What's up Team Madonia! Sorry for the lack of updates, I have been very busy getting back to work after surgery and trying to train this new puppy my wife and I just got, aka she is always napping on me and I can't type while she does! A lot has happened since my last post so let me fill you all in.
Surgery Results
Surgery went very well. This was the third time I had this surgery on my lung and this was by far the best recovery experience I have had. I guess practice really does make perfect! The surgeon was able to locate and remove a very small tumor in my lung. The pathology was consistent with synovial sarcoma, meaning that this tumor was another metastasis from my original tumor in my foot. The recovery has been great, I was able to leave the hospital the next day with very minimal pain. I was also able to return to work 12 days after surgery!
Chemotherapy
Before surgery my doctor and I were unsure if I would try chemotherapy following surgery. In my meeting with him last week, we decided to go forward with chemotherapy to try and make sure that I remain cancer free for good. This was a very hard decision to make for many reasons. Doing chemotherapy right now does not guarantee me anything, other than a whole lot of bad side effects. At this point, I have no measurable cancer in my body. After every surgery, my tumors have all been succefully removed with clear margins (no cancer cells in the surrounding healthy tissue). Unfortunately they have also come back each time as well. So the chemotherapy will be used to try to kill any cells that are undetectable and may be causing my relapses in my lungs. Unfortunately there is no good research that says that this does or does not work for people with metastasized synovial sarcoma. In theory, it is a good idea but is very hard to decide if the possible benefits outweigh the risks. The chemotherapy I will be doing is high dose ifosfamide, which has a wide variety of acute and chronic side effects. So why did I decide to go forward? Well, I am young and strong still, so I feel now is the time to hit this hard while my body can handle it. So, although I know this will be hell, I can only hope that this will give me the best chance of beating this disease once and for all. I am also quite tired of having pieces of my lung cut out, I think three times is plenty!
Team Madonia and Strength Fights Cancer
If you ordered shirts they should be arriving shortly. They are absolutely awesome! I attended the Rock and Roll Throwers Meet in Lancaster, NY this past weekend and I was overwhelmed by the number of throwers that were sporting their shirts in support of Team Madonia. Not only were a bunch of Buffalo native throwers supporting Team Madonia, but the RFA throwers and their families were all sporting their own custom RFA Track and Field Team Madonia shirts! I was very proud to see my name and the Team Madonia logo being worn by so many great people in the track and field community.
I also want to thank Nate Harvey for recognizing me in the newly renovated University at Buffalo weight room. Nate has been a great coach and friend of mine since he started coaching at UB and he knows how much the weightroom and athletics has helped get me through my battle with cancer. For him to put my picture up in that weightroom was more of an honor then I can explain in words. To be on that wall inspiring his athletes to work hard everyday and chase their goals feels amazing and I am so appreciative to be a part of that.
I hope that everyone will post a picture to the Facebook page of them in their shirts! It would be awesome to have an album of all our supporters sporting their awesome shirts! I know Steve plans on opening orders up again soon so if you haven't gotten one yet you will get a chance to snag one in the near future. Also, I will let Steve do the announcement, but he did tell me how much money we have raised for Roswell Park and I really can't believe it. That money will go to Roswell to help support research to cure this terrible disease.
Help the Fight
I also wanted to give a reminder that there are plenty of ways to help in the fight against cancer. I can tell you as an oncology nurse that one of the most helpful things you can do is to go donate blood and platelets! I can not tell you how important this is! Every morning on my 9 bed unit alone, we hang multiple bags of blood and platelets, and at Roswell Park, almost all that blood is donated right at Roswell. We run into shortages all the time so if you really want to do something to directly benefit the care of those battling cancer, please go donate! By donating you are literally helping your neighbors who are fighting this disease stay alive and continue their fight. Hit up the website below if you have questions too.
https://www.roswellpark.org/donor-center
No comments:
Post a Comment