Encouragement (In Suffering, Pain, and Witnessing Both…) #2: Relay For Life 2018!

The older I get, the more suffering and pain I’ve experienced; and the more of both I stand witness to. From my wife’s (and many, many of our friends and coworkers) battle against breast cancer; to my dad’s (and the parents of many of our friends and coworkers) process as he fades away as this complex disease breaks the connections between more and more memories, I have become not only frustrated with suffering, pain, and having to watch both, I have been witness to the suffering and pain among the students I serve as a school counselor. I have become angry and sometimes paralyzed. This is my attempt to lift myself from the occasional stifling grief that darkens my days…

I can find no more encouraging even than the Relay For Life series hosted all across the country.

As in the past five years, I’m participating again and I’d appreciate any support anyone who reads this blog might offer. As part of the Super Cooper Staff, I am thrilled every year when this time rolls around.

I have a fundraising page here: http://relay.acsevents.org/site/TR?px=43261654&pg=personal&fr_id=87887&s_src=boundlessfundraising&s_subsrc=bfDskFbPfPrbdg

I’ll post more in upcoming weeks as the event draws near. For now, here are links to the past events I’ve written about! My hope is that you find some encouragement in the ongoing fight against cancer.

The ones that have touched my own life? Breast Cancer in my wife and her best friend. Liver cancer in my brother-in-law. Testicular cancer in a good friend. Skin cancer in my dad, brothers, and sister. Prostate cancer in my dad. Lung cancer in my mother-in-law. Leukemia in the son of some very old friends of mine. It’s everywhere – and we can DO something to end it.

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2016/07/guys-gotta-talk-aboutcauses.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2015/10/guys-gotta-talk-aboutspiritual-journeys.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2014/11/guys-gotta-talk-about-9face-and-breast.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2014/11/guys-gotta-talk-about-9face-and-breast.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2014/05/guys-gotta-talk-about-2the-relay-for_31.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2016/03/guys-gotta-talk-about-23f-cancer.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2016/04/guys-gotta-talk-about-25-help-finish.html

http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2016/11/breast-cancer-research-right-now-50.html

Resources:

Image: http://www.quoteambition.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/encourage-quotes-destiny.jpg

ENCORE #84 ! – Why Do So Many Women Have Breast Cancer?

From the first moment my wife discovered she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started this blog…That was four years ago – as time passed, people searching for answers stumbled across my blog and checked out what I had to say. The following entry appeared in June of 2011.

The roommate of our foster daughter is somewhat estranged from her mother and through the grapevine last week, discovered that her mother had had a preliminary diagnosis of breast cancer. It turned out to be benign cysts, but my wife raised the immediate question: Why do so MANY women have breast cancer?

A legislator in the district in which I live sent an email to her constituency that she had finished a recent session (though it ended deadlocked and a special session is in the works). She also shared that she was in the final stages of ovarian cancer and she was in hospice. We all raised the question: Why do so MANY women have cancer?

Is it something in the environment? Is it the fast food and processed foods we eat constantly? Is it because we’re living longer that cancers get a chance to grow? Is it because we’re better at detection now and deaths that were at one time “unexplained” now have a clear cause?

Well, a dose of the facts never hurt anyone – it only shakes preconceived notions and perceptions.

FACT: Incidence of Breast Cancer

1975-80 –       held steady at 110/100,000 women

1980-87 –       increased by 4% per year

1987-1994 –   held steady at 140/100,000 women

1994-99 –       increased by 2% per year

1999-2006 – decreased by 2% per year to 120/100,000 women

(http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/content/@nho/documents/document/f861009final90809pdf.pdf)

What causes breast cancer? The short, concise answer is: “Don’t know, trying to find out.”

There are risk factors – none of which are related to the environment or food additives. In order, they are advancing age, family history, use of hormones, high doses of radiation (ie – nuclear reactor), obesity, booze and a fatty diet.

So as people get older and exercise less they increase the risk of breast cancer. The perception that it’s everywhere, while frightening, isn’t exactly true – HOWEVER the fact that the longer you live the more friends you have is an observable phenomenon. That increase in the number of friends makes it a statistical certainty that your chance of knowing someone with breast cancer will approach 100%.

This all means…what?

For me it means I will continue to write this blog; next year I will join one of the endurance events targeting fund raising to find a cure for breast cancer and I’ll speak at Cooper’s Relay For Life like they asked me to do this year.

It means we’ll all keep fighting, bankrolling, inspiring and looking for ways that a cure for one kind of cancer can apply to another kind of cancer.

Image: https://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5527/10893068965_1d328e8f71_b.jpg

BREAST CANCER RESEARCH RIGHT NOW! #60: COMING SOON – I, Robot Nanites Fight Breast Cancer!

From the first moment my wife discovered she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started this blog…

Every month, I’ll be highlighting breast cancer research that is going on RIGHT NOW! Harvested from different websites, journals and podcasts, I’ll translate them into understandable English and share them with you. Today: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature23657

Most of this article is behind a paywall, but reading the abstract (science term that sort of means the “summary” of what the paper’s about), I can see the application possibilities. I’d LOVE to read it in full, but NATURE makes its money selling the right to read the papers for absurd amounts…

In the online magazine, Science, an online science news magazine, they translate the abstract into reasonably understandable English (http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/nanomachines-drill-holes-cancer-cells)

Even so, it’s still pretty heavy stuff, so I’m going to take a stab at it here.

The basic idea is that by using chemicals, light, and even sound, scientists have created clusters of atoms that hang together and perform in particular ways. It sounds wild, but if you think of a all the parts it takes to run your car – or even more simply, your bicycle – it’s nothing radically different. It’s just the scale that’s amazing and the tools they use.

By the way, the things they create – they’re called nanomachines. They first four letters are Latin and means “one-millionth”. So, these nanomachines (if you ever say Will Smith’s movie, I, ROBOT, they used “nanites” (another word for namomachines and WAY easier to say), to destroy the crazy computer VIKI.) can be programmed to do certain things. Sort of like a set of screwdrivers. I can’t use one of those weird square-nosed ones to take out a Phillips screw. I can certainly try, but it strips the head and makes the job of taking out a zillion times more work.

What nanite scientists do is count on how atoms attach to each other and set them up so that they can attach together in the right way. In other words, that can set up a nanite so that it’s attracted to a breast cancer cell – in the nanoworld, a breast cancer cell will have certain chemicals around it and on its surface. The nanite looks for the “smell” of the cancer cell and then attaches to it.

They’ve also given their nanite a sort of “drill bit” on one end – a tail on one end to get around, a drill bit on the other to dig into a cancer cell. Wrapped inside of the nanite is a little surprise for the cancer cell – a molecule of chemo drug. Once it’s drilled through the wall of the cancer cell, it shoves the chemo in, then shuts down, its weapon delivered.

Zillions of these little machines seek out and destroy cancer cells, so instead of the chemo taking out hair cells along with the cancer cells, ONLY the cancer cells get zapped.

That’s the theory, and now these articles detail how scientists have made it work in the lab. The next step, of course, will be to see if it works in something alive – usually mice – and finally seeing if it will work in the complex universe (remember how small nanites are – 50,000 of them could line of end-to-end and just make it across the width of a Human HAIR! If you lined up 50,000 people, laying down, feet to head, that would stretch 52 miles) that would be a Human body.

So, we shall see!

Image: http://media.liveauctiongroup.net/i/21085/23631698_9.jpg?v=8D2E5328E6E9AC0

ENCORE #83! – Low Level Laser Treatment of Post-Breast Cancer Arm Lymphedema

From the first moment my wife discovered she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started this blog…That was four years ago – as time passed, people searching for answers stumbled across my blog and checked out what I had to say. The following entry appeared in August of 2015.

After our last visit to the lymphedema clinic and the response of the staff there when my wife asked about a cure, I will now be focusing the “BC Research Right Now!” entries on the subject of lymphedema treatment.

This first entry is NOT something that the clinic we go to has ever offered, and it may be something I suggest we ask for.

It’s called Low Level Laser Therapy or LLLT. Below you’ll find the description of a recent study using it:

“Low level laser therapy (LLLT) (wave lengths 650-1000 nm) is a…therapeutic intervention for treatment of arm lymphedema. [It] can be administered by individuals trained in the use of the device…[and] is believed to stimulate lymphatic movement and lymphangiogenesis (‘the formation of lymphatic vessels from pre-existing lymphatic vessels’, IOW, ‘growing new lymph vessels’); [increase] macrophage activity, and soften fibrotic tissues; improve contractility in the tissues that assist with lymph transport through the lymphatic vessels. These mechanisms increase movement of pooled fluid from the extracellular spaces into the lymphatic system for transport.

“Studies have evaluated the influence of LLLT on lymphedema in breast cancer survivors with mixed results regarding amount of volume reduction and degree of symptom relief...None of these studies reported complications. Although the number of sessions and exposure time to the laser varied across studies, overall results are supportive of the procedure as a lymphedema treatment and demonstrate the feasibility of conducting studies in breast cancer survivors with lymphedema.

“LLLT offers APNs trained in the use of the device an opportunity to directly provide treatment for their patients with lymphedema. Demonstrated successful use [and] could impact current standards of care and treatment delivery by offering alternatives to current treatment, earlier intervention, and increasing access to a pool of providers.

“Based upon the physiological mechanisms of action ascribed to LLLT, the authors of this article theorized that it should reduce lymphatic-associated swelling. The purpose of the pilot study was to examine the impact of [the treatment], as both a stand-alone and complementary treatment for arm volume, symptoms, and Quality of Life in breast cancer survivors with treatment-related lymphedema and to use data obtained in this study to power future studies.”

The hospital we go to has a cancer center with a strong breast cancer component and they are the place where we discovered massage therapy for the reduction of arm volume – what’s known as “manual lymphatic drainage” and includes both home-massage and wearing a compression garment on the arm.

 The results of the study, while not phenomenal or “world-shaking” do, in fact point to the use of LLLT as an adjunct to typical massage and compression treatments: “a 20 minute dose of LLLT when followed immediately by compression bandaging is potentially as effective in reduction of arm volume as 40 minute sessions of MLD or combined MLD and LLLT followed by compression bandaging . This preliminary finding is noteworthy, as the shorter duration of each LLLT session is less burdensome to patients and less time consuming for therapists.”

Less time wasted – that’s an improvement. We’ll have to see if the clinic we go to offers this treatment!

[Note: Shortly after I wrote this, our clinic visits ended. Now we only have yearly check ups; lymphedema is treated as it always has been: compression.]

Image: https://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5527/10893068965_1d328e8f71_b.jpg

GUY’S GOTTA TALK ABOUT…Alzheimer’s #14: Why I Won’t Be Joining An Alzheimer’s Support Group

Dad’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s stayed hidden from everyone until I took over the medical administration of my parents in 2015. Once I found out, there was a deafening silence from most of the people I know even though virtually all of them would add, “My _____ had Alzheimer’s…” But there was little help, little beyond people sadly shaking heads. Or horror stories. Lots of those. Even the ones who knew about the disease seemed to have received a gag order from some Central Alzheimer’s Command and did little more than mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started this part of my blog…

There’s an Alzheimer’s support group that meets once a month, across the street from where Dad lives. I have the advertisement as a photo in my cell phone.

Since I started this cruel journey two and a half years ago, there have been some thirty meetings.

I’ve attended none of them.

I’m also the school counselor of some three hundred-plus senior high school students. I attend to them from seven am to 2:30, 3:30, 4:30 and sometimes even five pm…with certain individuals, I attend beyond that.

Two posts ago, I talked about losing the focus of my life, losing focus on the ONLY relationship that means anything to me. Losing the focus on my wife.

If she wasn’t here, beside me, supporting me, going to school musicals with me, and listening to me when I describe sob-stories, I don’t know what I’d do. Going to a once-a-month Alzheimer’s-loved-one support group couldn’t POSSIBLY replace that.

Therein lies my argument against taking on ANOTHER “thing”. If it wouldn’t help me if my wife WASN’T here, how could it help me when she is? So I continue to resist.

What hope or help could such a group provide anyway?

You can see the facts in the poster you can link to below. Summarizing: 5 million (including my dad) have been diagnosed. SIXTH leading cause of death in the US (I wonder if that includes the car accidents caused by seniors who refuse to give up their car keys and end up killing both themselves and others? Watching my dad cut across five lanes of traffic to get back onto the interstate after he took the wrong exit to get home set up the events that led to my parents moving into a care facility.) A trillion…A TRILLION…dollars will end up being spent on Alzheimer’s and dementia by the year 2050. Heart disease deaths? They’ve dropped 14% due to research, treatments, and lifestyle changes. My mom lived to 82 because of the efforts put forth by the medical community (and us) to keep her alive. Deaths from Alzheimer’s and dementia have risen NINETY PERCENT in that same period of time. One in three seniors now die of Alzheimer’s and dementia-related causes.

So what do they do? Talk about it. Support each other.

I’m NOT saying that it’s bad. But it’s not for me. It would be another two or three or four hours out of my life and away from my wife to very little effective return. It’s not like it’s an AA group. They aren’t trying to change their lives.

To be perfectly cruel, they’re trying to change the trajectory of the disease – and not only is that impossible, it’s what I do in this blog.

So, my love, my wife, don’t worry about me joining something ELSE. You are my sanity and will remain so. I lean on you, but I will NOT jump into your arms and make you carry me!

Resource: https://www.alz.org/facts/

Image:  http://az616578.vo.msecnd.net/files/2016/06/25/6360242025150255191939281878_Alzheimer-disease-patients.jpg