My husband has cancer

A wife's journal

In the beginning.........

Vince and I have been married for almost 28 years. Mainly it has been him worrying and caring for me during all my multiple illness's, including my own cancer. Now, it's my turn. On January 14^th, 2014, we received the results of his biopsy, Esophageal Cancer.

What brought us to this life changing diagnosis came months ago. It seems to have slowly crept up on us like a cat on a mouse. I had seen signs that something was wrong with him probably 7 months beforehand. He would come home from work and look white as a sheet. I mentioned to him on multiple occasions that it looked like he was anemic and in traditional Vinnie style he poo poo'd me and said, “I'm fine”.

He was loosing weight which was a good thing as he was a big man but he really wasn't on a diet and had not be actively trying to loose weight. His energy started dropping to the point he was so exhausted when he got home he melted into his chair and didn't have the energy to do much of anything. Like a true stubborn Italian man he was ignoring his own body till he got so tired and worn out he finally went into Urgent care. Well, Urgent care was pretty much a waste of time as the doctor just assumed he had some virus and wouldn't do any blood draws. One week later we took him to the ER and after they did all the blood work found out that he was indeed anemic. His Hbg was 7.2 and for a normal male it should be 14 to 16. That night they gave him 2 units of blood and sent us home but they did arrange for him to have a colonoscopy to try and find where he was bleeding from.

The next day he went to work and really should not have but when he got home he was white as a sheet again and feeling weak. Two days after the 1^st transfusions he was back in the ER to get 2 more.

We waited patiently for the day of his colonoscopy. The day arrived and they decided that they were doing a colonoscopy and an endoscopy the same day. Colonoscopy turned out clear but he had a lot of bleeding in his stomach which they said was an ulcer and they took biopsies of the area. Those biopsies came back negative and he was to return in a month to have another endoscopy to see if he was healing. They had prescribed him Prilosec 2 times a day.

So on January 6^th he went in for his follow up endoscopy. This time the doctor took more biopsies and told us the ulcer was clearing up. One strange thing is he didn't give us the pictures this time. I asked for them and the nurse came back and said he was going to keep them to talk to a couple other doctors. Flag went up for me right there.

So on his appointment with the doctor on the 14^th Vince was told that the biopsies this time showed cancer. Deep down we had both had the big “C” in our heads that was going to be the diagnosis. When he called me from the doctor's office and told me I was devastated, he was numb. The diagnosis was Esophagus Cancer. The doctor did say they caught it early but they didn't know the stage of the cancer which won't be known till after it is removed.

Immediately he was given the information for all the appointments for scans that he has to have done and his Nurse Coordinators etc. I was at home in tears and had to call our daughter to give her the news. She was upset but she became the rock and tried to calm and reassure me. She is a strong young woman.

When Vince came home we sat together on the bed and talked trying to reassure each other that no matter what we would fight this together. I posted for prayers on FB and the immense love came pouring out for both of us. And so it began......this fight for life.

Wednesday, January 15^th the day of the 1^st CT scan. Neither of us had slept as this was moving at such a whirlwind pace. One day your told you have cancer the next morning your in a CT scanner. We have so far dealt with all this with humor. Laughter is the best medicine and Vince had me rolling on the floor after he was done with the scan. He told me that when they took him into the changing room they said, “You can keep your shirt on but everything below the waist off except for these scrubs.” Well, they had two sizes of scrubs one to big and one to small.

He got the bigger ones and as he walked down the hall to the scanner in his exsausted state he forgot to hold his pants up and found himself in the hallway with his pants around his ankles with his naughty bits all hanging out for the world to see. He calmly pulled them up and continued walking as the nurse said to him, “forgot to hold those up huh?”

Laughter..... You have to have laughter or you fall down into the pit of despair.

January 16^th, Off we go into the cities for a PET scan.

As we waited for them to call him in for the scan I snuck over to the gift shop to look around. I found the coolest things. I came back to the waiting room and handed him one.

That brought out a huge smile.

After 45 minutes of waiting the technician came out to tell us that the PET scanner was broken. GRRRRR. We had his Nurse Coordinator for Abbott with us at the time and I said, “Well, we have to come in tomorrow for his ultrasound can they reschedule him tomorrow?” as we live 50 miles from the hospital. GREAT news they had an opening at 7 am. Which seen as the PET scan takes 2 hours we would get done in time for him to go to the other side of the hospital for his ultrasound at 9:30. Although now we have to get up at 3:30 in the morning to leave by 5 to get there by 6:45 with the crazy snow and bitter cold storm coming through.

Nurse Jessica gave us a 3 ring binder with everything a cancer patient could want to keep track of everything and told us that she had scheduled the appointment with his surgeon for Tuesday the 21^st. Off we went.

Now I have learned that you should always use Valet parking. We unfortunately did not and ended up on the fourth level, winds blowing and lo and behold.... the elevator was not working. Tomorrow I'm using Valet parking.

We were both starving to death as he had not eaten since the night before nor did I so off we went to Perkins. He ate a hearty meal.

And so our wait for the morning begins. It is 1 a.m. Vince is sleeping and here I sit typing. Yup, insomnia is my name.