Oh, Happy Day!

Remember the gospel group that sang that song? That's what's going through my head today.

The scan results show shrinkage in the primary pancreatic tumor and the major tumors on the liver. The smaller tumors on the liver can hardly be seen. My tumor marker has gone from almost 10,000 to 47 in 3 months. It's now in the normal range. No new areas of concern are showing and nothing has gotten any bigger.

I've been pretty stressed out the last couple of days. Even when he showed us the scans and went over the results, I wouldn't let myself believe it at first. I guess I had prepared myself for bad news. It's taken most of the day to sink in. I just called my Mom. She said "don't forget you have Grandma Halloran's genes to help." I told her "Then I'll be the first 90-yr old woman who has had pancreatic cancer for 40 years."

The Dr. was thrilled with the results. Of course, they never get all giddy with you, but I could tell he was pretty happy. So, we will continue on the same chemo course and hope it will continue to work this well. Monday I will get a port installed which will also mean that I will probably have to go on low dose blood thinners. I'll have to be careful about brusing and bleeding. In three more months I will have another scan to see where we are again.

I'm not thrilled about the continuing chemo part, but I know what it's going to be like, and I can live with that. I have no choice. I'm so happy to be able to plan further out in the future.

Oh, Happy Day!