Here is some data and some of my history:
Those of you who have met me would have trouble recognizing what is left. My weight had been 168+/-2 since sometime around 1970. Today it is 143. Why do we lose so much weight so fast? Simply put, it is the changing demands on your metabolism.
The tumor starts small and not very hungry. As near as we can trace, mine started as a result of a serious pleurisy in the mid 90s. It lay between the pleura and the outer lining of the lung for years, not eating much nor growing noticeably.
During the process of renewing my medical in 2012, we noticed that my weight was down to 164. This was not of itself worrisome, given my age. However, concurrently, I was deloping lot of bronchial congestion. That came and went all summer, and seemed fine when we went to Mustang Beach for my birthday.
The week after, a cold went from Sandra to me and became a mild pneumonia within 5 days. But, my weight is now 155 which is now a big concern. We went to BACFest anyway, me so full of antibiotics that every time I coughed, I cured someone. I enjoyed it immesely, eventhough I was a long way from my normal self.
We had 2 more trips on the schedule for Oct/Nov, A Crocker reunion in Tupelo/Pontotoc and the trip to New York to visit Ray and Martha. I skipped the trip to MS to concentrate on getting well, because I didn't want to miss New York. We went, I felt generally good, and was able to tolerate all the walking and sightseeing. Even though It was tiring. By early Dec, the cough and congestion is back and this time is worse. I made it through Christmas, but by the end of the week, something was definitely going very wrong. On Saturday (12/29) I went back to PrimaCare. This time, the pneumonia is bad. The X-Ray shows the entirety of the bottom half of the left lung copmpletely occluded. I just barely make 150lbs. Pumped full of antibiotics, they send me home again. At CVS, waiting on the prescriptions, I also buy a Pulse oximeter (<$50) for my own reference. I am having severe shortness of breath, especially at night. Monday, I am sure that I am not improving and when PrimaCare offers no further help, we head for the emergency room about 5PM. When I get to the check in window and the guy asks for my problem, I simply say "I have pneumonia. No guess, I've seen my X-Rays.". They took me in immediately.
It took 3 weeks to get the pneumonia under control and discover and map the cancer. Basically, the care was excellent with only one case of an empire building doctor causing some confusion and "signing us up for some treatment that we later refused on the advice of the Oncologist.
I was discharged on the 20th, but that evening, threw up everything down to my toe jam. Back to the hospital for another 48 hours to rehydrate me, and make sure that was an anomaly. I next get a quiet week at home before starting the thereapy. By now the weight is at 145 and still dropping. After ther first week of therapy (5 radiation treatments and one chemo), The radiologist explains the weight loss in simple terms and later between he and the Oncologist a complete explanation.
Simply put, I am quiet on the outside, but inside, my body is running a forced marathon. While still in the small growth stage, the tumor was a low level metabolic demand. When it started the fast growth during the summer, it placed an additional metabolic load on the system already hampered by loss of appetite due to everything tasting strange. Then ccame the therapy. Both the radiation and the chemo kill cells wholesale. Hopefully, most of the victims "needed killing", but many healthy cells are killed also.
Our body is set up as a cell replacement and recreation system, but this cell replacement load is far beyond its normal capability.It normally takes 8 years for us to reproduce a full bady of replacement cells and now our system is being asked to replace 5-10% of our cell structure a week. It cannot match this load, so it uses all of the stored resources available. Any and all stored fat, slowing all other replacements to concentrate on the most needy areas. Consequently, more weight loss, loss of stamina and ever increasing fatigue.The radiologist says that the object is to complete the therapies before I evaporate and there is nothing left to save. Even if you have a large appetite and can eat everything in sight, you are still losing ground to the out of sight metabolic requirement.
Today completes the radiation part of the therapy. Since going on another med, the esophageal burn is much more mitigated and I can swallow somewhat larger bites without continuous pain, but I still am not eating nearly enough. But with that part over and hopefully by midweek next week, I will be able to eat more and begin catching up some. After next week's chemo, I will get at least a 2 week break from that and will hopefully regain some strength for the serious 3x3 wwek series of chemo.
Those of you who have met me would have trouble recognizing what is left. My weight had been 168+/-2 since sometime around 1970. Today it is 143. Why do we lose so much weight so fast? Simply put, it is the changing demands on your metabolism.
The tumor starts small and not very hungry. As near as we can trace, mine started as a result of a serious pleurisy in the mid 90s. It lay between the pleura and the outer lining of the lung for years, not eating much nor growing noticeably.
During the process of renewing my medical in 2012, we noticed that my weight was down to 164. This was not of itself worrisome, given my age. However, concurrently, I was deloping lot of bronchial congestion. That came and went all summer, and seemed fine when we went to Mustang Beach for my birthday.
The week after, a cold went from Sandra to me and became a mild pneumonia within 5 days. But, my weight is now 155 which is now a big concern. We went to BACFest anyway, me so full of antibiotics that every time I coughed, I cured someone. I enjoyed it immesely, eventhough I was a long way from my normal self.
We had 2 more trips on the schedule for Oct/Nov, A Crocker reunion in Tupelo/Pontotoc and the trip to New York to visit Ray and Martha. I skipped the trip to MS to concentrate on getting well, because I didn't want to miss New York. We went, I felt generally good, and was able to tolerate all the walking and sightseeing. Even though It was tiring. By early Dec, the cough and congestion is back and this time is worse. I made it through Christmas, but by the end of the week, something was definitely going very wrong. On Saturday (12/29) I went back to PrimaCare. This time, the pneumonia is bad. The X-Ray shows the entirety of the bottom half of the left lung copmpletely occluded. I just barely make 150lbs. Pumped full of antibiotics, they send me home again. At CVS, waiting on the prescriptions, I also buy a Pulse oximeter (<$50) for my own reference. I am having severe shortness of breath, especially at night. Monday, I am sure that I am not improving and when PrimaCare offers no further help, we head for the emergency room about 5PM. When I get to the check in window and the guy asks for my problem, I simply say "I have pneumonia. No guess, I've seen my X-Rays.". They took me in immediately.
It took 3 weeks to get the pneumonia under control and discover and map the cancer. Basically, the care was excellent with only one case of an empire building doctor causing some confusion and "signing us up for some treatment that we later refused on the advice of the Oncologist.
I was discharged on the 20th, but that evening, threw up everything down to my toe jam. Back to the hospital for another 48 hours to rehydrate me, and make sure that was an anomaly. I next get a quiet week at home before starting the thereapy. By now the weight is at 145 and still dropping. After ther first week of therapy (5 radiation treatments and one chemo), The radiologist explains the weight loss in simple terms and later between he and the Oncologist a complete explanation.
Simply put, I am quiet on the outside, but inside, my body is running a forced marathon. While still in the small growth stage, the tumor was a low level metabolic demand. When it started the fast growth during the summer, it placed an additional metabolic load on the system already hampered by loss of appetite due to everything tasting strange. Then ccame the therapy. Both the radiation and the chemo kill cells wholesale. Hopefully, most of the victims "needed killing", but many healthy cells are killed also.
Our body is set up as a cell replacement and recreation system, but this cell replacement load is far beyond its normal capability.It normally takes 8 years for us to reproduce a full bady of replacement cells and now our system is being asked to replace 5-10% of our cell structure a week. It cannot match this load, so it uses all of the stored resources available. Any and all stored fat, slowing all other replacements to concentrate on the most needy areas. Consequently, more weight loss, loss of stamina and ever increasing fatigue.The radiologist says that the object is to complete the therapies before I evaporate and there is nothing left to save. Even if you have a large appetite and can eat everything in sight, you are still losing ground to the out of sight metabolic requirement.
Today completes the radiation part of the therapy. Since going on another med, the esophageal burn is much more mitigated and I can swallow somewhat larger bites without continuous pain, but I still am not eating nearly enough. But with that part over and hopefully by midweek next week, I will be able to eat more and begin catching up some. After next week's chemo, I will get at least a 2 week break from that and will hopefully regain some strength for the serious 3x3 wwek series of chemo.
