Facing New Obstacles

Picture taken July of 2009 weeks before he was diagnosed with brain cancer.

It seems while our lives are settling down and becoming more and more normal, we still seem to face new obstacles that make us want to bang our heads on the wall repeatedly. What next, we ask ourselves? Haven't we been dealt with enough and all we have been through?
However, fear not, we try to look over and around these roadblocks and look for ways to make them better; to all but disappear.

Three weeks ago out of the blue Tim decided to have his cholesterol level checked before his once a month chemotherapy regime. Not expecting anything of it only wanting to know what his numbers are. And being a man in his mid-40s and having all of his other bloodwork checked over the moon and back, why not have cholesterol checked? It was something he had never, ever had checked before.
His numbers and levels came back high. Too high in fact. Well over 300 with normal being below 150. There was nothing to compare these levels to which made us wonder when and how that number came to be so high. As Tim put it that day he studied his results, "I'm a stroke and heart attack waiting to happen." And while most days he feels fine, those numbers tell him he is not.

A call down to our nurse clinician at Duke University told us his cancer situation and chemotherapy had no role in raising those numbers. And nothing out of the blue for Glioblastoma patients.

That day our eating changed. No more chips. More green veggies. Fruit. Nuts. Lower fat milk. More grains. Funny thing is you would never suspect him of having high cholesterol. Tim eats far better than I do. He is far from being overweight. He works out. I am not a fruit person. I love veggies. I should be having my levels checked.

A week and a half later he came down with a dreadful cold. Upper respiratory, sinus infection. Which always makes me fearful of pneumonia for him since his immune system struggles to regain strength. Just when he felt he was feeling like he was over it he relapsed into a worse cold. With stronger antibiotics, he is so much better. Which makes us rest easier and sleep better.

As many of you know Tim has suffered quite a bit of right side weakness from the location of the tumor(left side of brain), surgery, radiation and chemotherapy drugs. There is still an awful lot of inflammation in his brain, even 21 months later. Which brings me to this other obstacle in our path. He has been suffering from awful shoulder pain and some days, he can barely lift his arm, much less use it. Steroids always help but they don't last and days later he is in pain again. With a visit to a bone surgeon last week, x-rays and a MRI this morning we are hoping to find out a diagnosis of his chronic shoulder pain. The doctor suspects a rotator cuff tear. How and when that happened we are unsure. Did it happen after one of his many falls last year which is about when this pain began? Or did it happen during one of his focal seizures in his arm a few months after radiation? Oh how the human body can be so amazingly confusing and yet so completely amazing!

These are a few challenges we are facing right now. I hate these punches to the gut. The constant reminder of Tim's ongoing health just as we are trying to "settle" into some normalcy.
We just keep going and not let it bring us down. Tim has been through so much. I have watched him struggle so many times and so often want to be in his shoes and let him have a break from this baloney. It seems so unfair at times and makes me so angry at life. Why must we be constantly challenged? Why is this happening? So often I wonder if these challenges presented are tests and only happen to teach us more about life. Preparing us. Making us emotionally stronger and better as a person.

It is funny how you can look at life as being so unbelievably complicated and sad but then on the same token so wonderful and blessed!