Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Well, looks like the wait is over ... somewhat.

I met with a new Doctor today and looks like we have some direction. I have what they call Splenic Marginal Zone lymphoma. It's part of the non-Hodgkins Lymphoma family. Instead of going into detail use the link below for more info

http://www.lymphomainfo.net/nhl/types/smzl.html

My new Doctor is really good. I'm glad that they didn't move me from PMH. I was told it could happen if my condition wasn't that bad and could be treated closer to home. I guess having a very rare condition, they wanted to keep me here.

This is what happens now. The Dr. wants to start right away. One way to really put this into remission is to have my spleen removed. I have to meet with a spleen surgeon first. With my spleen being so big ( I mean really big ) my Dr. wants to be sure we don't have any complications cause of it's size. I also have to go for another CT scan. Again, to check the size of the spleen and see if anything else has changed in there. Once those are done, I will meet with My Dr. and decide which way to go. He has already booking my chemo sessions incase taking out the spleen is not an option. Don't know when, but I assume it will be right away, like next month.

If they take out the spleen, my condition may go into remission itself. I will have to take drugs to help with common viruses. If they can't take it out ( cause the complications and risks are too high ) they will do chemo. Either way looks like they might do it. Don't know what the sessions will be but he did say that it will 2 years before i'm done the first round. The drug of choice is Rituxan. He says it's very good and has been used for about 15 yrs. It's not curable, but it is treatable and manageable. I should be able to get a good 8-12 yrs in, ( right from his mouth )  SHIT!!!!  Oh well, least that will take me to retirement-ish age. I will stretch this out as long as I can, and fight it as hard as I can. This last part is really hard and it is the last I'm going to talk about it.

Till next time,

vik

2 comments:

  1. The important word is REMISSION, and we are so glad to have read it in your blog. It won't be easy but you'll get there.
    big HUGS xxxxx

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