How did that happen 2

2010-12-16T19:40:24Z

The rest of monday was a daze. We had to go and tell my parents, my siblings and my in laws,which wasn't easy. Even now, writing this is hard cos it makes me think of it over again. We decided to keep the kids(13 and 16) in the dark until after Xmas as it wouldn't do any good to spoil it for them. By the wednesday, the clinical nurse specialist from our local hopsital contacted us and said the MDT team had gone through my notes and scans and assessed my cancer as operable. This was at the time much more positive news. I thought it would mean I could be cured. Not so. This B*stard disease is by all statistics, going to kill me and even with surgery I can only expect to live up to 5 more years if I'm very lucky. I'm 48, with a lovely wife, two really smashing kids and I don't want to miss them growing up or me growing old with my Lisa. But that choice has now been taken away from me. So now, I got to work out a way of facing up to my new future, of hospitals, discomfort and demise. Sorry if it sounds depressing, but thats how I feel right now.

How did that Happen?

2010-12-16T19:27:43Z

It started off back in October this year. One minute I'm fine, the next I'm doubled up at a customers home, later that day I'm admitted to hospital after tests with a suspected knackered gall bladder. I've turned yellow and my back and upper chest hurts. So I'm booked for an op 6 weeks later to have the thing removed and sent home with some painkillers and told to avoid fatty foods. Nothing to worry abou there I thought. While somewhat stunned by the radical alteration it would mean to my diet, I was actually pleased they'd found the cause of my discomfort which had been creeping on over the previous weeks and months, but I'd ignored it until now. Unfortunately, I didn't make the 6 weeks til the gall bladder op. with two weeks to go, on 22 November, I was taken in again, in a lot of pain and VERY yellow. This time, the CT scans found my common bile duct was blocked, as was the main pancreatic duct, and I underwent two ERCP ops to fit stents and carry out a sphincterotomy. During these ERCP ops the took some brushings of the pancreatic duct for analysis. After 13 days in Hospital I almost insisted on going home for my birthday on the 4th December, under a promise to go back the next day for a final CT scan. This I did and the following meeting with the consultants this week(again, the 13th!) I was told the results of the biopsy were cancerous cells present around the head of the pancreas. To say I was stunned was an understatement. My poor wife was with me and she burst into tears, nearly taking me with her. They told us it looked inoperable due to the location around lots of major blood vessels, but that we'd be contacted later in the week by the MDT team regarding what and when treatment would begin.

Scratchers Story.

How did that happen 2

How did that Happen?