Birthday, Fireworks, Up Coming Dates and Donations

Was feeling pretty down yesterday but toughed it out enough to make it to my niece Giullianna's 1st birthday party for an hour or so. Was happy that I made it but felt bad that I couldn't enjoy myself and made my mom and Jim leave early so that I could get home and get some rest. Despite my intention to take photos of the event I really didn't feel up to it so here is a photo that I have of her from a few weeks ago. I think that at the time she had just woken up from a long nap which is why she has the glazed over look on her face. Looks a lot like me before I have my coffee in the morning!

And here's one of Owen stuffing his face, just so he doesn't feel left out!

After leaving the party to go home and rest up for my 7:45 am appointment at the Mayo Clinic this morning we remembered that there was going to be a fireworks show at the church down the street from my mom's house. They normally have a huge show for the 4th of July but I guess another church in the neighborhood began competing with them so they chose to move it to Labor Day weekend this year. I took these photos from a lawn chair in the front yard:

I head into a long week at the Mayo Clinic with appointments starting at 7:00 am tomorrow and taking place everyday until the 9th when I will finally have about a week off. This week will be filled with shots to boost my blood counts. Meetings with the bone marrow transplant coordinators to get more familiar with what is going to take place. And the implantation of the ash spit catheter so that they can begin harvesting. I am hoping to get a lot of questions answered tomorrow when I meet with my "team" as like I said before, I am pretty nervous about the whole process. 

I am not sure if this played a factor into anything but I saw that my mom posted a comment on my last blog about my going into a tough time and reaching out to others to keep in contact with me. Following that post I received many calls, texts, e-mails and posts which I am grateful for. It is so hard to explain all of the emotional feelings that someone goes through when they are faced with something like cancer but at times, despite knowing better, you tend to feel completely alone in the world. At least that is how I have felt and it is these comments and messages that let me know that I am not alone in this thing and help to keep me going! I don't want to single any particular one out as they all meant so much but Mr. Minn, your comments really brought the fighter back out of me at a time when I was beginning to doubt myself and I thank you for that! 

I also want to thank Maui Divers (my employer and work Ohana for those that don't know) for their extremely generous donation to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Hawaii's Team in Training. My good friend John Gephart will be running the 2008 Honolulu Marathon in my honor for Team in Training and it is through donations like these that help keep the society functioning. They do great things for those inflicted with Lymphoma, Leukemia, and other cancers including offering emotional and financial support. There is a link on the left hand side of my page to John's pledge, if you are able to donate anything at all, even one dollar, I can promise you that it will be going towards a good cause...

Losing my Hair

So after going through six months of chemotherapy in Hawaii and having my hair thin a little but not fully come out, I am finally actually losing my hair with this new stronger chemotherapy. I know that it isn't as big a deal for a man to lose his hair but it is a little weird to lose your eyebrows. I had been waiting for a month for my eyebrows to finally come back and now I am scared that they are going to be going away again. At least it is all temporary and will come back once I recover from everything, so I really shouldn't complain too much!!! I decided to have my hair cut shorter so that it wasn't so obvious every time that I took a shower or woke up and saw a ton of hair on my pillow.

Here's a pic that my step-dad took to remember the moment of my military cut. I think that after this round of treatment when I feel a little better I am going to get the mohawk until the rest of it all falls out...

Round two has been okay so far. I spent almost 11 1/2 hours at the Mayo Hospital in Phoenix on Monday going through tests, meeting with Dr. Reeder and then finally having chemotherapy. Dr. Reeder seemed very pleased with the results of the scans and is getting me prepared to start the bone marrow harvest immediately following this round of chemotherapy. Essentially what will happen is they will have me go through tests to make sure that my lung and heart functions are up to par with what I am going to be facing. I will also be given shots of Nuprogen  for a few days straight, what this does is boost the production of my white bloods cells and hopefully makes it easier for them to access my bone marrow. They are going to also have an ash split catheter implanted into my chest. What this will do is allow them to pull my blood out of one tube into a machine that will separate the bone marrow from the blood, the other tube will then replace the blood back into my body minus the bone marrow which they will freeze until my treatment. Below is a diagram of the ash split catheter and the bone marrow harvest machine:

To be quite honest I am a little afraid of the bone marrow process as they will be giving me another round of chemotherapy while I am staying in the hospital call BEAM. If they were to not harvest my bone marrow before giving me the BEAM treatment, I would essentially die due to it's potency. Not exactly the kind of thing that I wanted to hear but I guess it is better to know that whole truth when you are going into something like this. I will also have to go through an approximate 10 day period in which my immune will be so low that I will be susceptible to disease and bleeding, therefore I will be placed in a safe room like the bubble boy until I begin to regain my immunity. I will stay strong and face this thing like a man!!! The stronger I fight it the faster I will beat it!!!

Getting Ready for the Next Round

I spent a few hours on Friday morning at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale having my port-a-cath declotted. Essentially what happens is the body views the port-a-cath as a foreign body and creates a fibrin sheath over the catheter making it difficult for blood to be drawn. So after waiting for ten minutes without any results from the Heparin that was injected to declot the sheath I was given an injection of a stronger medicine (I am not sure what it was called but I am sure it was expensive) and was told to wait for another half hour. Thankfully the medicine worked and I was able to have my blood drawn for testing before my next treatment tomorrow. For those of you who don't know what a port-a-cath is, it is a small medical device installed beneath the skin in the chest. The  catheter is connected to a major vein usually near the heart and is used for blood draws and infusions for chemotherapy. Below are some pictures that may help give you a better idea:

After leaving the clinic my mom, Jim and I headed about an hour north to Payson, AZ to escape the desert heat and grab some lunch. It was a nice drive and much cooler up in the mountains although the lunch wasn't anything spectacular. 

These are some of the pictures that I took both on our way up to Payson and then on our way back to the valley.

I will be meeting with Dr. Reeder tomorrow for the first time since I began treatment and am anxious to hear what he has to say about my first round and the results of the chest x-rays that I am having in the morning. Following the meeting I will be starting the second round of chemotherapy, I will try and update my blog as much as possible this week but it will all depend on how I handle the treatment. But you better believe that I will continue to fight this thing with all of my strength! I also want to thank everyone for the comments on my blog wishing me good luck and sending prayers out to me. I may not respond to them all, but I do read them and truly appreciate them very much!!! One more week and I will be a step closer to recovery and Hawaii...

Mia Comes to Visit

My sister Malia (or Mia or Mimi) came to visit for the weekend. It was great to see her although she is probably going to kill me for posting this picture of her on the internet. But what do I care she is two states away ;) We had a nice time just hanging out around the house and arguing with each other as we always do :) But deep down we love one another. Can't wait for her to come back again!

Also had a big bday party for my step-bro Kevin, step-sister Bryn, and her husband JJ. There were about 20+ people here at the house enjoying good food and drinks and just good company in general. After the party my step-sister Brooke took me out with her boyfriend Jake and her friend Joanna to arguably the most ghetto bar in the City of Mesa. But we made the best of it and still had a great time. It was great to get out of the house and hang out!!!

Still waiting for the next treatment to take place on August 25th-29th. Not that I want to do it, but I know that it is something that I have to do and just want to get it over with! Hopefully this will be the last chemotherapy treatment that I have to do before they begin the bone marrow transplant process but it is going to be up to the scans and how my body has reacted to the treatments so far. So cross your fingers for me because this treatment is pretty killer compared to what I went through back in Hawaii. On a lighter note, one of my favorite bands Pepper from Kona is coming to town on September 5th along with Slightly Stoopid, so hopefully I will have my strength back to go and check them out with Brooke, Jake and Joanna!!! 

Giullianna enjoying the bubble wrap 

Mom, Owen and Jim

Decided to shave my head out of boredom. Still contemplating the short mohawk as this will probably be the only time that I can get away with it since I have no work and don't really know anyone here in Arizona...

Live with Intention

I began reading The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch today an inspiring book that looks into the life of a man who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and given 3-6 months to live. Rather than wallow in his sorrows he decided to take advantage of what time he had and make the most out of it. Most importantly he wanted to be able to leave behind something that his young children could remember him by which led to his "Last Lecture" that he gave to 400 people at Carnegie Mellon where he was a Professor. One of the more profound quotes that he makes is regarding the "brick walls" that we all face in life and why they are sometimes placed there. Here is what he had to say, "The brick walls are there for a reason, the brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something." In essence, if you want something bad enough there is nothing that can stop you from getting it not even a brick wall!!!

I cannot help but feel like I need to beat this cancer not only for myself but for my family and friends as well. Not only that, but as I look back on what I have accomplished so far in my life I know that there is so much more out there for me to do and see. I no longer want to just live my life day to day without setting and achieving new goals I want to make sure that I create a legacy, big or small, here on this Earth when I do leave it many many years from now! I plan on living my life with intention!

I have come to realize that life isn't just about materialistic things but about how you live it and what you do with it. I am not saying that I don't want to be able to afford nice things, what I am trying to say is that having those nice things are not the be all end all. There is so much more out there in this world than a big house and a nice car in the garage. I want to see other countries and learn about different cultures first hand. I want to help people that are in need rather than just helping myself. I want to give back as much to this world as I have taken from it and that is what I plan on doing from here on out! But first I must break through this brick wall that I am facing right now!

***If you have a chance I highly recommend reading The Last Lecture or at least watching the video of the lecture that he gave, I know that the video is a little long (1 hour +) but in my opinion it can give you a great insight on how life is supposed to be lived and how you can achieve your dreams. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji5_MqicxSo or you can watch the reprised version he did on Oprah which is much shorter at http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8577255250907450469

***Thank you Nani Janet very much for giving me this book, it has been an inspiration...

Owen meets Uncle Alika (again)

My step-sister Bryn stopped by with her 17 month old son Owen today. Although he was a little skittish of this giant guy in a bright orange shirt, side note I will never wear orange again, I think that we were getting along pretty well by the end. He spent most of the time playing with Paka and all of the toys that Tutu and Paka have bought him and Giulianna but he did share his tv remote with me, surprisingly because when I have the remote he will never ever get a chance to use it :) He also showed me his version of knuckles which he calls cinco, I guess that's what happens when you are raised so close to the border and are becoming integrated ;) Can't wait to see him again, he is a cute little guy and pretty soon he'll be out on the links with us drinking O'Doul's and telling bad jokes, sorry Bryn!!!

First Course of Treatment

Round One:

The first day of treatment was another long one. We got to the Mayo Hospital at around 1:30pm only to have to wait until almost 3:00pm to finally meet with Dr. Reeder. Thankfully his review of my scans and slides did not reveal anything unexpected and he is confident that the new ESHAP form of chemotherapy and bone marrow transplant will help take care of the cancer and knock it into remission once and for all. The first complete round should take care of the most of the mass while the second round will be used to prepare my bone marrow for the transplant. He even made reference to not having to do the third round of chemotherapy if the bone marrow transplant goes along without a hitch!!! 

At around 4pm the first round of the 5 round title fight began between me and ESHAP. Sitting ringside were my mom and step-dad Jim and officiating the round was nurse Jackie. The fight went almost five and a half hours with me taking the first round but it was a close one. Despite getting in some good shots ESHAP was unable to take me down, just wore me out with the ground game and drained some of my stamina. Round two is set for August 3rd at 9:00am so I am going to need my rest to keep the momentum going.

Round Two:

It was difficult to wake up and get started for round two as I hadn't gotten a lot of sleep the night before and was drugged up on anti-nausea and pain pills, but nothing was going to stop me from getting back in that ring and taking the second round from ESHAP. The second round started off a little slow with ESHAP taking me down to the ground once again and trying to work his brazilian jiu jitsu moves but I was abl

e to escape the multiple submissions and take it back to our feet. The round ended after another epic 5 hours and I was able to walk out although I think that ESHAP may have been able to edge me in the cards this time. But tomorrow would be another day and anther round! 

Round Three: 

I was able to get more sleep following the second round and went it to the battle with more vim and vigor than the previous two. I was even able to catch a quick break for something to eat after the rampage style slam that I laid down put ESHAP into the corner for a bit trying to recover. Round three lasted about as long as the first two and I have a feeling that the battles are going to continue to go the distance as we are both tough and stubborn competitors but only one of us can be named the victor and with the amount of support that I have in my corner I already know what the outcome is going to be! Stay tuned for rounds four and five to come in the next two days...

Round Four:

 I started off round for a little tired and 

feeling pretty nausues from the night before. My hands and feet were tingling and I honestly did not want to leave my bed and make it to the ringside but I forced myself to man up and take another shot. It was too late for me to throw in the towel at this point. After receiving some anti-nauseu pills and an IV drip of Zofran I began another battle. I don't remember much, just that I slept throughout most of it and was happy to still be in one piece once it was all over. Just one more day of treatment and a winner will be named and I think that we all know who that winner will be...

Round Five:

This was the shortest of the five rounds as I decided that it was about time that I lay the smack down on ESHAP once and for all and stop playing games. I knew how much ESHAP liked the ground game so I thought that I would mess with him a little and take it to the ground myself. After slipping out of a kimura and then reversing the attempted rear naked choke I felt it was time to bust out the secret CB Dalloway peruvian necktie. And I caught ESHAP just like CB caught Rampage in practice and Jesse Taylor in the ring... It's official the first match-up went to the victor, me of course, could it have gone any other way? I am the one writing this blog after all. Stay tuned for the rematch in about 2-3 weeks!

***Note: I am not an MMA fighter and am not trying to be one especially since Anderson Silva just fought in what would be my weight class, oh hell no!!! I just thought that it would make for a good analogy ;)