I just returned from the hospital and the doctor who performed a bronchoscopy on my Dad told me my father has lung cancer, and surgery is not an option. This is too much. First Mom's SCC, now this. This sucks. I don't know how I'm going to deal with this. This is truly messing with my head. He's what got me though my Mom's illness, now what am I to do? I can't believe this is happening. I can't tell my Mom about this, she'll fall apart. And she's still recovering from her battle. This is just not good. Oh, man.
I need help.

Didier, I am so very, very sorry for you and your parents. What a low blow and gosh awful timing, too. If it helps, please know that I am very angry on your behalf! I guess there must be a group of people who talk about lung cancer as we talk about OC, who might be able to help you understand what to expect about your dad's condition. I had two older friends with non-operable lung cancer. One had a good five years and we lunched and shopped, and it was only for a couple of months at the end when she was bed ridden. The other had a pretty good three years, so this may not be an immediate thing. When you get over your shock, you will need more information from his doctor for sure. Know for certain that we will be here to send you strength for the weeks, months, and hopefully years ahead.

Oh, I feel so bad for you and your family. I can't imagine what you must be going through. If it makes you feel any better, I know a woman who had tremendous results with a clinical trial for lung cancer, after conventional treatment was not working. I'm sorry, I don't know any details, except that this is definitely beatable.

Stay strong and make sure they both keep fighting!
Also, don't forget to take care of yourself.

Hearing this is almost too much for me...Gee whiz! It has been a bad day here in our cyber world.

All I have to say is I'm sorry....and that ain't enough.

If I can help let me know....

Hi Didier,
I am so sorry to hear of your predicament. I will keep you and your parents in my prayers.
A close friend of mine was diagnosed with a stage III, small oat cell lung cancer about the same time I started treatment. Hers was "inoperable" also. She received a cocktail of different chemotherapy drugs and radiation. Later she received brain radiation also as a standard extra measure. She has been declared cancer free. The treatment is as tough as it is for head and neck cancer, in some ways tougher because of the extensive chemotherapy protocol. There is always hope.

Didier,

I feel so bad for you, too! I have certainly had many days (weeks?) when I have felt like I couldn't take another thing. I can only offer this story to hopefully help: My best friend's mom was going to have a hysterectomy three years ago and when a routine chest x-ray was done before surgery, they discovered masses of tumors in her lungs--advanced cancer from smoking thirty-something years.

At first, everyone was so devastated; docs said they couldn't do a thing to save her life, only prolong it. Boy, was that a hard one to handle. They said she might live six months if she was lucky. However, through chemo treatments she lived three years--died last month because the cancer spread to her liver. Because of her mom's recent death, my friend was still here in Va and could be with me while my husband had his cancer surgery last week. She and I had a lot to talk about while he was in surgery. She told me how hard it was to come to terms with her mom's disease, but while by her mom's bedside in early December, my friend wrote in her journal: "Thank you, Cancer, for giving me time with mom these last three years. She could have died suddenly of a heart-attack or in an automobile accident, but instead, you gave me three years to love and appreciate every moment...to go to the beach for the first time together, to ask dumb questions like, 'Why DID you marry Daddy?' and to appreciate each and every call to just say hi."

Didier, I know you are a long way from feeling like that now, but since my friend told me this last week, I am trying to figure out how I can come to terms with the cancer that is threatening to take my husband of only 1 1/2 years from me and my daughters. It is a struggle, but I want so badly to stop grieving over this cancer.

I hope you can find some way to get through this a little easier.

Christine

Hi Didier,

Wanted you to know that I'm thinking of you and your Mom % Dad. Mt father-in-law was DX with lung cancer and he went through radiation and his last check up showed the tumor hsd been shrunk to the size of a pimple. The doctors were very pleased that it was almost nothing, He is 84 years old.

So please don't give all hope for your father.
You have been such a great and loving caretaker that I know you will survive no matter what the outcome. Step back and take a deep breath and
continue to be the rock both your parents need.

You can alway's vent here or please free to email me anytime.

Yoir Friend, Dan Bogan

Sincerely, Dan Bogan

Thanks you guys. You have no idea how much I appreciate your support. For the last 20 minutes I've been trying to write something coherent, but there's just so much crap going on in my head I keep deleting what I've written because none of it is very cohesive. I gotta go. I've got to get myself some help tomorrow and talk this through with a doctor or something. Sorry. Please take care of yourselves. I'll catch up with you later.