I saw Dr. Robison on Monday (thank you to Katie for joining me for moral support at 7:30am!). She elaborated a bit about what they saw on the CT scan. There is what she described as “studding” meaning small nodules of disease on parts of the abdominal living, liver, and lining of one of my lungs. Due to the location of the measurable disease, surgery is not an option. It is not safe therefore, inoperable. That officially qualifies me for a trial chemo offered through Mass General with Dr. Dizon (my adorable, ascot-wearing, ray of sunshine). We will try the trial first and if it does not work we will rely on some other options such as Avastin (an infusion) or go back to traditional chemotherapy. I do not know what the trial involves, how often I will have to go to Boston, or what the side effects are. I will learn all about that on Friday. My homegirl Sarah kindly volunteered to take the day off on Friday to be by my side for this appointment (though secretly I think she just wanted to witness the adorableness that is Dr. Dizon and his festive fashion). Over the weekend I will be sure to update you on what I know regarding this chemotherapy.

Upon receiving this news I was initially rattled by the word “inoperable”. It just sounds so grim when you hear it out loud. Luckily the measurable disease, though in more than one area of my body is small and slow growing so those are two facts in my favor. I am choosing to take this as a sign from the universe that we are not turning to surgery because physically, I am tired. I’m still recovering from the last one. This is the universe cutting me a break. Thanks universe? (You mysterious bastard).

Thank you for the continued support and love. I need every ounce of your positivity.

I have been really neglecting the blog. I’ve been busy living my life and not really thinking about cancer. Last Friday I went to the doctor and had my usual blood test to check on my CA-125. Unfortunately the results weren’t favorable. My CA-125 is about 385. Just as a benchmark it was in the high 90’s prior to the surgery I had in December. Yesterday’s CT scan reflected the presence of fluid and possible nodules/small masses in or around my diaphragm and liver Needless to say, I’m annoyed.

When I last saw Dr. Dizon he helped me to reframe my illness as a chronic condition. I’ve become accustomed to thinking about it in a gray sense instead of black and white. Although I was expecting for the cancer to “come back”, I at least thought that after the intensive surgery I had in December that it would stabilize for a few months…or years. I thought wrong.

I see doctor Robison on Monday and hopefully I will have a little more information about how we plan to proceed next week. Although there is a lot to be nervous about, in reality my health is no worse or no better than I realistically expected (at least once I knew that my CA-125 was elevated).

In more exciting news we raised over 1200 dollars for the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition at the Alex and Ani fundraiser I hosted back in February. Thank you to everyone that participated, donated, volunteered and took the time to attend!

In even more exciting news Tony (from www.effleukemia.com), my brother, and I are heading to Las Vegas in two weeks!!

I will be better about posting in the blog when I have updates. Until then, I’ll keep hoping for the most ideal outcome of a mildly sucky situation (<– It’s amazing how devastating news becomes “mildly sucky” news when managing cancer becomes your new normal).