Friends,
July 2nd was the 13th year since my diagnosis, so this time of year I usually post about how fortunate I have been to be cancer free and to have lived a mainly normal life since I healed from my treatment. I have been around to watch my kids grow up, graduate college and become fine young adults and I outlived my dear mother who died last year at 95. I returned to work and have been married to a wonderful woman for 10 years and we have traveled the world together. So no big complaints....
But, the degeneration in my jaw has apparently continued and I have an appointment for my third sequestectromy to remove more dead bone where a tooth came out and never healed despite the HBO treatments. I have dodged the bullet for a couple of years but would not be surprised if a mandible replacement is in my future. In the meantime I have been aspirating liquids more lately and suspect that I have a little pneumonia. My dentist at MDACC just put me on an antibiotic called Levaquin which I am hoping will solve the pneumonia problem.
I can eat just about any non spicy food as long as I drink water, but the water can be aspirated to the lungs and carry food particles.
I did not mind my feeding tube during treatment because I could look forward to removing it one day. The prospect of going back to a feeding tube now is rather depressing, as is the idea of a .mandibulectomy.
I realize that I have been so very fortunate to have been able to live well and enjoy these last 11 to 12 years after a stage IV diagnosis so I don't want to whine, but I damn sure don't like it, either.
Hoping for the best and wishing the same to all of you on this 4th of July.
Danny