“David Foster's Kicking Kidney Cancer’s Arse”

Well, Where the Heck Have I Been?

Friend Sandi writes and asks where I have been the last week, since I got that lump of coal. H'mmm, let me see now. Uhhhh, no where. Well, I did drive over to Marcella's Fine Cigars and Gifts a couple of times. See, they have these super recliners in the front of the story and  fellow can work and puff his segar (spelling from the 1800s) with out the first rude distraction, at least from non-smokers. Pipe smokers, on the other hand, tend to enjoy asking other ffolks what they are doing it.

You are clicking away on your laptop, fellow comes into to by some tobaccao, sits down in the chair next to yours and spends five minutes going through the ritual of loading a bowl. The he asks for a light. He doesn't need one, he just wants to be sure you get a good view of his meerschaum-clay  bowl carved in the likeness of some and rough and ready seafarer. Within a moment the bowl is framed by blue smoke and you can't help but be impressed by the workmanship and the obvious years of service ii has rendered. Since the ice has been broken, he decides to discuss Iowa politics revn though we are in Georgia, last I heard some distance from Iowa. Since I have no interest at all in Iowa politics, I just nod politely and keep on writing when I notice I have  typed "Hillary" for no reason at all. Then a second sits down, goes through the same ritual and declares that while Iowa is important, it is nothing compared to New Hampshire. He says as goes NH (he used those initials, no kidding), goes the nominations, but who he hell the cares, the Democrats already have the big game  sewn up. That's when I closed the lap top and began explaining to the realities of politics to both of these pikers. Which takes three hours as they are slow learners. And then Marcella sent us all home.

All this political talk has made me ready for a nap and so I take one on the new recliner until eight the next morning. Feeling all rested, I ask Sherry to please go out and bring in the newspaper, which again consumes three hours of time (one hour for reading and two for napping at times during the reading). By now, lunch is coming on and I am deciding exactly what member of the sustenance family I want to force down the old craw, when Sherry shows up  and says we are going to the doctor. Seems they want to give me some fluids, some more albumin and a new nausea med. I take the lap top to get done what didn't get done the day before only to find that a about five minutes after the IV begins to drip I feel a little sleepy, make the mistake of pushing into a reclining position and, next thing I knew, that day was spent as well.

That night I take one of the little bitty nausea pills, which also serve an anti-anxiety remedy. Boy is it ever, as I have felt no anxiety at all since sipping it down. Nor much of anything else. Feeling a Little guilty for laying in bed the next morning until after nine, I moved to the television room and got another forty winks. By bedtime, I had gotten 500 winks and one good meal and said my prayers and was again in blissful non-anxiety.

Woke us this morning terribly hungry so to up some oatmeal and then about two hours later for eggs and bacon and now here I am doing something.  All in all a productive week. No worries, caught up on my politics and hell bound and ready for the next opportunity to put my feet up.

A Lump of Coal

So Mike Carraway read yesterday's blog and called Sherry today and offered to take us to dinner, pick the joint. Sherry had been trying to get me to eat some crackers and cheese since and just the thought....well, you know what that thought can do. So Sherry suggests to Mike, in a good-natured way, that I was lying. Not true (though I lied like a dog about leaving the back door open in time for Sadie to come around the house and tinkle on a bedroom). Yesterday I was all those people who eat go to buffets for. Today, orange juice was a challenge.

When I walked into the kitchen I knew the glory day was over, that Santa had delivered my lump of coal one day  late. One of the neighborhood kids asked what a lump of coal was. I explained coal best I could. And I said it was burned for fuel back in the old days he said that was "way too cool." Almost every house on our street has these huge coal bins under the house, and I am betting not a child trying out his new bike has any idea. But you should have seen the kid's eyes light up when I told him it burned. When I was a child we burned coal occasionally and I just thought it was nasty. Dad made me clean out the little fireplaces. "Way to cool" huh. Hope he never gets his turn dealing with it.

Which brings up medicines. Lets see, at the moment I am on Dilan tin, Megs, Prefaced, two diuretics, one steroid and a nausea pill. Why is it that I can down all those medicines, even on an empty stomach, and they don't bother me at all. And a decent sandwich just whacks me back. The oddest thing, what? But maybe tomorrow the kid will get his lump of coal and I will have a good appetite again.

Of  all my experiences with cancer, I have run into none more miserable than the edema, especially in the crotch, torso and legs. God that hurts, not the edema itself but walking with my fun pals pressing against my legs. Torture, torture.  So I hobble everywhere.  And  just image at times in my life I thought I would have gladly taken testicles of Taurus the Bull. I know longer wish that. In fact, I have sent Taurus a sympathy note. The doctor says I am shrinking nicely. And I can't wait to go to the potty without making a five minute search for the fire hose.  I am not suggesting this for every Warrior in a similar situation, but I have found talcum powder and Depends a very nice treatment.

So Sherry got me a walking cane for Christmas. Nice gold head and black staff. Back when I considered myself something of a rake, I carried a shibboleth from time to time. Didn't care what people thought. Now that I have one for truly helpful purposes, I am a bit embarrassed by it. You know, folks thinking poor old guy is falling about. Which I guess I am, but do we need so public about it. However, I am hobbling with help and a grand help it is. And besides I'm not trying to impress any other woman that the Warden, so there you go.

Tomorrow I want to have eggs and cheese for breakfast. If I get nauseas, I'm gonna beat the frying pan to hell with the cane. I know, that's not very mature. But when you are a warrior maturity sometimes takes strange turns. I may even buy a bag of coal, burn it in the fireplace that the kids and then have them clean nasty mess up.

I Am Starving...Thank Goodness

Oh, let's see, it has been at least four months since I was hungry and perhaps two years since I could say I'm starving. You know, like right now when my stomach is burning, but its a message not a disease. "Put the computer down man and let's go eat. Anything!" Since I no longer trust the whims of my belly, I mentally ticked through a number lunch ideas. Not one of them gave me the slightest nausea, not even the sardine and roast beef sandwich. At the moment I think I could graze the browning grasses in the front yard, maybe toss some gravy in for some variety. In fact, I so hungry that once I get into the kitchen I might just scoop up a handful of dog food to knock the edge off. That kind of hungry.

There is nothing more in life I used to love more than eating. Not the good-for-you stuff, please, but hamburgers and hot dogs (with slaw) and french fries and, well, the list goes on. Soups, especially cream of tomato, rank very high, not to mention sardines and Vienna sausage and pizza of any sort. Two weeks ago (hell, two days ago), just thought of eating anything made me nauseous but even as I type the work nausea, the belly is demanding we get inside eat something.

What the hell is this all about? Maybe its about the Megase I take as an appetite enhancer, but I've been taking that for three months. Hasn't done jack. Then I wake up this morning drooling for oatmeal, but ended up knocking off two sweet rolls instead. Two! And wanted another one, but I have a growing child and didn't want to hear her wail through the house like a beggar in old London...Who ate my sweet roll? Lord, child go make some eggs, with cheese and while you are at it maybe you can think of something else to eat for yourself.

This, to me, is a major victory. Not only do I want food today, but  I can even taste it. Cardboard is retired. Does life get any better? For almost three years I've up and down with this cancer business (mostly down when it comes to the food part) and here I sit thinking when I get done with this post a bowl of Sherry's venison chili and some chocolate cake would be delightful. Just delightful. All hail food!

I would like to think some inner strength has brought this about, but instead I am going to lend it to one reason and one only. I am getting better. You may say I celebrate too early, it has only day, but what a day it has been. How about a grilled cheese sandwich with bread and butter pickles on the side. Now my stomach says I am torturing it. Well, too bad. You have tortured for what seems forever. And frankly, I am having a good time sitting here being hungry. Yes, better eating will mean better health, but just knowing you can be hungry is a moment to celebrate.

Boy, did I forever need this. A gourmand moment in my cancer experience. And just in time for Christmas dinner. Gosh, the good luck seems not to end.

So I'm going in now and feed myself. Then take a nap because of too many carbs, not because I am weak from not eating. lf it lasts, kicking cancer's arse just got a lot more doable.

Epilog: Ate a can of sardines with soda crackers for lunch and chicken and dumplings for dinner. That's my merry Christmas. Hope you have your own.

Well Ain't I just the Shmuck?

Three days before Christmas and the floor under the tree is full of stuff, all wrapped and beautiful. Stuff from Sherry, from Alex, from the dogs. Not a dang thing from me. I believe the stuff from the dogs is there just to make me look bad. Sherry took them somewhere yesterday to get bathed. Ha, it was shopping trip. Sadie doesn't quite get the gist of this gift giving thing. She protects the package from her to me as if she were a lioness and that package her cub. You ought to hear a twelve-week old puppy try to sound like Gunga-din. It's funny, but not funny enough to make an assault. Jeb doesn't care about any of it. Figures the old phart deserves what he gets because it ain't good to eat anyway. So there.

Once the recliner found itself well situated in the living room, Sherry began speaking of how much we need a new set of fireplace tools. Forget it. The old ones are dangerous enough. Then again, new ones would be equally dangerous (to me), so why not take a beating from the best...if it ever came to that. And I would get some husband points for the new ones and that alone would save me for a couple more years. Forget I said forget it.

When Sherry asked Alex what she was getting her dad for Christmas I distinctly heard her say, with a shrug, "I dunno, some old man stuff I guess." See how smart college is making her. She now knows the difference between old man stuff and what everybody else gets. I think she should write the book: Old Man Stuff for Teenagers. That, however, would require teens to read a book that was not assigned to them, so forget that as well.

But the question begs:  What does one give an old man who does not believe he is an old man? I assume here that new socks, ties, shirts, slippers and the like are not considered Old Man stuff since I have gotten that kind of thing my entire life. The child simply does not have the juice to go into a pharmacy and ask for a bunch body regulator stuff. And even if I did ask for regulator stuff, she would most like buy me a clock. In return I did go to Amazon and searched Dummy Teenager's Guide to Growing Up, but apparently that book is still being written. Since 6,000 BC.

But thank goodness, neither Sherry nor Alex are old men. That's going to make the stockings, bathrobes and the like just while. But I might give Sherry some cachet. Just to let her know that old manhood is coming. Which means I might oughta be nicer to Alex. After the cachet I'm gonna need a place to sleep and her dorm floor sounds perfectly good to me.

Hobbling 'Round the Warden's Ire

OK, here is how it went. I got up a little early to get a fresh start on my life, not just day. Decided I had been screwing off too much and that in turn had led to my less than thrilling physical state (a recognition I make about three times a week by the by). So I zip down an anti-nausea medicine, hobble into the kitchen, eat half a bowl of oat meat and rush  for the big bowl at the back of the house. Once done there, I go straight to the old recliner where I am self planted until I feel the wave as has passed. Then into the living room and the new recliner for most of the remainder of the generally feeling like crap not to mention sorry for myself.

One case in point: The new recliner was super last night and every body who came over took the time to step out of their lively conversations with the more ambulatory to at least have some perfunctory words with me. Every thing in yesterday's post went exactly as predicted, but for the sitting in the recliner part. It segregated me from the main spirit of the party. Not a festivity killer by any stretch, but enough to let me know I was somehow on the fringe of things. Didn't like it. Not bit. None. But upon every attempt to abandon it I was soon back in it, doing the best I could.

And this morning, Sadie got out the front door and it was no problem getting her back. The problem was the butt-crawl I had to make back to the porch because I could not raise myself from the that sitting position.

And so, like a thumb-sucking child, I just retreated. Back in the recliner, only forcing myself to move once, and that to take Jeb for a short drive (I know, I know, should have been a short walk.). And the swollen legs hurt like hell, going to the potty was still a massive effort and just trying to write was an repulsive effort.

So Sherry comes in about dark and asks what I want for dinner. I shrug. Nothing really.. She says, "Want to know why you are so weak? You aren't eating anything. Maybe a thousand calories a day. In effect you are starving yourself."

"Not true," I reply.

"So when you wake up dead one morning will you call me in to say you are sorry or just be dead are you going to call me and say that I was right or will you just be dead."

"Deprive you of giving me a bit more hell."

"No point giving a dead man hell, sugar. Oh and you are terrible about taking your medicines."

"Am not," Yes, I am pouting.

"Did you take your appetite medicine,? Did you?

"Uh, no."

"Why not."

Didn't feel like."

She sat back with a smug. "Case closed."

And this the same woman who was waiting on me hand a foot two days earlier.

So just to prove this issue one way or the other, I hobbled into the kitchen and made a grilled cheese sandwich. It was delicious. Five minutes later we are chatting away beside the fire and then I decide to write this post, and answer today's emails and work on story. Oh and commit to taking the appetite come the morrow.

Ha. What does the Warden really know.

Hobbling 'round the Christmas Tree...

Jeb and I are ready. When it comes to humans walking around with food, Jeb is always ready. I, on the other hand, tend to not to be as ready for the annual Foster Christmas soiree, at least since I got wrestled down by cancer a couple of years ago. Standing around for two hours with your neighbors and friends is fine mano-a-mano, it sucks a bit when you're  holding court--on your feet. But it is still the biggest night of our social year and Sherry always puts her heart and soul into it. And I certainly don't want to appear Grinch-like and not be a good host. If fact, for this party I may be the happiest host ever. Though it will be one of my most challenging.

You see, I am still in pretty rough shape from all the medical business over the past three weeks. I am not only dealing with the swollen feet and legs, but the pain that goes with it. Nasty stuff. Recognizing my needs, Sherry went and bought this cool recliner from which "you can hold court." But that is only one reason why it will be a happy party. Last year, a friend with Leukemia told me that all he wanted for Christmas was "one more year." I, thank God , have most hopefully not gotten to that simple goal, nor has he. He called yesterday, we chatted and then he said, " well, I asked Santa for one more year again. After a while they begin to stack up." I am going to have one more year as well and this party is sort of symbolic start.

Within an hour I will have forgotten all about not wanting to have the party for any reason. Instead I will be enjoying the warm good wishes of a neighborhood that closed around Sherry and me like a fortress of strength and love.  They have shown it over the years in more ways than I can list, from having our grass cut to bringing over food, to just calling over from time to time to see how we are  doing. God Bless Them, God Bless Them Everyone.

If there has been a pay off for me during this time, it has been the often surprising lengths friendship will go. How so many people, with their own concerns and crises take the time to support this family through ours. Our neighborhood is old, stretching back to the beginning of the 20th Century. And it is affluent, which some people often thinks is synonymous with cold. There is no neighborhood association to look after matters like ours. The benevolence of our neighbors springs simply from 15 years of associating with my family during dog walks or over the fence conversations. Nothing more, nothing less.

So they will fill my house tonight with love and gaiety, concern and celebration. There will doctors, journalists, artists, lawyers, school teachers and business people. They will in turn ask me how I am doing and inevitably tell me I look good. And I will hobble around drinking it all in and thanking them and meaning--oh so meaning--every word and every feeling I can't articulate.  In just three years these folks have  gone from just neighbors to a fount of support neither Sherry nor I can imagine being without.

So while at this moment I kinda dread the whole thing, believe me, come seven o'clock I will be ready to hobble until I drop, knowing  a couple of those strapping fellows will just hustle me to bed with a truly meant, Merry Christmas to you and especially a good night.

If it weren't for humans, I was told once, the world would be an especially lonely place.  Oh the deeper meanings in those words.

Planning To The Non-Beyond

Sitting in the car, puffing my pipe and thinking on the day. This morning Dr. Shlaer and I had a great conference and I do start Torisel after Christmas. This afternoon the ladies at PT pulled and pushed on me for about an hour to help get back to where I was just two weeks ago. Wrote some magazine copy for a start publication out of Charleston, S.C. named Garden and Gun. Somehow it is mixing the basic copy of a women's magazine with the addition of shooting. As a husband, I am not sure I am in favor of that, especially if they have true to life stories such as "How I Straightened Him Out for the Last Time." Not to worry, David Foster will not write one of those. Sherry is fully prepared for such an incident. If it comes to that, however, I hope she uses her Beretta O/U, an absolutely beautiful shotgun that is almost feminine in its feel (no pun intended) and looks.

It is so beautiful, Sherry might consider displaying it at the memorial services. I have a number of affluent unmarried men friends who would love to have a gun like that in their cabinet and more than willing to pay the price of admission: Behave or end up in a little urn like this one. The woman is kinda cute, but you know where the straight and narrow is and the gun will always remind you of where it is not, not to mention a pawning value of some $2300. Sounds like a winner for every body but me...which is why I stay on the straight and narrow. Yes, sir.

Speaking of arrangements I have now in the process of planning mine. Not that I expect to use them anytime soon, but better safe that sorrow. So last week as I was all drugged up in the Human Garage, I asked our oncology chaplain if he would facilitate. Then I would like four or five close friends to speak about my poor departed soul. And that's it. The only music I will demand is a hymn, not very well known, "Into the Woods My Master Went," by Sidney Lanier. As for what to do with the corpus delicti? Cremate it. And what they do with the ashes, as a dead man I don't think I will much care, so I don't much care now.

And I am going to do a ten minute tape for the chaplain to play at the end of the services as a little surprise. This comes from friend of mind who announced a formal dinner, "Foster, if this cancer kills you I'm coming to the funeral." I said, "Pete, that's  mighty sweet, but I don't think I would fly all the way from LA to Augusta just to go to a funeral." And he said: "Oh, no, if you are going to be in one room and not talk, I don't want to miss it."

I thought that was funny as hell, but I can just hear the groans (and hopefully the shock) from the watch watchers when I crank up with  one of my stories. Just the thought of that  provides me with great entertainment. It's like living through a little bit of the hereafter long before you get there. Heh, heh, heh.

Impossible To Believe, But I Vote True

Last Wednesday, I awakened all warm and fuzzy, this during a 24 hour period when I had no drugs. Even the hospital room felt inviting and I very much at home in it. Many of the gloomier concerns that were on my mind the night before were gone. For all the poking and prodding and not good news I felt at one with everything. Was even glad to see breakfast. When the assistant nurse came in to take my vitals I told her about my especially nice well-being. And she said "Those are from your prayer groups." She blew up the blood pressure bladder, waited for that business to be done and said, "You know, all those people out there praying for you. That's what you feel. You didn't know that?"

"I know a lot of people keep me in their prayers, but you are saying those prayers are literally touching me?"

"That's what I'm saying. We see it a lot, though most folks don't know what it is. And I don't tell'em because they might think I want to start some religious conversation or something."

"Why did you tell me?"

"I just thought you needed to know."

"Be danged."

For they rest of that day (and from time to time since) I have mulled that moment over. I do know I experienced a time of peace and optimism I have seldom felt during this crisis. But at no time during my cancer experience  have I felt it was out of my control. Yet the day I went into the hospital I feared I was at a turning point and not a good one. Then to wake up one morning and all that is gone? well, there had to be reason.

It was as if all those prayers suddenly coalesced somewhere and shot a beam of love and confidence right through me. People from as far away as Moscow and as near as right next door have told me they keep me in their prayers and on their prayer lists. As I think many other people do, I took those thoughts as just that, thoughts. One human being offering a psychological hand up to another. Being nice, as my mother would say.

But since that night, my cancer has not seemed the demon it was. There is a new found strength in my psyche that I have seldom--if ever--felt. How all that works is beyond me. My father said to me once: "Son, never question a miracle, just accept it."

The thoughts of hundreds, if not thousands, of people around the world coming together in that one instance to give me strength. Impossible to believe, but from my frail point of view undoubtedly true. At least true to me.

Glad That's The Hell Over

(Thanks to all of you who sent me supportive messages this week. I will answer them all individually, but just not been much up to it today. I hope you understand.)--DCF

To me, the funniest thing about being in the hospital is folks who come by and say something like: Enjoy it and get some rest. That's akin to saying to Joan d'Arc: Hope the fire gets you warm. One visitor said it must be nice to have access to Percoset, then you can lay around all day stoned. Ha! You take the Percoset to try and forget where the hell you are...that doesn't work.

I was in the human repair lab for two reasons: First, a new tumor (they think) was found in my vena cava after last week's CT. Seemed every doctor in that hospital was scratching his head over that one. It was all very exciting I guess as the parade of scrubs and stethoscopes coming through did not stop from the time I got there until I left. And since I was there anyway, they did a follow up endoscopy (clean as a whistle, thank you), both a cranial and abdomen MRI, not to mention taking some action photos of the heart (so very comforting to see you heart in action).

As for the swollen members of my precious body, they drew some fluid from the abdomen and then connected me to a bunch of IV's to download albumin (some kind of moisture killing drug) and other fluids. So I says to the doc, I says, "Doc, seems stupid to try to get fluids out by putting fluids in." He told me that it does seem stupid, but it works. I did lose some nine pounds but my bet that is from not eating the crappy hospital food (you  ever heard of brown gravy on ham? That bad.) One look at that stuff and you toss your first meal. I mean the very first, like when you were at your mother's bosom (that brings up another interesting study. The "bosom" is actually a woman's chest, not her breasts. Back in the more delicate days references to breasts were kind of off-putting.).

As for the patient, he doesn't know what to think of all this. Since he was all swole up, the news of the new tumor went over his head like 767. And I do mean swole. But today I am much less the swollen man, especially in my thighs and scrotum. And what a blessing. Last thing a man needs is a fifteen minute search for his fluid dispenser, sometimes wondering if it just got stolen. Talk about fates worse than cancer. This morning that was not an issue. Things heading north for sure.

The "new" tumor might have been there for a while. What surprised everybody was that most vena cava tumors present themselves at diagnosis and since this one is hiding behind the liver it was only by coincidence they found  it this time. The plan, man, is Torisel. Begin after the first of the year. As I said, they believe Sutent has simply run its course. We shall see.

One fun thing about Percoset. Try writing a blog or memo while you are on it. Whoo-wee, far out man and all that old hippie stuff. For every letter you strike correctly the next you don't, which is why the entries last week were so short. Several of you have already commented on the fact that I seemed a little loopy. You got that right.

Finally heading for deer camp, if for no other reason than to have lunch with the guys. I understand they have taken a few nice deer and have saved some Jim Bean for me. I'm bringing my own farts.

More come the morrow.

G'mornin' Me Fellow Warriors and Knights

Greetings from room 1048 at University Hospital. Still a bit pumped up from Perkocet, but hey, party when you can is my philosophy. In truth I decided today would be rest day and anything that would push rest forward would be helpful. No, in truth I am feeling decadent. Spending an entire day, in bed, slightly stone with folks waiting on your hand and foot can only be described as decadent. Forster's all for it.

So, as have many of you, the DCF has seen the bowels of the this place over the last week and it has seen his bowels as well. There is absolutely nothing left to look at. Heart, digestive system, lungs, and all associated organs have been photographed and available--for the first time ever--to the general public for only $10 per scan, guaranteed suitable for framing.

As for how I am doing. Well, much better now, thank you. They decided the swelling had something to do with a protein deficiency, most likely brought on by poor appetite in turn brought on by almost two years of Sutent. The swelling is well under control now, but that tumor/blood clot or whatever in the vena cava is a much more tricky piece of business. A rash attack through the chest is not a guaranteed to work because of the tumor's location behind the liver. We ruled out anti-coagulants because it could cause swelling at the tumors (which are stable at the moment). So we are going to move me to Torisel, see what happens. I have also asked Dr. Shlaer to consult with an RCC specialist on this odd scenario. I do know he has consulted with several other physicians on this, but at this stage of the game a conversation with an RCC expert ain't such a bad idea, so says me.

Beyond all that I have taken three bags of blood and a ton of albumin to help the swelling. Go home tomorrow, which means at least one night at deer camp, so I count myself a as fortunate fellow.

Bless you all.