, there's a silver lining. And it's full of great excuses and containers of pudding.

The thrilling, fast-paced world of chemo...a play-by-play

2011-10-04T10:49:00.000-07:00

Four hours in a freaking chemo room is long and unbelievably boring. Here's a breakdown:

9:12 a.m. - No side effects sippin' on bleo. Like a boss.

10 a.m. - I offer Lauren my chair so can she sleep. I tell her she can wear my cancer blanket, sit in my cancer chair. She declines (horrified) and instead takes some of my cancer candy. She looks more bored than I am.

10:30 a.m. - I remember http://www.nescafeweb.com/ and its collection of Old NES games and a good chunk of my morning is shot. On Tecmo Super Bowl I destroy Buffalo by 50+ points with the Giants (Lawrence Taylor is unstoppable), remember how much I hate Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers and get frustrated on Baseball Simulator 1000 after getting called out on a pickle because my runner on third won't move as the catcher runs up to me. He's just camping out on the bag there like a vapid zombie, oblivious to my hurried button-pushing. Like everything else for the next three months, I chalk it up to a side-effect of the chemo (Lessened Nintendo expertise, farting in bed, eating the last (row) of Oreos and not lowering the toilet seat after use are all side effects).

11:33 - Pop Up Video is back on VH1? This is the stuff I'm not made aware of having a normal 9-5 job. Side note: We are the only chemo room in the floor blaring Ke$ha from this pop-up video. I believe the rest of the rooms, given the average age here, are mad that it's blaring out the Glenn Miller coming from their record players they lugged in.

11:43 - With all the hubbub of fighting a disease that claimed my second-favorite testicle, I completely forgot that today is Tuesday, and new music comes out on Tuesday, which I can critique on Spotify. If I didn't have Spotify, I never would have known that Bush released another mediocre CD a few weeks ago (or that Bush has done anything since 1996).

11:47 - My nurse just emerged back in my room, this time covered in a splatter gown, gloves and goggles around her neck. If she's not spraying foam insulation in a room somewhere, I may drag my IV cart down the hall and hide out somewhere until this all blows over. It's sure dampening the chemo mood the Indigo Girls' new CD is putting me in.

11:50 - As usual, my musical maven friend Corey Munson is 100% correct - Feist's new CD is awesome. I may have to actually go spend money on this one. I could listen to this all....Jack's Mannequin has a new CD? Well nevermind, it's time to music hop.

11:52 - If I clamp off my IV tube, will the nurse come back in 25 minutes later and find me soaked in a pile of chemo?

11:53 - Nope. Machine beeps and I get reprimanded. Lesson learned.

12:10 - Holy shit. I can't feel my left testicle. NURSE, I CAN'T FEEL MY LE...wait, no, false alarm. Phantom nut.

12:15 - Even having cancer, watching Teen Mom just makes me feel better about my life. This should run non-stop in all chemo wards. "Yeah, you may have cancer, but at least you're not a 17-year-old parent that hates your significant other and will have documentation forever of a child being raised by its grandparents."

12:31 - CNN Breaking news...Chris Christie isn't running for president. I'm not sure how that's breaking news...I believe he's said that 12 times publicly now. Here's some more breaking news... pigs are made of ham. Also, I'm not sure I want a president named "Chris Christie." He sounds like he should be a DJ on a radio morning show. "Chris Christie and the Mad Max in the morning with the Zoo Crew."

12:37 - Daytime television sucks. I'm entirely convinced I could create any show on HGTV. Have somebody offer to renovate somebody else's home. Have them start this task with a shot of a petite woman swinging a sledge hammer into the wall. In the next five minutes, create a dilemma "This isn't the tile we ordered!" or "Oh no, there's mold behind this wall!" or any other problem that is fixable. Have them solve this problem through great adversity and then show several side-by-side pictures of the old and new room, with the host walking around with a shit-eating grin and his arm around the house's couple. That's it...sell the crap out of advertising to Lowes, Behr and whatever other advertisers enjoy picking off the easily persuaded.

12:45 - This chemo is making me ridiculously tired. They told me this morning that one of the drugs they were giving me was Benadryl. I laughed. "Like the over-the-counter medication I take for allergies that makes me exhausted?" The nurse nodded. "Yes, in IV form." Good...I'd much rather have it drip into my veins for the next 30 minutes over taking two pills with some water. Sigh.

1:20 - Energy back. Went to the bathroom for the fifth time today (I'm still drinking water like crazy) and while going to the bathroom came dangerously close to spraying my IV tube on the cart I had to drag in there. I'm a coordinated 28-year-old guy standing without any problems, and many of the others in this department are far, far less coordinated. How many other times must this happen? Do they wash and sterilize these? I really wish I hadn't been joking with my wife yesterday about cutting the IV and sucking it out like a straw...that kind of makes me shudder now.

1:34 - My infusion pump has a beat better than 90% of rap songs on the radio these days. Of course, now that I typed that, T-Pain will sample it and ruin it forever.

If I Google "BEP," I want chemo treatment info, not a song about lady lumps

2011-10-04T08:33:00.000-07:00

I wasn't terribly happy when I tried to google BEP for additional info on my chemo cocktail (bleomycin, etoposide, platinum) and the first search result is Black Eyed Peas. I pity the poor soul that is legimiately worried about chemotherapy treatmetn and with tears in their eyes and a great deal of fear googles BEP and is inundated with Mr. Fergie and his rag tag group of Matrix characters putting together garbage music. (Fergie's a woman? No joke? She looks like she might smell like my shoes after running 5 miles without socks.)

I'm back in the chair again today, doing my Bleomycin...bright and early at 8 a.m. After writing my post yesterday, I went back to work and finally experienced my first signs of nausea around 4 p.m. yesterday (I've started keeping a notebook full of side effects, keeping my fingers crossed for "Moon Face" or "Sausage toes.") Fortunately, I've come to the realization that I've learned more in college than I thought I had, and it transfers directly to my chemo treatment.

Have you ever had one of those nights where you just rage, say yes to every shot that's bought for you and end up falling asleep somewhere strange? Uh, yeah, me neither, but just for hypothetical sake, let's say I wake up in a canoe, shake the glitter out of my hair, wash the Sharpy moustache off my face and start going about my day. That feeling you have, where you constantly re-evaluate your body and say, "Do I feel like I'm going to throw up? Maybe I should just throw up. Is this going to go away? Am I going to throw up this morning?"...that's exactly what chemo is like. It's that feeling, but so far for me, it's been so moderate that I just take one of my anti-nausea pills and it's gone in about half an hour. If I hadn't spent time drinking in college and battling through the next morning, I wouldn't know where my limit was and my nausea chart would be in complete chaos. So, in a weird way, I owe some apologies to college friends that I yelled at the day after, accusing them of forcing me to drink too much.

I've got a new room today, this one facing a lovely brick wall on the other side of the hospital, where I'm sure other patients are excited to state at my window and brick wall. It comes complete with another non-dead plant (which gives me comfort) and all the coffee I can drink.

I also have a new nurse today, who isn't nearly as talkative as the one yesterday was. I tried to engage her in some light conversation, but she seems distracted (a frightening trait to have your nurse possess in my position). She came in and asked if I still had my port in. Having just had it put in last Thursday, I assured her that, yes, I had not dug it out of my chest prison-style. She seemed somewhat annoyed when she went to hook up my bag and noticed just a bump on my bruised skin. Apparently, she was referring to the needle with tube hanging off of it that had been stuck in me yesterday. I wasn't aware that some people keep that thing dangling out their chest when they leave each day, just begging to drip blood all over their bed when they roll over weird in their sleep. No thanks.

I had a new needle popped in and started sippin' on bleo.

So far, the chemo hasn't seemed to slow me down much. I got about as much work done yesterday as I normally do (although much of it was from the hospital), and I went to my EMT class last night and lasted OK. I found it was difficult to concentrate, mostly because I've started to pay almost constant attention to my body, surveying it for changing signs that I'm about to get sick. So far, the light onset of nausea symptoms I've experienced have been thoroughly slapped down with my prescription anti-nausea pills (where I imagine a "Ric Flair WHOOOO" being shouted as my body smacks down the urge to vomit), due in part to this constant monitoring. I'm worried about getting caught up in a lecture on stomach trauma and suddenly realize that I'm going to barf all over the hospital lecture hall. That doesn't inspire confidence in putting me in an ambulance for clinicals, so I'm trying to avoid that.

Other than that, chemo's going pretyy good so far. I'm still the youngest person in the chemo ward (thus the reason why nobody has taken me up on my offer for "flip cup chemo" or a race down the hallway dragging our IVs) and I'm kind of digging all this free time I can use to play video games and update blogs on my sperm and white blood cell count. Of course, it's kind of awkward when my mom tells me she printed out my blog post about me talking about my sperm (http://lessthannuts.blogspot.com/2011/09/testicular-cancer-excuse-for-people-to.html ) and shared it with people in her office. Having a mother proud of a son talking about sperm is, I imagine, is like having a kid that smears crap on the walls with a mother bragging about how much of an artist he is. It's nice setting the parental expectations bar low.

Early bird chemo...I feel like I should be driving a Buick

2011-10-03T09:56:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting here and they just started my Cisplatin, so I'm officially on chemo. Because I'm sure everyone wants to live vicariously through someone who has cancer, I'll fill everybody in on the process.

I arrived at 8 a.m. for the early bird chemo (I assume it's cheaper) with my laptop, several books and water bottles. It's like I'm going to be lounging at a very sick beach. After waiting in the waiting room, I was brought into a corner office (no big deal) by one of the nurses. She assured me this was the best room they had, with a large wall of windows overlooking a beautiful parking lot that's currently being torn up by construction. I've been told that if I stare long enough, I might be able to see a dog sniffing around one of the trash cans out there (nature!). Also, the nurses are able to accurately gauge the temperature outside based on the amount of clothing the construction workers shed throughout the day, so that's kind of interesting.

The morning began with my nurse coming after me with a needle...a much larger one than I anticipated, but since they just put in my port last Thursday, the swelling hadn't quite gone down (me poking it all weekend because I thought it looked cool apparently didn't help) so they needed this massive needle. I mocked fear, and the nurse actually seemed concerned that I was going to freak out. She poked the needle in me quickly with a look of fear on her face, and I laughed. She seemed half-relieved and half-scared that I'm a wacko.

Apparently chemo doesn't come in flavors. I requested "Wild Cherry," but found out the only flavor they have is clear. My nurse also requested that I not "taste" it and urged me not to cut the IV open and drink it out of the tube like a straw. I've found that oncology departments are somewhat strict with their rules.

After the anti-nausea IV, they put me on a saline solution for two freaking hours to hydrate me. During this time, I had to get up to pee something like 5 times, each time dragging my IV into the bathroom like some sort of metal drinking partner.

In-between, I tried to get some work done and talked with my wife, who made one of the most intelligent and humorous observations I've heard in some time. At one point, she was staring at a green potted plant hanging from the ceiling, and said to me, relieved, "Well, that's a very healthy plant. That's a really good sign." I accused her of really struggling for conversation topics this morning, and she denied the accusation, saying, "That shows the type of people they are. What would you think if you came into the chemo department and there were a bunch of dead plants." This made me laugh...a lot...but after I got done it made me think. The last thing you'd want to see anywhere, at any sort of business, would be a bunch of dead plants hanging in jars from the ceiling. I don't care what the job is...if you've got dead plants hanging around, you likely lack a certain level of dedication. I'm glad my oncology nurses have the level of dedication to water their foliage...hopefully they'll take as good of care of me as a leafy thing hanging in front of the window. Now I'm kind of hoping it isn't plastic and this metaphor hasn't gone to shit...you know what, I'm not going to check. It makes me feel better.

I'm 10 minutes in with the Cisplatin right now (Oh yeah, I'm a fast typer) and so far, no side effects. The nurse gave me several business cards with the side effects listed on them and the dates I began each medication on them, however I plan on dropping these into fish bowls for the chance to win a free lunch buffet (drinks not included), so fortunately I've got them memorized. I'm doing BEP - Bleomycin, Etoposide (VP-16) and Cisplatin (Yeah, I don't know where they got the "P" from on that either). They also gave me Dexamethasone (Decadron), which as one of its side effects includes "Moone Face." That might be the greatest side effect I've ever heard of, and sounds like some doctor with a sense of humor made it up and threw it on the card to see if his peers and nurses would make up an explanation for it on the spot. It makes me want to start warning other cancer patients of the side effect "Pickle neck."

So that's where I'm at...apparently the two hours they quoted me last week was way off, and I've got about 4-5 hours each day this week in the chair with a tube leading into my chest. I'm kind of digging this...with my job and part-time jobs and stuff, this is actually giving me a chance to relax and reflect on things.

I'll keep you all updated. If I find a different plant in this room tomorrow, I'm going to flip shit.

P.S. I'm going to try and get some "Flip Cup Chemo" going tomorrow in one of the public rooms. When the IV stops flowing and starts beeping, you try to flip that cup onto its top. Thoughts?

Are you ready for some chemo?

2011-10-02T19:00:00.000-07:00

Chemo treatments start tomorrow...and thanks to fellow newspaper editor and EMT Mindy, I'm ready for it. Thanks for the wig.

A chemo port sounds luxurious. Why can't you just use an ice pick and a rusty garden hose?

2011-09-29T21:22:00.000-07:00

Guess who's got a port now? I'll give you a hint...he's got two thumbs, one ball and cancer.

Had a busy day at hospitals today. I started out at Mary Greeley, getting baselines for hearing and pulmonary function before heading back to the office for a solid 45 minutes of work before my surgery to have my port put in. You know what makes surgery even more fun? Having your insurance company not give you a clear A-OK on the procedure before starting...that's just a running kick to the nut. (Half-metaphorically)

I got a call last night from a nurse in my surgeon's office telling me she was fighting with my insurance company because they still hadn't given pre-approval for my port to be "installed." (Makes me sound like a robot). She said she'd get it taken care of this morning, and 1 hour before I had to show up for surgery she called back letting me know they had given her an answer of "maybe," but nothing definitive. "So, it's up to you at this point," she said. Great. How expensive is this? "Very. The device they're putting in you is two grand by itself, not to mention surgery and anesthesia."

A quick call to my HR head went unanswered...she was in a meeting. Another quick call to her secretary informing her, politely, to find her got her on the phone.

"I have cancer and start chemo Monday, for which I need a port. Our insurance company apparently believes this port is a luxury. Should I just skip the chemo and try to ride this out with some amoxicillin or something?" Ten minutes and a phone call to the national HR and I'm given the green light. "You do what you need to do to get better, don't worry about it," she said. Our HR head is actually pretty awesome.

I head into surgery, where I'm briefed by the nurses. I should use this opportunity to say how cool the nurses at BCH are (Boone County Hospital, for all you laypeople). Yesterday, one of the nurses called to confirm and mentioned, "I'm a cancer survivor myself. You actually interviewed me and wrote an article about me last year for Relay for Life. Maybe I should interview you tomorrow." Was that a cancer burn? I believe so.

They asked me to wear a button down shirt with no shirt on under it so the surgeon could get to my chest with ease. I found out quickly that they must have done this to mess with me, because as soon as I got there they made me get in one of those ridiculous gowns. I'm not sure why I thought it would be any other way...you don't often see television shows about surgery where the patient is on a table with a button-down shirt spread open like Scott Stapp.

More paperwork, questions about allergies, and an IV is started on me. I show her my veins, figuring she'll be impressed with how bulgy and visible they are through my pale skin. She is impressed. Win.

Lauren's hanging out with me in the room when my surgeon shows up, rocking jeans and a polo. He's visibly angry and starts going off on a tangent about how much my insurance company sucks and how I deserve so much better than that and compares the entire experience to beating a dog. That's no joke...I laugh genuinely, but I'm scared. I think about every time I've tried to assemble something when I'm pissed off. I'm not sure I want a pissed off surgeon's hands inside me trying to get a plastic tube into my vein. If it's anything like when I tried to put together my barbecue grill, he'll get to the end, notice an extra piece lying on the table and say, "To hell with it, it should still work." (Although, to be fair, my grill still works marvelously)

My surgeon calms down and begins joking with my wife and I like he did a couple days earlier in our meeting. He's hilarious and just a genuinely nice guy. He leaves, and returns five minutes later. I was at the hospital two days earlier taking photos and writing an article on a radiology doc that shaved his moustache for charity. One of the surgery nurses remembered which shoulder I had my camera bag on and suggested I get my port put in the other side of my chest. This is why small towns, and the hospitals they have, are awesome.

The nurse comes in and grabs my IV so I can shuffle past the entire nursing staff wearing a stupid gown and socks. This is exactly what a dog must feel like being taken on a walk.

I get to the surgery room and, like my orchiectomy (read: half-neutering), it's packed. I'm put on a table, given the good anesthesia, and just like last time it's like all of a sudden I'm in recovery.

When I had surgery to remove my cancer-infested ball, they gave me pudding. Now, getting a port put in me, they brought me pork chops and mashed potatoes. This is the greatest thing ever, and I tell them that. There must be a pattern here...lose a ball, get pudding. Get a port, get pork chops. I assume if I'm ever castrated I'll be given a "Fun Size" Hershey's bar, and if I'm ever given a prosthetic hip I'll get filet mignon.

So now I'm the $2,000 man with a port leading directly to my vein, sitting conveniently under my clavicle just under the skin like a weird lump. Man...I've got one nut, a lump under the skin on my chest and I'll be bald in two weeks from chemo. It's a good thing I locked down my wife when I did.

Tomorrow I've got one last meeting with my spermatologist, a meeting with my oncologist to finalize everything, and the chemo starts Monday. Five days of poisoning myself, throwing up and sleeping 14 hours a day...it's going to be just like college, only with less sleep.

It's a waste of some seriously great veins for me not to be a drug user

2011-09-28T06:55:00.000-07:00

Nothing ruins a good day like thinking you’re going to get drugged up and then having those hopes dashed.

I went in for an appointment at Boone County Hospital to have my port put in (so I thought) only to be told that it was a pre-op meeting and I would have my port put in Thursday. I guess that makes a lot of sense, considering they usually tell you not to eat anything 12 hours prior to the surgery and I had a loaded double omelet sandwich from Hardees a mere 5-1/2 hours ago. I doubt they would have liked discovering my stomach contained a double omelet sandwich halfway through.

For those of you that are unfamiliar with chemo, a port is essentially like a frequent flyer for needle users. It’s implanted under your skin so that for people that need chemo frequently (like this guy now), they’ve already got this thing there that they can hook up to without searching for a vein like an 80s rock star. To test the waters with my surgeon to gauge his level of seriousness, I decided to float a needle drugs joke.

"Yeah, with as pale as I am, it's just a real waste of God-given visible veins that I'm not a heroin user," I said with a straight face.

My doctor cocked his head, a slight smile on his face.

"You're telling me," he said. "Not only are you pale, but your veins pop out a bit. I saw you come in here, and I just started drooling over your veins."

We both started cracking up. This surgeon is awesome...he almost makes me feel bad I'm only having a port put in and don't have anything seriously wrong I need operated on. (Just cancer...dammit)

So the next few days are a bit hectic. Thursday I have baselines for lung function, kidney function and hearing in the morning followed by surgery to put my port in at noon. Friday I head back to the spermatologist (P.S....they don't like being called that) for sperm freezing (a topic I will never talk about with anybody), a final meeting with my oncologist Friday to make sure we've got all of our ducks in a row, and the chemo party starts next Monday and runs all week long. Boo yah.

The support I've gotten so far with those whole nut cancer thing has been pretty awesome. I've received several cards from former fraternity brothers, including one from two of the people I respect more than nearly anybody, Christ and Maggie Hatch (Check out her blog...she and her husband are much cooler than I: http://maggieandchrishatch.blogspot.com/ ). Among the cards I've received was one from a guy in town I did an article on this past summer who included a yellow Livestrong bracelet and a very touching note, as he is a 20+ year cancer survivor.

I've somewhat made fun of the bracelets in the past because they're trendy (or were 5 years ago) and I view them as somewhat of a form of slacktivisim...feeling good about helping a charity without really doing anything. Based on the note I received from this cancer survivor, who went out of his way to explain to me its meaning, I've somewhat changed my mind on them and have started wearing it. Feel free to mock me for my flip-flopping.

Since I lose my hair Oct. 17 and will officially start wearing beanies full-time, I've utilized the full range of scientific tools available at my disposal to prepare you all for the awesomeness of bald Greg. Enjoy before and after renditions:

Before

After.

That's Photoshop mastery, people. I'm available for freelance work.

Yeah, you're going through chemo, but it's the same kind as Lance!

2011-09-25T12:09:00.000-07:00

"You know, this is the same type of chemo treatment Lance Armstrong had," my oncologist said with a hint of pride in his voice.

Since being diagnosed with testicular cancer, every single doctor I've seen has gone out of their way to mention Lance Armstrong with me as if I'm desperately seeking a one-nutted hero to relate to. They tell me "This is the same type of cancer Lance Armstrong had," as if I was given some sort of an honor. "This is the same treatment Lance Armstrong took," as if I'm being served the fanciest meal at the fanciest restaurant. "Your testicle is the same size as weight as the one they removed from Lance Armstrong's sack," said my surgeon.

OK, that last one was made up. (Mine was way bigger)

I can get why some people may be given hope being told they're receiving the same treatment Lance Armstrong was given. They're freaking out thinking that chemo is going to mess them up physically or mentally, and it's nice to have a pseudo-celebrity to point to and say, "Look at that dude. He's healthy and got to date Sheryl Crow."

That's great, but I'm just not that into Sheryl Crow. And for someone who's about to go through chemo, this is strange to say, but I would never put poison like Michelob Ultra in my body.

The guy's healthy, he's famous and the organization he's founded has raised millions for cancer research, which is admirable (although don't get me started on those rubber wristbands). But it's weird when doctors talk about him as if he's their son who just bought a respectable chiropractic clinic in downtown Cleveland. Taking the same chemo as Lance Armstrong doesn't give me confidence...a 95+ percent cure rate does.

I had my oncologist appointment on Friday, and I'm shocked I wasn't given a dayplanner rather than the lengthy sheet a nurse handed me. This week I have a port put in my chest to make receiving the chemo easier (I was hoping it would be in my head like in the Matrix), I have tests on my lung and liver function to obtain a baseline to make sure the chemo doesn't mess with that, and I meet with my oncologist again just to make sure everything's good to go. I also have to find time to get to a spermologist (probably not a real word, but talk to somebody about freezing sperm) to get that taken care of. Lauren not only shot down my ice cube tray idea I talked about in my last post, but also using a cylindrical bag like an Ice-E-pop, so apparently I have to go the clinical route. When I told my dad I'm getting this taken care of this week, he offered, "Do you want your mother and I to come up for that?" I almost rolled me car into a ditch I was laughing so hard.

After giving me all the scary stuff first (chemo can mess with your liver, chemo can mess with your breathing, chemo can mess with your white blood cell count...just like Lance Armstrong!), my oncologist reassured me that he's never seen any of that personally (a great sign, considering he's been doing this forever) and started doing the paperwork to get everything set up.

While he was doing paperwork, my wife and I peppered him with questions...my wife asking him the technical questions, and me asking him questions about how much time I can expect to miss at work, if I can work through being tired safely and other similar questions. It wasn't until I told him I have to complete 32 hours of clinicals for my EMT class by December (around the same time my chemo treatment ends) and asked if I should wear a mask while in the ER and on the ambulance when he stopped typing and peered at me amused over his glasses.

"You're a pretty active guy, aren't you, Greg?" he asked with a knowing smile. I agreed with his assessment.

"Well, you're going to have to slow down," he said. "You don't want to burn the candle at both ends."

It was with that statement that I realized that chemo might be a little bit more than being bald, dizzy and throwing up now and again (essentially living the life of Billy Corgan, I assume). I'll be interested to see how this all works out.

So...chemo starts Oct. 3. The first week I'll have two-hour treatments each day, followed by two weeks of treatment only on Tuesdays. That's one round, and it will repeat for rounds two and three, ending my treatment after 9-11 weeks around the beginning of December. My hair falls out Oct. 17 (I'll likely shave it before then) and then everyone in town who doesn't already know will either know or think I'm weird. Likely both.

I'll update this blog during my first chemo treatment to let anyone that's curious to know what chemo feels like exactly what it feels like (while kicking it in my chemo dorm with the others. Based on their average age, I'll likely get some Scrabble going up there. Finally I can wear white pants with black socks and white shoes and use old-timey words like "hoity toity")

I had blood taken for some tests for a baseline, and if anything shows up (just like Lance Armstrong!) I'll share it. Prepare for pictures to be posted of me bald...it's going to be creepy (just like...nah, I've overused it. You get the idea).

Most people don't like sleeping in a pile of hair

2011-09-24T04:31:00.000-07:00

Walking through the oncology department of my hospital yesterday, I noticed that the chemo rooms were a lot like dorms for old people. My oncologist was in the process of giving me a tour, and every "chemo dorm" we passed had the door open with people listening to music, watching TV, eating take-out food and casting a wary eye to the newcomer that was checking the place out.

I should probably preface this by saying I'm approximately 25 younger than the youngest cancer patients in that place, so they're right to be skeptical. They probably think I'm going to be that guy that blares rap music at full volume and calls all of them "bro" regardless of gender.

While a weird experience, the oncology department is far less depressing than I originally expected. Unlike other departments, the patients kind of run the show. They joke with the receptionists, they talk to each other and they actually walk around the department at their leisure. You know how your doctor's office has the waiting area and then the corridor of hallways that have the exam rooms and everything? That's totally fair game for the cancer patients. It's as if they're like, "I've got cancer...who the hell is going to stop me?" and just go where they please. I plan on trying that at Burger King tomorrow as I attempt to grill myself a Quadruple Whopper (patent pending).

The staff at an oncology department is kind of different. While all the patients are old, all of the staff is ridiculously young. I'm not sure exactly where the logic is in that, but they're all super friendly, which is oddly discomforting. You go to any other department and chances are you're going to hit the receptionist we're all familiar with - the "I don't care if you've been waiting for 45 minutes to see the doctor, I'm eating a sandwich and I already gave you the look when you brought your questionnaire back up that told you where you can file that." Cancer trumps that. I'm starting to learn cancer trumps a lot of things. This is going to get annoying for my friends the next time we play poker.

The only exception to the young staff rule is my oncologist, who is dry, very direct and super knowledgeable. How knowledgeable? I asked him how long I would have after starting chemo before I lost my hair.

"16 days," he said, not even looking up from the computer. My wife and I laughed.

"That's very specific," my wife said jokingly.

"I've been doing this for a while," he said. "16 days, give or take."

I only got him to smile once, when he was telling me how many men usually shave their hair once it starts falling out.

"They don't like sleeping in a pile of hair like a mouse?" I asked. He smiled and said something to the effect of "Most people don't like sleeping in a pile of hair."

That may be the greatest thing I've heard come out of a doctor's mouth, although it likely doesn't inspire confidence after telling you all how smart my doctor is. ("My doc is so smart, he knows the difference between the behaviors of humans and rodents.") Obvious or not, it's good advice, so the pile of hair on my head is going to be gone shortly...apparently Oct. 19, based on my doctor's flawless knowledge of hair.

More tomorrow...

Testicular Cancer: An excuse for people to ask about your sperm

2011-09-22T06:22:00.000-07:00

Four people this week have talked to me about my sperm, and none of them were doctors.

That bears repeating: After making it public to pretty much everyone that I’ve been diagnosed with testicular cancer, I have had four people engage me in conversation about my reproductive byproduct, and only two of them were family members.

If you’re reading this, chances are that you may only partly know me…a former classmate, friend, friend of a friend or possibly a complete stranger. Because of this, I suppose I should clarify…there were very few occasions prior to being diagnosed with TC that I’ve engaged in conversations, even with close friends and family, about my reproductive byproducts. It’s just not a subject that often comes up around the dinner table…my parents asking if I plan on cryogenically freezing sperm as they pass the container of Tony Chachere Creole Seasoning that is more of a condiment at their dinner table than pepper ever hopes to be.

It’s not that I’m a modest individual…it’s just that I’ve never been engaged in the discussion.

“What are you doing about your sperm?” asks somebody at work that will remain nameless.

“You need to start ‘harvesting your sperm,’” my Uncle Mark, a fantastic guy that loves being mentioned in print (check that off my list), writes to me in a Facebook message.

“If you need help paying to have your sperm frozen, let me know,” my mother offers during a phone call (we don’t, Mom, but thanks for offering to give me the most awkward birthday present ever).

My favorite, however, came from one of our freelancers at my newspaper. I wouldn’t even hazard a guess as to her age, because I’m horrible at that and unless you’re working at a carnival game that requires it (in which case you always guess ‘35’), it’s never appropriate to do so. I’d say it’s safe to say that she’s over 70, however.

I told her a couple of days ago about my diagnosis, to which she gave me a great deal of advice, as she and her husband both had cancer multiple times. We bid each other adieu and hung up. Yesterday, I got a phone call out of the blue.

“Greg, I couldn’t sleep last night. This is a delicate subject, but I just kept thinking about your sperm.”

Join the club.

“You’re young and while your sperm counts usually return after chemo, it would probably be a safe bet to look into freezing some so you can have kids down the line.”

I assured her that my sperm was now a “Top 5 priority” in my life, thanked her for losing sleep over them (plural? Yeah, plural.), and hung up the phone. Apparently just hearing one side of that phone call left a lot of questions.

“Who was that?” my sports editor yelled from across the room. I told him. “What did they want,” he yelled back.

“She couldn’t sleep last night thinking about my sperm,” I yelled back. The office went quiet. Nobody asked a follow-up question, and I didn’t offer any explanation. Sometimes the key to being a good newspaper editor is having your staff wonder what makes your sperm so special. Write that down, quote that and attribute it to me…it will be in a leadership book someday.

To cut down on the amount of time I spend during my day talking about my sperm with people that would have previously blushed asking me where the bathroom is located, I’ll put everyone’s minds at ease: I will be having my sperm frozen to ensure that Lauren and I will have kids in the future. We checked into it, it’s amazingly reasonable in its pricing and I’ll be doing it before I start my chemotherapy.

Always a bit…cautious… (read: cheap) with how I spend money, however, I’m passing on that option and doing it myself using an ice cube tray and our not-so-spacious freezer. Feel free to stop by my house anytime for a nice, long talk about my sperm. I’ll have margaritas ready.

**

By the way, got a call from my Doc yesterday, and my tumor markers are way down. My HDG normalized and is now undetectable (it was at 11). AFP is now 12 (was at 23) and LVH is 118 (was 193). If you're like me, those numbers mean nothing, but apparently it's good news. If you're like my parents, that news prompts your first question to be "So you don't have to go through chemo?" Nope...still going through chemo. Nice try, though.

Testicular Cancer - A Journey (and other overused metaphors)

2011-09-20T07:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I’ve gotten a lot of questions about my “cancer thing,” so in order to share information with long-lost friends and avoid the awkward phone calls with very little information (“Old buddy from college? It’s Greg. My tumor markers dropped a little! OK, I’ll see you at VEISHEA in five years!”) I decided to start this blog and share my overly personal experience of losing a testicle to cancer. Just imagine…before blogs, this would have taken hundreds of overly-personal Christmas cards.

Anyways, it was August 15 when I first noticed something was amiss. I was sitting in a city council meeting when I noticed that one of my testicles was hurting (that was a fun sentence to type knowing fully well my grandmother will likely read this…HI NANA!). I’m not one to put off pain because I’m scared of hospitals at all. I’ve got health insurance, so I’m going to use it if there’s anything I’m worried about, but this situation was unusual. I had rode a horse the day before (the first time I had done this since I was small enough to be lifted on top of one), and not being used to being jostled up and down, I figured I had landed weird while the horse was galloping and had bruised one of them. “I’ll give it a day,” I thought.

The next day I noticed a fruity sensation. This was entirely attributed to the Fruit Stripe gum I was chewing, however, and the pain in my testicle was gone. I completely forgot all about the pain and my reference to a chewing gum popular in the mid-90s and went on with my life.

It wasn’t until two weeks later that the pain returned, same testicle. I made several jokes with my wife, including a few about it being cancer, and made the same promise: if it’s still there tomorrow, I’ll get it checked out.

The next day the pain remained, so I called up a local physician. I hadn’t been to the doctor since moving to Boone except for a physical for the fire department, which was paid for by the city. When I inquired about returning to the doctor I saw that day, I found out my insurance didn’t cover that provider. My wife, however, had received a tetanus booster from a doctor that did accept our insurance – Dr. Mehlhaus.

This leads to something that is a new subject all in itself…small-town life. When I had my fire department physical, I was holding a urine sample when I passed my next-door neighbor, who thanked me for the cookies my wife and I had made for them a few weeks earlier (tip: if you don’t own a snow blower, but your neighbor does, learn how to bake). It also turns out that I’m in Rotary Club with Dr. Mehlhaus (typing that sentence, I feel like a 90-year-old telling a story that they are making purposefully long). Eating lunch every week with a person that you make an appointment to look at your testicle is difficult, but I’d heard good things about him, he was a very nice guy in Rotary and I had a high opinion of him. To summarize, living in a small town is funny...chances are if you're holding a container of urine or having a bulge on your nut examined, you're going to run into someone you know, so modesty is something you learn to live without.

My opinion of Mehlhaus being a decent guy nearly changed when I was led to his Iowa Hawkeye-filled patient room. I felt like I was being recruited and wondered silently if any patients were offended by this. I reminded myself that Iowa State didn’t have a medical school and waited for the doc. (Note: Despite his Hawkeye allegience, I now view Mehlhaus as the best doctor in the world)

Mehlhaus showed up and we spent about five minutes shooting the breeze about a recent bond issue, which was cut short by him asking me to drop my pants…an odd conversation shifter. He inspected, had me pull my pants back up, and immediately hopped on the phone trying to set me up with an ultrasound at BCH. Apparently everything in the city was booked up that day because he left the room and spent 15 minutes on the phone, using his skills of negotiation to get something set up.

He came back in the room and didn’t mince words: he was worried. It was either very severe epididymitis or testicular cancer. He told me if it was epididy-whatever I’d take some pain medication and they’d monitor me. He said if it was testicular cancer, survival rates were 95-98 percent and I’d have surgery. He said he had set me up with someone he knew in Des Moines and wanted me to drive down there now. Not in four hours, not tomorrow…go get in your car, tell people at work not to expect you today and leave.

This was an unexpected turn, but I nodded along with him as if I was given a cancer diagnosis all of the time. I asked about the epididymitis, as if he were a mechanic telling me my car had either a chipped windshield or a blown transmission and I had responded with, “Oh man, does it look like the crack has started to spread at all?”

I thanked him, left, ran home to swap cars with my wife and share the news, which I actually gave her over the phone on the way home. I stressed the high survival rate, told her not to worry and met her at home looking for my iPod. She asked if I was in shock, and I told her not really…I fully understood the risks, and I absolutely did. I was more concerned with making a 45-minute drive to Des Moines without my 160 gigs of music (as usual, on any given day, 98% of my music is crap, but I have to skip through it all).

I stopped at work and gave them the news, which is not easy. Telling a newspaper staff that the person who usually does all of the layout, writes a couple of stories (I had two I was in the process of writing for the next day) and alters the photos that instead of doing that today, he’ll be leaving, eight hours before deadline is…tough. Obviously the possibility of cancer is a flawless excuse, but I still felt bad.

I showed up in Des Moines and was told to meet my urologist. I showed up at the lobby, was given my sign-in stuff and delicately asked a question to the clerk. “I need to use the bathroom. I assume, with this being the urology department, you’ve got, like, 50 of them. Can you point me to one of them?”

They only had two, but one was unoccupied. In there, with it being urology, I noticed a tray of urinalysis cups. A sign prompted visitors to leave a urine sample if they could. “Wow, just like a fancy hotel,” I thought to myself. “Why not?”

I left the bathroom, and my urine sample in the metal cabinet, and went back to the paperwork. I had filled out quite a bit of paperwork that day and was getting tired of it all. This paperwork was ridiculous…all questions focused on my urination habits. Do you have trouble urinating? Nope. Get up frequently at night to urinate? Nope. Reason for visit? Cancer. Allergies? “Cats, but I do not ingest these orally,” I wrote.

A nurse came out and got me and we went through the routine – she takes my height, weighs me, I make the same stupid joke I’m sure all patients make about how the patient questionnaire I’m holding must weigh 10 pounds, and I’m led to a small room.

My urologist was awesome. He checked me out, said the same thing Mehlhaus told me, sent me to an ultrasound tech in the same building, and it was there that I started to get slightly nervous. I walked into the ultrasound tech place, signed in, and sat down amongst a crowd of about 25 people. Not two minutes later, a nurse came out for me…not a good sign.

I threw on the gown, laid down and looked around at all the maternity pictures of mothers with their babies as the tech put ultrasound gel on my nuts. I’m sure it was awkward for the both of us, but it gave me a chance to leaf through the latest copy of Parenting magazine while she went over my testicles with something that looked like an airport security wand. I resisted the urge to ask her if it was a boy.

From there, she left, leaving me in the room for about 15 minutes and I was sweating a bit. It wasn’t until this point that I started thinking about how this might be somewhat serious and asking myself if Mehlhaus and my oncologist were simply telling me the best odds and not the most practical odds of beating this. Fifteen minutes in a room normally reserved for people excited to find out the sex of their baby when you’re facing a diagnosis you’re still unsure of is an eternity.

When the tech came back in and told me to go back to my urologist, I was nervous. When I got back to the crowded urology department, signed in, and my urologist came into the waiting room to get me himself, I knew.

Sure enough, there was a mass. The urologist was 90% sure it was testicular cancer, and said there was a 10% chance it was just a mass. Surgery was scheduled, I was given no options on time, I was to show up for surgery the next day at 8:30 a.m. I immediately called my wife, who understandably was freaking out, but kept it together very well in front of her daycare kids. Next I called my parents and brother to let them know, which is an interesting experience. “Hey, mom? What’s going on? Oh, really, Amy’s doing good in cross country? That’s awesome! Anna’s doing well also? That’s great. Anyways, not a big deal, and I don’t want you to freak out, but I’ve got what looks like testicular cancer and I’m having surgery tomorrow.”

Obviously, my parents freaked out. Anybody hears cancer and they think the worst, but I honestly wasn’t all that worried at the time. I had asked questions, and based on the odds and the state it was in, testicular cancer to me was like the Detroit Lions of cancer (post-written edit Sept. 27: I'm starting to regret typing that looking at their record so far this season). It’s this reason why I don’t really look at myself as “battling cancer,” a term that’s used a lot these days. It’s difficult to describe, but being a huge fan of metaphors, it’s like when top clothing designers do a line for K-Mart. “Is that Gucci?” “Technically, yes.” That’s how I feel with my testicular cancer. “You have cancer?” “Well, technically, yes.” That might be the most non-heterosexual metaphor I could throw out there, but I preceded it with a football reference, and I only have one testicle, so cut me some slack.

My favorite part of this was telling a couple friends, who reacted exactly how I needed them to react in that circumstance (and I knew they would). Robson told me it sucked, but now I could make “I would give my left nut for…” statements with more validity. Vize matter-of-factly asked me if I had heard of the song “Half a Man” by Stephen Lynch. This is precisely the reaction I needed…the last thing I wanted was sympathy or people acting as if I’d been given horrible news. The odds are unbelievably high…do you tell somebody going in to have their appendix removed, “I’m so sorry, you’re going to be OK. You’re in my thoughts and prayers.” It’s a sweet thought, but not entirely appropriate.

Hanging with my wife the evening before surgery is an odd experience. I felt like my left testicle was on death row, but I didn’t know the best way to give it its last meal. We both joked about it (mainly me…this entire process has been hell on her, as it would be for me if she was going through it), had some Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and went to bed. Surprisingly, I slept like a baby that night. I’m unusual.

The next day, more of the same. Same paperwork, same joke about ingesting cats, thrown into a gown and put on an IV. Lauren had the difficult part…she had to actually be conscious through the surgery. I went into huge room with a bunch of people, debating whether or not it would be appropriate to ask if they could put a Junior Mint in my sack to help balance out the weight so I wouldn’t steer right when I walked. I felt the timing was inappropriate, so I put that one away to use later (apparently here).

They put the good stuff in my IV and told me they were starting the knockout stuff. I started to ask them if they wanted me to count to a certain number or if I should just…holy crap, I’m waking up in recovery.
My eyes were heavy and I struggled to regain consciousness. A nurse noticed and asked me how I was doing. I asked for a late checkout and where continental breakfast was…a horribly lame joke that seemed even lamer with how exaggeratedly they laughed at it.

I was given pudding…hardly a consolation to losing a testicle…and two packages of crackers. This seemed like an odd combination, but I was hungry. They didn’t have coffee there, so I settled for a Sprite. I still feel bad for this, but my wife hadn’t eaten all morning and there were no vending machines in the lobby. She ate one of my saltines, to which I jokingly accused her of pilfering my “surgery crackers,” which prompted a nurse to bring my wife a package of them. They sat untouched, my wife embarrassed. I still feel horrible about that…I don’t think she had eaten for 18 hours at that point, and wouldn’t until we got home.

I was disappointed that they didn’t give me my testicle so I could have it stuffed and put on a keychain, but apparently they needed it for a biopsy. My wife drove me home and I slowly worked my way upstairs and into bed. Ice, Playstation, mini corndogs and Percocet got me through the next two days, although the pain wasn’t bad at all. I was off pain killers and drinking wine at my in-law’s house three days later. Four days afterwards, I was at my parent’s house in Omaha hanging out with them for Grandma's birthday.

Biopsy came back – it was cancer. However, the cancer was contained to the testicle itself – a four-centimeter long growth on my left testicle. People from Canada are gasping right now…for Americans, that’s about 1-1/2 inches long. Oh yeah…my testicle grows cancer better than teenagers grow crops on Farmville.

I went through a CT scan, which was interesting, and waited for the results. Everybody was optimistic. For the first time, I wasn’t, and I don’t know why. I think I was worried that with everyone else assuming it was done, I should be wary. Results of the CT scan came back…once again we went to my urologist who told us that I’d be going through three rounds of chemo. The odds of success with the chemo for the type of cancer I have are good, he said, about 95-98%.

So, that’s where I’m at right now. My wife and family has understandably been freaking out about this, as I believe I would be, too. If Lauren was going through this, even with odds near-perfect, I would freak out. Me, however, I’m not worried.

I’ve never seen the point of worrying about stuff like this. At this point, there’s nothing I can do about this except to move ahead. Worrying isn’t going to do a thing about this other than freak myself out, freak family and friends out and completely ruin what would otherwise be a good day. Besides, looking at this, it’s kind of a funny situation when you want it to be. I’d rather laugh about how bizarre and funny this entire process is than sit there and reflect on the process. Besides…95% odds? Chances are better that I’ll get in a car crash on the way to chemo than for my treatment to not be effective.

I look at chemo the same way I do as watching “The Deadliest Catch.” If offered the chance, would I work on one of those crab boats, without pay? Hell no…but part of me wonders what it would be like and how I would handle it. It’s the exact same way with chemo…it’s not something I would voluntarily sign up for, but I’ve always wondered what it would be like and how I would handle it. It’s completely messed up, but I’m kind of excited to get it started.

So, that’s where we’re at. I have Stage 2 K-Mart Cancer, I’m going through three rounds of chemo (which may leave me bald around Halloween…something that opens up all new worlds of possibilities for costumes) and I find the entire process oddly funny. Sure, it’s somewhat serious…any disease is…but it’s not anything that people haven’t gone through before and with cure rates as high as they are, it’s not anything that I’m going to worry about.

Going from pain in a testicle to removing that testicle within 24 hours, and then learning I’d need chemo two weeks later…that can seem either kind of scary/sad or really pretty funny. It all depends on how you look at it, and I will always look at that type of situation from a humorous viewpoint…it just doesn’t make sense to do it any other way.

So, for family and friends that have read this far, take the fun route…joke about me winning the Tour de France, tease me about being half a man and laugh when I say, “Man, it’s hot in here…I’m sweating my ball off.” This isn’t a scary situation…I don’t think people freak out about doing anything else with a 98% success rate (did you know it’s the same success rate as having Lasik eye surgery?).

Finding humor in situations where others find sadness is going to make your life a whole lot more fun. Believe me. I’m not entirely crazy, I’m only half-nuts.