dad's progress

People have been asking about how my dad is doing. Here it is in his own words. :)


The absolute coolest thing happened on Thursday this week. I was eating something (besides a raw vegetable) and it tasted good. Man oh man, that was the beginning. I am so happy to report that a number of foods are really starting to kick back in again. Yes!!! Seriously, a week and a half ago I opened a root beer and took a sip, closed it up, tried a few days later and so. Well that soda hadn't lowered more than a hair but let me tell ya, last night I polished off the whole bottle. I'm talking a 12 ounce here, might have even been 16. Anyway it is pretty fun to start liking a number of things again.

I went into see my radiologist on Wednesday and she is pleased with how I'm doing, I guess in about 5% of cases there can be complications with the skin or inside of the mouth, but I seem to have escaped this. On Friday I was down at the UofM for my follow-up and he was also pleased. I will go back in two months for my first post-op MRI and those will become an annual event. He indicated that he would want to see me on a three month basis for physical exams. Things I was told: most recurrent cancer is found by the patient, so I'm supposed to start poking my face every day. He knew that my inclination was not to touch it because it's sensitive (still hurts a bit) and it feels messed up as in scar tissue... Anyway I'm supposed to teach my fingers what the new side of my face feels like as this will help me notice if something does start to change. If recurrence happens, it will be expected on the nerve, that's what acynic cell likes and that is where the scrapping occured. This means that one day I might start feeling stuff which I'm to ignore if it's just a twinge or if it only lasts a couple days but if it continues for over two weeks I'm to call. The left side of my tongue will likely always have a bit of a metallic taste to it. He told me that I would have dramatic improvement in taste, boy was he a prophet there. Think about it, everything tastes gross and suddenly it tastes awesome again. Man.

Many women complain of morning sickness and how awful this time is, I find it interesting thought that months later when there eating and everything tastes great again that there not more excited about this, must be because there all caught up with how cool new borns are that they don't think about how great food tastes again.

Anyway, things are great with the doctors. Oh did I mention weight. On a real scale like at the doctors office I'm at 189, this is compared to the 204 at the doctors office when I started my treatments. So, officially down 14 pounds. This is of course fully dressed so adjust for clothes we're talking about 185, in my prime at Purdue I was just under 170, so we are in striking range of real fit here, now if I could just get my butt (Vic reports that my butt sags, no one wants to hear this I know, I think it may just be psychological manipulation to get me working more and off the couch) out running we could really be bragging.

Comments