Just take it already

The oncologist went to bat for K with the insurance company, and performed a small miracle of sorts.  She got approval for the mega-expensive Tarceva drug.  This is a biological drug, it works on the DNA of some cancers and stops them from over-replicating.  There has been basically no hard evidence that it is effective against the cancer we are fighting.  So while the consensus was that he should try it, I honestly didn't think it would come to be.

But the prescription has been sitting at the pharmacy for almost a week.  Why? K doesn't want to change anything right now.  Doesn't want to tackle a new drug, doesn't want to deal with the ugly acne rash that almost always goes along with this drug.  On the one hand, I understand.  But I'm watching this tumor on the side of his face grow larger and larger over the course of a few weeks. Or maybe it isn't, maybe it is only growing larger in my mind.  And I just want him to take the damn drug.  Take it now.  The sooner we know if it works, the sooner he can stop.

The Beginning of the End

I want to get a first post up quickly, but there is so much to cover...

I started this blog as a way to pour my pain and fear out into the internet.  I've just turned 35, I have a son who is not yet two, and my husband has terminal cancer.

I used to think we were lucky.  So many people die suddenly in tragic accidents and things are left unsaid, no one is prepared.  But it has been over six months of this knowing, of this preparation, of treatment and caregiving.   And there's a point where this way just starts to look like torture.

Not that I want the torture to end.  This is awful, but what I dread the most is after.  I read the blogs of widows and two years later they are still depressed and grieving.