Twas the night before....

Well it's almost that time. That time where nothing I can do will stop some man from ripping my guts out. That's right, it's surgery time. (technically tomorrow at 7am it is). Now I know what your thinking, "why is he perfectly ok with getting his guts ripped out?" Well if you must know, for one, I'm not actually getting my guts RIPPED out, it's just fun to say, and secondly, I'm hoping this is the last thing needed to rid my body of this horrible cancer. See, they are going to remove roughly 30-40 of my Lymph Nodes, and depending on the findings I may or may NOT need chemotherapy. Believe me after my last rant I got some answers, so if 0-1 nodes are cancerous I will just be put on surveillance, 2-5 nodes then it's 2 rounds of chemo, more than 5 and I will have the full 3-4 rounds of chemo initially scheduled. I should be home no later then Thursday (just in time for everyone to rub it in my face how good the Easter ham is this year), and can begin recovery. Hopefully recovery should take no longer then 6-8 weeks and I can head back to work shortly after that. Of course that is only if I do not need chemo. If I do, well then, the hell if I know.

Actually the only thing I'm really upset about is that I didn't have the time to scan some of the cards I received this week, or in my first trade for that matter. Oh, well. I will definitely have enough time in the near future. Well I'm not going to ramble on to much today. I had to drink some awful magnesium citrate so I can't sit in one place for too long.  I will try to put an update on here as soon as I can, or as soon as I can convince Carrie to do so for me. Until then, enjoy your day(s) and may we meet on the other side. Ken

Cards and the "Heritage"

Well it's been a very productive last couple of days. I have finally tucked away the last of the cards I got from my first trade!!! William over at foulbunt was awesome enough to send me some Indian's from the late 00's A&G's I did not have, in return I sent him some Emeralds to help complete his set. As soon as it's working I will scan some of my favorite's I received. I will definitely be trading again with him soon. Going through all of my old cards, while filing away the new, have brought back some good memories of when/how I acquired them. Once again when the scanner is up and functional I'll post some of my favs. Already this year I will forever remember my Indian's Heritage SP's (Brantley/Santana) and how I got them.....I'll save that for another time. Until then, be safe and make sure to enjoy that WBC finale going on tonite!

Lazy Sunday..

Happy St. Patrick's Day! For the first time in a long time I actually did not consume any alcohol today. Unfortunately lately I have not had much will power to do much other than sit and stare at screens, tv, computer, etc. I will however continue to work on my blog this week, especially when it comes to the baseball card part. My goal is to have my want list and trade bait updated at least 50 percent by Saturday. This way I can send out my blog to the masses and hopefully have some trades to work on while recovering from my upcoming surgery. If anyone that is reading this already had any suggestions please feel free to comment or email me. I'm still learning and any advice will be helpful.  Hope everyone was safe today, and enjoys the start to their work week.

Annoyances, Plain and Simple

Well, as you can see I haven't been on here in a while. Needless to say it's been an emotional and draining last week or so. Let me start with why....so during this process of Cancer, I call it a process because there are no shortcuts, and definitely no easy fixes, I have been told a few conflicting things about what my treatment will be. The first oncologist I saw in my hometown of Warren, OH gave me a quick physical, drew some blood and seemed positive that I may need no treatment at all. He also scheduled me to see him 6 weeks later, just to be sure. Now during this time we had our worries, but, myself not being anything of a doctor heeded his advice and continued my recovery from surgery. Now the urologist that performed my surgery not only set up that appointment with said oncologist, he also set up an appointment with another urologist in Pittsburgh (see last blog) for a follow up and a second opinion. Now when I saw this urologist he seemed very concerned with my case and the fact that my oncologist at home was not reacting with any treatment. It was his concern that with the type of cancer I have, the results of recent scans, and with my high AFP count (tumor markers in the blood), that I would need either Chemotherapy or surgery to remove my Lymph nodes. The worst part was, he thought I may need both. So what was to be a routine follow up appointment quickly turned into more blood work and more scans. Before we left for the day, he set me up with an oncologist in Pittsburgh that only deals with testicular cancer.

It was a long and terrifying week leading up to meeting with the oncologist. Not knowing which treatment would be used, but knowing both the treatments side effects, can kill ones good mood. Luckily, again, I have wonderful support in my girlfriend and friends and family that it actually wasn't as bad a week as it could have been. Then I met with the doctor. He was 98 percent positive that chemotherapy was my best course of action, so, I gave more blood, scheduled some pre-Chemo tests and scheduled my first cycle of Chemo. The drive home from Pittsburgh that night was pretty somber, even though Chemo was kind of what I wanted done anyways. That was last Friday. This week has been spent calling around trying to get housing, cleaning the house for when I am home, and my girlfriend rearranging her work schedule so that she could assist me. That was until Thursday.

Thursday my oncologist called me and informed me that himself, his team and my urologist butted heads and came to the conclusion that surgery would actually be the best bet at this point. What brought them to this conclusion is beyond me, but again, I'm no doctor. Apparently, if I have Chemo now I would most definitely need the surgery afterwards, where-as if I have the surgery first, there is a chance I may not need Chemo. I won't go into details as I am already rambling, but this information contradicted what was told to me prior and basically slapped me in the face. So now we have canceled the chemo, and I am scheduled for surgery on Monday, March 25th. I am not looking forward to this at all, as it is a very invasive, 8 hour surgery. Surgery is followed by a week in the hospital and up to 12 weeks home recovery. Not cool. So I write to you now and hopefully a few more times this week (I completed my first trade via blog,details coming soon) because I definitely will not be able to for a while. Peace and Love. Ken