Which Way is Well?

We went for Terri's third round of chemo today. Before that, we got another CEA level (the blood tumor marker) to see if this second round was working.

After the initial surgery 2 years ago, the level was 3.1. It quickly dropped to 1 with chemo the first round. (Normal is 1-3).

Over the past 9 months, we had watched it go from 2 to 4 to 6 - and 6 was when the PET scan showed the tumor had returned.

We had gotten our hopes up that the level would drop quickly, the way it had the first round.

It came back 18.1.

After the initial shock, I was confused - there is no way the tumor could have taken off that fast in 3 months. Colon cancer just isn't supposed to work that way. I called my best friend, Karl Kerchief, who agreed with me - and wondered if this may in fact be elevated because the tumor cells were dying quickly. After all, there was much more tumor present than there was after the first surgery.

I did some internet searching of medical journals, and sure enough, there was a study of colon cancer in 2004 with chemo very similar to what Terri is getting. In 15% of the patients, there was a LARGE bump in the CEA between 2-6 weeks after chemo started - the average bump was triple the pre-chemo level.

Well, this was triple, 4 weeks into chemo.

Up is good? Down is good? Add to that the inherent unreliability of the CEA test, and we have been floundering a good part of the day.

Terri is still very upset (in addition to the usual nausea she has at the end of chemo day 1), but the oncologist also reminded us that this CEA was done at the Cancer center lab rather than the hospital lab, so comparing the two is not such a good idea. We'll have to treat it as a new baseline and see what happens in another 2-3 months.

As for me? I choose to believe that this indicates the cancer cells are dying wholeheartedly. I will support my lady love, and we will fight on.

Because I don't believe it is time to start dying yet.

Thanks for your love and prayers, brothers - they mean a lot.

--Ken