More positive than negative now except for one bad week

Quick update for all you followers (and you all know I couldn't thank you more for supporting me).  Things were going well up until Saturday the 22nd of September.  I was eating one or two little meals a day and seeing definite progress.  Then, Saturday night I went to go to bed and my fingers and toes started tingling and burning.  My whole body was wired and I couldn't sit still.  I was up the entire night like I had swallowed 10 Red Bulls before bed.  I stayed up all day the next day, went to bed Sunday night and slept for less than one hour.  Same issue.  It continued all week.  I literally slept for less than 5 hours over 4 nights.  My body was wiped out but I couldn't sleep.  Dana Farber called it peripheral neuropathy and told me to try a cream to help.  It did nothing.  So they had me come in Friday for a battery of tests.

Long story short, it may be tied to my blood sugar again but in a good way.  They took me off all the insulin and overnight Lantus shots I had been doing to see how my blood sugar goes.  I finally slept this Saturday night for 8 hours.  Felt great.  Hopefully this may be a sign that there is no diabetes and it was the drugs I was on that was causing all the sugar issues.  That would be fantastic.  All I know is sleeping felt so good.

While at Dana, they told me I dropped four more pounds, up to 42.  I was ecstatic, right up until Jason told me it was all muscle I was losing, not fat.  Oh.  Well that stinks.  However, I have been doing some 1.5-2 mile walks which he then said maybe it is burning some fat but I need to start eating more to maintain my weight before he will pull the feeding tube out.  So, I need to start doing some shakes and get more in me.  I want this tube out.  As much as I appreciated having it, it's time to move forward and this is the one thing that keeps reminding me I am still recovering.

My throat is doing ok.  Still hurts but I came off almost all the pain meds and they said I did that about 4 weeks ahead of time.  Great.  I like to hear I am ahead of most in recovery.  The long walks he said are real good.  The eating I still lag a little.  It's tough but the taste buds are starting to come back and some foods are tasting good again.  That's super exciting for me, trust me.

Eating more is going to be the key.  To be able to exercise more, I need to get more in me.  That's the key and what I am focused on now.  The Dr's are really happy with the way it's going.  I did get sick one day (wednesday) but I was fine right after so they said don't worry about it.

It's all positive now.  Full steam ahead and I rest when I need to.  I've learned to listen to that part of the recovery because if you rest when you need it you come back stronger the next day.  If you don't, it sets you back which becomes a morale issue for me.  I hate going backwards.  I won't know if this all worked until early November when they do the scans, but from my perspective that's just a formality.  All the prayers and hard work by Dana will not go unrewarded.   I know I will be shown Cancer FREE in a month's time!  The final hurdle!

I unfortunately don't have any real funny things to pass on.  Lame week this week with lack of sleep.  Things are moving positive everyone.  You are a major reason for it.  Though nobody seems to post to my blog I do get a lot of emails which is great.  Never having been through something like this before for myself or close family member, I never really realized the power of positive support.  You all have been amazing and I will never forget it.

Cheers for now.  Thank you all.

Mark