Music

Hi friends, I've had too many thoughts as of late, and it's actually pretty draining trying to put them all into words.

I met with Stanford yesterday, and I will be beginning chemo shortly (probably early next week).  The doctors confirmed that multiple myeloma is not yet safely curable.  (It's curable in rare cases that bone marrow transplants from other donors take, but there's huge risks of life-threatening complications from that procedure where most of the time the risks outweigh the benefits).

There are reasons to hope though:

• Blood cancer research (and myeloma, in particular) has seen massive strides in the past several years.  My doctor said that even 6 months ago different treatment was being prescribed, and now they have something found to be more effective.  There's the hope that while they're trying to maintain the cancer, a new game-changing drug or treatment comes out.  
• The fact that I'm young and basically asymptomatic (I'm slightly anemic) are things that will hopefully work in my favor in how I will respond to treatment.  It also gives me more options for treatment down the line that other, older patients may not have available to them.
• They say this first round of maintenance treatment (which should last 6-8 months) will have minimal side-effects.  I'm told I should be able to live life pretty normally.  I won't have to be in the hospital (except for a weekly shot), I should be able to go to work, and I can even try to stay active (though I need to avoid things that put a lot of strain on my bones; running is okay though)

I'm feeling okay about things, I think.  I mean, it's hard to know what I'm feeling.  I wish I could put things into words for you all, but my brain feels like jello.  Here are some songs that have captured my thoughts recently.