they say it's your birthday

Well, Dad's birthday did not get off to a stellar start. This morning we learned that Dad had not had a good night; his NG tube got blocked, so he had major pressure build-up as the night progressed. His pain was at an 8 or 9 by the time they flushed it and got him relief at around 9 this morning. We did sing him "Happy Birthday" over the phone - hopefully that improved the situation!

They took another CT scan this morning so they can get an idea of whether there are specific areas of blockage, and (preliminarily) it's looking like there aren't, but that the cancer is causing the stomach and small intestine to just shut down. This means that the nausea is probably more cancer-related than chemo related.

Dr. Powell spent some time with us this afternoon answering questions. We'll know more tomorrow when Dad's oncology doc, Dr. Repka, is in the office, and once a radiologist has had a chance to look at the CT scan. For the time being, we have stopped chemo - Dad just doesn't have the strength to take the next 7-day dose of the 5 FU.

I asked Dr. Powell if this were a member of his family, what time frame he thinks he'd be looking at (acknowledging that this is a very difficult question to answer). He said realistically he would be thinking 4 weeks to 3 months. He gave us some possible options for addressing the disease and symptoms, not because we're at a point of making decisions quite yet, but because he wants us to be aware of the types of decisions we may be running into shortly - even tomorrow. Basically, it's not looking good. He made a comment that at each point in this disease's progression, the worse case rather than the better has been what has happened. That there isn't a way to truly compare the painfulness of different people's situations, but from his perspective ours is about as difficult as it gets.

I gave Dad & Amy a belated anniversary present, and then Amy and I both gave him birthday presents. He liked 'em! So I think he'll keep us around for a while.... If only we could do the same for him.