Update on Joan's condition July 1998

July 22, 1998

Today was not a good day.

Phil took me to the University of Pennsylvania Hospital for radiation treatments.

We learned yesterday that I have three tumors in my brain. They're small but distributed widely so surgery would mean too much cutting to remove them. The radiation team will try to burn them out in the next ten days. I'll get getting really strong doses of radiation and there might be some strange side effects ....like glowing in the dark, or losing my teeth (groan) or having difficulty arranging thoughts...and maybe even sounding like I'm drunk (slurred speech).

This new development of the cancer in the brain strongly indicates that the cancer has spread elsewhere as well so I guess next week will include a whole host of body scans and MRIs. My condition has now progressed to a Stage Four....not sure what that means, I'll need to look it up, but I don't think it's good.

One thing, though. When they told me today that it was almost a certainty that the cancer has now spread beyond my lungs, I got a very strong feeling this was not true and I said as much. My Radiation doctor, Stephen Hahn says people know their own body and he is willing to run new tests to find out...so we'll see.

This series of ten radiation treatments is going to make me very tired so I might not be doing much work for the AngelicArtistry website...but I'll be looking forward to seeing what people have done with the free art and I love all the candles...I love each and everyone of them....and I thank all who are praying for me with all my heart.

I won't give up....even if I just hold on for a year or two until some of these new miracle drugs become available I will still have a strong chance of surviving.

With my love, Joan

July 21, 1998

Well ... the latest news is not so good .... but not so bad, either....I hope.

Last month immediately following my first chemotherapy infusion I was feeling pretty spry. The next morning I decided to do some laundry and hang it out in the sunshine to dry. Everything was pretty good until I started walking back to the house after hanging out a load of clothes. I made it almost to the kitchen door when the ground went out from under me. I just sat there on the grass with the dog licking my face until the panic passed...then I just about crawled up to my bedroom...collapsed on the bed and called my husband at work and asked him to come home.

I had no idea at that point how sick I was going to be and I have not written to you about it because it was so awful. You don't need to hear the gory details...I'll just tell you that I lie in bed for ten days knowing I wasn't going to die....because my condition would have had to improve for me to die....I was delirious most of the first week and sick...sick every way imaginable. The second week I was more conscious but in a great deal of pain in muscles and bones....it wasn't pretty....it wasn't fun....but the good thing is that the medicine was working. If it knocked the stuffing out of me, it had to have hurt the cancer cells.

The third week was better. I was still pretty much confined to bed but was beginning to feel a little better.

The fourth week (last week) I was up and moving around, slowly....but getting around which made me feel wonderful. However, I noticed that I was often dizzy and seemed to be listing to the right as I walked and would frequently hold my right hand out to steady myself....and my peripheral vision had flashing lights of some kind going on and off....extremely distracting...so I didn't get any art done.

Yesterday, Monday the 20th I went for my second chemotherapy. This time they used only one chemical on me...the one of my choice, Taxotere. While the doctor was examining me I told him about the dizzy spells and the rest of it. He was very concerned and explained that it could be caused by many different things...some not serious but a few possible very serious causes....the worst of which would be if the cancer had entered my brain. It seems that is what lung cancer likes to do...wriggle itself into the brain first...so he stressed that he wanted me to have an MRI of my brain done as quickly as possible. I was able to have it done at 10:30 this morning and the MRI shows that the cancer has entered my brain. This is very upsetting to me, worse than losing all my hair, which happened last week.

So....now....along with the chemotherapy I have to have radiation treatments to burn the cancer cells out of my brain....my Radiation Oncologist, Stephen Hahn is trying to get ready to start me on radiation tomorrow. I will need to go every day for two weeks and if the radiation doesn't do it....it will mean brain surgery....right away.

But with all this going on I have met some wonderful people and some very sick people, many much younger than I. Yesterday many people came to speak with me while I was having my chemo infusion (takes 4 hours). They asked me if I was afraid to die and they asked me what I thought happened when we die. So I started responding honestly, from my heart about my thoughts. At one point five other patients had asked to be moved closer to me so they could hear what I was saying. The nurses wanted to hear also and didn't mind moving everyone's chairs around. We talked for hours. They asked questions and I answered what I thought. I got the nurses involved, too, by asking each if they had ever been present when a patient had been declared dead and later resuscitated. Many had, especially from years of working with cancer patients. They gathered into the group and began telling of things they had witnessed where the resuscitated patients cried and asked "Why did you do that? I was so happy. I was with God and my lost loves and didn't want to come back"

And the nurses also spoke of some rather strange things they had witnessed. All listeners were enthralled and hung on every word. At the conclusion of our chat group we must have had twenty people participating, patients and staff. Dr. Algazy came out and saw what was going on and smiled. I know he was pleased that his patients were talking so freely and honestly about their concerns...and I think he was glad to see so many of us smiling!

So now other patients are asking to have their appointments when I will be there so we can continue to investigate the near death experience...and the possibilities of what awaits us all on the other side of the sky.

I saw the husband of a woman patient crying as the doctor talked to him about his wife's condition being beyond hope....and shortly thereafter realized the husband was the husband of a woman I had met a few times since going for evaluation and treatments....I have become close to her because I recognize the beauty of her spirit.She is a young and beautiful woman with two teenage children. Apparently there has been some recent estrangement between her and her husband. But I cried with her and told her that I had seen his pain when the doctor was talking to him. I also spoke to the husband, before realizing it was my friend being discussed. I got up from my seat in the waiting room and went and sat beside him and just touched his arm and asked about his wife's condition. He was struggling to hold back the tears and he kept saying....it's my wife....it's my wife....if I lose her what will I do? He was suffering terribly. I was called in for my treatment then and had to leave him. It was only a few minutes later that he came into the infusion room and sat down beside my friend and I realized it was her they had been discussing. I started to cry....tears were streaming down my face. She thought I was crying because I was afraid of the infusion and I let her think that. She held my hand while they put the IV lines into me and I told her how much it comforted me to have her do that.

Later in the day, after she told me what the doctors had told them about her condition I revealed to her that I was crying about her earlier, when she thought it was my fear of the chemotherapy because I had overheard the doctor talking to her husband but didn't know, at that time, that he was HER husband.

Then she and her sister, who was also there, started telling me their mother had died just last year and about how much they missed her.....this is what got us into the conversation about what happens after death...and that got the whole ball rolling about the near death experience.

My friend had related to me that she didn't think her husband really loved her anymore and I was able to drive those negative thoughts out of her mind quickly by telling her how much he suffered when I saw him in the waiting room. Before they left yesterday they were doing a lot of touching and holding and she was looking into his eyes and smiling and he was holding her and telling her they weren't going to give up...he told her what I had told him....you don't have to hang on for a cure...just hang on until some of these wonderful new medicines will be available...and that's true....by this coming Fall they expect a fabulous new chemical to become available that is a 'smart' chemical in that it will only destroy cancer cells and not hurt healthy cells.

What a blessing that will be!

So it looks like I have found more work to do....between trying to keep up with AngelicArtistry and go for all the treatments I'm going to be moving pretty fast....if you don't hear from me for a while, please don't be concerned....I'm doing just fine....and as each new obstable presents itself...I'll deal with it.

My doctors are wonderful, my family is loving and supportive and I have your prayers....I'll be fine.

But what I have learned and seen of people under stress and how they react to it is enough to write a book....no...no....I'm not going to write a book...but I will have a lot of stories to tell.

Well, enough....this should bring you up to speed on my condition.

Please keep praying for me.

Joan x

April 1998 / May 1998 / June 1998 / July 1998 / August 1998 / September 1998

October 1998 / November 1998 / December 1998

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