Christmas

I hope you all enjoyed Christmas! I know I did. It was a great time with my family. So for this post I'm going to discuss my three favorite gifts that I received this year.

1. The gift of keeping my arm.

A couple weeks ago my mom asked me what I wanted for Christmas. For me the answer was simple; For the surgery to go well, and to have good function in my arm. I received both of these gifts this Christmas. I was blessed to have the plan for surgery change to allow for more function in my arm. Now I have a really good chance for full strength, and flexibility. I also was lucky to have such a good surgery team, and for everything about the surgery go well for me. Back in August when I was being diagnosed with all of this I wasn't sure if I would even be able to keep my arm, and now I'm sitting here typing a blog post getting ready for some rehab after I'm finished with this. It's really incredible! Thank You University of Penn.

2. Autographed Football

This one is really awesome! I received a football signed by Ewing's Sarcoma survivor, and middle linebacker for the Giants, Mark Herzlich. Back when I found out that I had Ewing's sarcoma, I found out that it was an extremely rare disease. So I researched to see if anyone famous has had this cancer with the expectation that I wouldn't find anyone due to the rarity of it. I found one person. Mark Herzlich. His story really inspires me. To have bone cancer, beat it, and then play in the NFL is really amazing. He was also treated at the University of Penn. The words: one survivor to another are written on the top. Whenever I become discouraged with my situation from now on, I will put those words into my head. One survivor to another. Thanks Uncle Paul for getting me this football, and Mark Herzlich for supporting me.

3. Your support

The amount of support my family has received throughout my battle with cancer is really incredible. The other day my blog reached a milestone. 10,000 views. It's actually at 11,000 now, and I couldn't be more surprised. When I started this blog I didn't expect to get any views at all. Now I have over 10,000 views on my blog. But most importantly I have accomplished what I created this blog for: Helping other people. When you have a rare disease, most of the time you're not going to know someone else personally who had it. When you go to the internet you're not going to see much more than statistics, and treatment options for the disease. As a patient, how are you supposed to know what the treatment for the disease will really be like. And that's why I created the blog; to help others who are fighting the same battle as me. I chose to share my experience with my cancer treatment in the hope that others will find it useful. I have been in contact with many people who have been affected by this cancer. Some have even created blogs of their own because of me. This feeling of helping others is really the best gift I could ask for. So thank you everyone for reading my blog. And to those of you who are reading this who are battling cancer or other diseases; I hope 2014 brings more healing to all of you.

I Love This Picture!

More Results

Yesterday was a long day. I had an appointment with my oncologist at 11:15 and my surgeon at 1:15. We left the house at 8, and didn't get back until 5. The appointments....went well. I got all of my questions answered, and I'm now much less nervous about everything.

Let's break down where I stand with this cancer.  I now have all of the results of the scans I had before surgery. The last scan result I needed was the bone scan. Its Clean! No spreading of the cancer to my other bones. I asked my oncologist about the 2 mm nodule in my right lung. He's not worried about it at all. Since that was my first pure CT scan of my chest, the nodule could have been there my whole life. Also, 2 mm is the smallest size a CT scan can pick up. In other words...if you were to have 10 CT scans of your chest, not all of them would pick up the nodule. If my oncologist isn't worried about it, then neither am I. I don't know if I mentioned this before, but after surgery my hemoglobin dropped a lot. It dropped from 10 to 7, which caused me to become very tired during my stay in the hospital. To put the number into perspective, when you get below 8 you need a transfusion. The normal range is 13-16. Throughout treatment I've been pretty steady around 10. To help fix this without a transfusion I was given iron pills. Yesterday, I had blood work, and found out that my numbers are back up! Hemoglobin at 10.6. 

Now the last result. Necrosis percentage....only 20-30%. Yeah I was just as shocked as you are right now reading this when I was told this yesterday. Even a little upset. But, here's the problem here...I was a little confused. Here's the explanation I got from my oncologist. He's not worried about it. For Ewing's sarcoma, the necrosis percentage doesn't hold much merit, but it does with other cancers. He told me that he's had patients who have had 100% necrosis, and have the cancer come back multiple times. He would have been more worried if Jimmy didn't shrink so much. I mean, obviously the treatment is working. I had an 82% shrink of my primary tumor. So nothing is changing with my chemo. The plan is staying the same. Same drugs, 3 more months, same rest period, Same Everything. I was still a little upset leaving the office, and on our trip to my surgeon's office. Out of all of the thoughts that were going through my head, only one thing was able to help me come to grips with the current situation, and to think rationally again. Math. I thought to myself... If my tumor never shrunk, the cells just stayed put when they died rather than just dissolving or whatever they do. This result would have been much different as you'll see now. Jimmy started at roughly 100 ml. After three months of chemo it was down to 18 ml. So 82% of the tumor was already dead. Lastly, 20-30% of Jimmy was dead when he came out. So something like 5 ml of what was left was dead. Add that to the 82 ml that was shrunk, and you get a much different result. 87% necrosis. And this explanation is similar to what my surgeon said when I asked about the necrosis. I finally was fine after my surgeon explained the necrosis, and why it isn't really that important. She's had many patients with even less necrosis do just fine.


Now onto the arm. Everything is looking good so far. The incision looks great. She was happy with the range of motion in my elbow. I'm pretty close to full range there already. I was prescribed more exercises for my shoulder, so I'm progressing. I'm now able to hold up to 5 lbs with my arm. I have rehab at noon today. I can't wait to perform these new exercises. I have a follow up appointment in 4 weeks. She said that I might have the green light to do more things with my arm. Like play basketball. I was shocked that I might be shooting hoops in 4 weeks. She said it'll be good rehab. The main thing holding me back right now is my deltoid muscle. That needed to be detached, and then reattached during surgery. It's still healing right now, and I don't have much strength in it right now. The weakness in my deltoid muscle makes it difficult to raise my arm. Lastly, my arm isn't really that sore now. I'm not taking the painkillers anymore. Just Advil when I need it.

Looking forward I got the OK to return to chemo on the 30th. Not looking forward to it, but it must be done. 6 more treatment, 18 more days, 3 more cycles, 3 more months, that's all that remains. I already did it once. I can do this again. Hopefully I can stay as healthy as I did the first time.


Have a Merry Christmas Everyone.

Recovery

It's been exactly one week since my last post, and what have I done in this time...not much. I have been sleeping a lot, and when I say a lot I mean it. Like I get around 10 hours every night plus a few naps totaling around 3-4 hours a day. I've been eating well, and doing my exercises whenever I'm up and awake. Even though I don't feel like I'm doing much; I really am doing a lot. I'm recovering. I saw the biggest improvement in my arm yesterday from the day before yesterday. The swelling in my arm went down a lot giving me more flexibility in my elbow. I also didn't take any Dilaudid yesterday, just some Advil. The pain I felt didn't warrant the hardcore painkillers. I did take it this morning, but laying still all night sleeping can do that. I'm improving with all of the exercises except the external rotations. Not making any progress with that one. I'm not really using the sling anymore, not even when I go to sleep. The incision looks good as well. Last thing to mention with the arm. I'm just carrying myself around better. A week ago, I was all hunched over walking because of the arm, but now I'm standing straight up. And that's without the sling too. I can let my arm hang on the side of my body with little pain. I'm writing this blog post with no issue. Oh and the hip...I have no problems walking. The only thing to mention with the hip is that my upper thigh is still numb. Kind of a weird feeling. I'm going to ask my surgeon about it tomorrow. And lastly, my upper thigh, and hip gets that hot feeling that I mentioned a few blog post back. It hasn't been too bad. Only the one time a few nights ago was bad. I woke up at 4 in the morning, and it was pretty wicked. I just took the painkiller and fell asleep in 30 minutes. It was gone in the morning. I'm excited with how things are improving for me. It's really amazing at what one week can do for recovery. So the moral of the story here folks...Listen to your body; Don't fight it! It will reward you in the end.


The only exciting thing I did all week was go to Joey's basketball game. It was a really fun time. Too bad they lost, but it was a fun game to watch. I was shocked at how much my brother improved. I better get out practicing or he'll be beating me. Just kidding! I won't be playing ball for a while. The team looked great. The coaching up there is amazing. I hope I can make it to a few more games.


Now I'm going to mention some things that I forgot to mention in my last post. Some of these might make you laugh a little.
1. My right armpit is bald. They shaved it during surgery. Yeah didn't notice this until I got back from the hospital. I was really shocked when I saw it, like those hairs won't grow back for a long time. Not sure if I should just shave the other one. Yes, I'm OCD like that. I probably will. I need to be symmetrical.

2. About a week before surgery I began to notice that my eyebrow hair was falling out like crazy. Yes, it was finally happening. The one thing that I dread for my appearance than anything. Losing my Eyebrows. Well I just found out why this was happening. The new hair was pushing the old out. I now have a fresh pair of eyebrows. The hair is really short, and in my opinion looks kind of silly.

3. This one ties in with #2. My hair is growing in like crazy. My head was really fuzzy the other day. I was like a baby again. I got that shaved as soon as I noticed it because I hated it so much. I'm also getting mustache hair. So it was pretty odd to shave again. It was the first time I shaved since starting chemo. And lastly, the hair is already growing back. I have a mustache, and my head is fuzzy again. Ugh! I'll just have to let it be.

4. This last one was from the day of surgery. If you remember I was in the recovery room for quite a while, and it took me a while to come out from the anesthesia. Well, when my parents went down to check on me I was very out of it, and really trying to communicate with them, but couldn't. My blood pressure top number was at 180! I'm usually under 120. Well, before my parents left me my mom rubbed my head for a while. In just minutes I was calmed down, and my blood pressure dropped to 150! This is amazing! I don't remember any of this happening, but when my mom and dad told me about this I was amazed. I love my parents so much.

There's my selfie for the week.
I'm shaving the mustache as soon as I finish this post

So what's the plan this week. This week is going to be pretty busy. I have appointments with my oncologist, and surgeon tomorrow. I'll get the results of my bone scan, and also get to really talk to my oncologist about the CT scan. And get the clear to start chemo on the 30th. The appointment with the surgeon is just to make sure everything is going well so far. I'm pretty nervous about the appointment with the oncologist tomorrow. I just hope everything goes well. I have physical therapy on Tuesday morning, and chemo on the 30th.

Surgery Week

Before I dive into probably my longest post yet I just want to thank everyone for their support and prayers. I really am blessed to have this. It really makes a difference as you already know with the success of my surgery. The prayers have been answered. Thank you everyone!

Alright I'm going to try to keep this as short as I can, but at the same time try to get all of the main events that occurred throughout the week for me. I'm starting this right now at 7 pm Friday night. Let's see if I can get this done in one shot since my arm is pretty sore. Lots of pictures in here.

Monday: Made our trip down to Philadelphia, and stayed in a hotel that was only one mile away from the hospital. This was really nice on surgery day allowing us to get more sleep and be less stressed on an already stressful day. Not much really happened this day other than getting down to Philly, and enjoying the hotel which I did greatly. There was a pool, and hot tub in the hotel so I got rid of my nervous energy that way. It was a fun time with my brothers. On a normal day this would have helped me sleep better, but no dice this time. I only managed to get 4 hours of sleep. I just couldn't sleep that night. It's Friday now, and Monday night in the pool was the last time I had any amount of fun. So I was really glad for this day.

Had the Pool to Ourselves

Not to Brag, but don't I look pretty healthy in this picture?

I love hot tubs!

The picture right above at the beach was taken when me and my family went on vacation this summer. It was taken a week before I found out that the lump in my arm was more than just a strain, or tear. The swelling in my right arm is obvious even from the front in this picture. If you compare this image to the pictures above you can really see how far I have come. Not only am I bald now, but my arm looks back to normal. I also have genuine smiles on in the pictures on Monday. I was in so much pain on vacation... it was a pretty miserable time. Monday was the conclusion of my big break from treatment, and it really showed. I mean I was jumping in the pool and everything on Monday. It was really great! It's crazy to think that 6 months ago I was sitting in a hot tub on vacation thinking that the jets directed at my arm was going to fix it. On Monday I was sitting in a hot tub counting down the hours until the operation that would finally fix my arm.

Tuesday: Operation Day! A lot happened on this day, but I was knocked out for most of it.

Presurgery: We arrived at the hospital at 5:30 a.m, and the surgery started around 9 a.m. It was a pretty scary time for all of us, but us staying together is what helped us get through it. It was a pretty emotional experience when my family saw me for the last time before surgery in the waiting area dressed in my gown and all. I don't think it really hit me how scared I really was until I was getting dressed in my hospital gown. I began to get really afraid as I got dressed up, but seeing them one last time helped me a lot. The one thing that kind of eased me during this time was the fact that I was naked underneath my gown, and the hat thing looked ridiculous on me. My brothers were laughing at the way I looked. Once I said goodbye to my family they took me into the surgical room. Setting me up made me feel stressed out because they strap down like every part of your body to the bed. But they gave me an anti anxiety med which slowed me down so that feeling didn't last too long. The last thing I remember happening before I was knocked out from the anesthesia was........throwing up. Yeah, the anesthesia gave me problems during the last procedure(installing the port in my chest), and it was no different this time.

 Complete Boss Right Here

Surgery:

Surgery as you know went better than expected. My surgeon was very surprised how well it went. Like nothing went wrong at all. Some of these details might overlap from the post that my mom so generously wrote on Tuesday. The section of bone that was removed was 10 cm in length. There wasn't much muscle removed because the first margin of healthy tissue she took with Jimmy was clean. Meaning the removal of heathy tissue stopped there. The muscle she took didn't serve much function at all, and that strength will eventually come back. There was no damage to the rotator cuff so I'll get full flexibility in my shoulder. Also there was no damage to the nerve in my arm that controls hand function. My surgeon explained to me that this damage does occur a lot unfortunately, and it is difficult; often impossible to regain this hand function fully. Very lucky here. I can move my hand, fingers, and wrist in any way possible which was one of the first things they assessed when I woke up from surgery. Necrosis percentage I won't know for 2 weeks, but I'll get it on here when I find out. Some more statistics... 46 stitches in my arm, and 7 in my hip for the bone graft. One of the things that surprised me was that the surgery took longer than expected. 6 hours! It's crazy to think that I was knocked out for that long.

Post Surgery:

This part I don't really remember too much, but I was in recovery from like 3 until 8 pm. The first thing I remember doing was.... throwing up, and then I saw my parents in an hour or so. I remember feeling so bad because I wanted to talk to them so much, but I could barely speak because of how out of it I was. They left soon after so I could get more rest. A few hours later I saw Joey, and my mom. During this time I was much more alert, and able to talk with them. We were so happy with how well surgery went. This was also when my mom explained to me that I had a catheter which was a lifesaver for me that night. I didn't even realize it was there until she told me. I don't think I moved a muscle until I saw Joey, and my mom. I had so much pain in my arm, and my hip, but I feel like the nausea, and just overall sick,crappy feeling was the worst part of this night. Like after they left I threw up about an hour later. Then, about 20 minutes after that they transported me to my room. I was feeling pretty sick on the way up so they slowed down the bed. But as soon as we got to the room in which everyone was there already so happy to see me, it happened again. I threw up yet again. Not much happened after this. My family wasn't up there too long since I was still slowly getting over the anesthesia, and it was pretty late.

Night: 

I didn't get much sleep at the hospital during the nights, but the first night was the worst. It's hard to get much sleep when the nurses are checking your vitals every few hours, on top of that you have all of the iv's, wires, cords, and straps wrapped all over your body. This night was also pretty difficult to sleep because of the pain, and lack of effectiveness of the painkiller I was receiving. I switched that up in the morning. Switched from oxycodone to Dilaudid.  The other things that made sleep difficult was the constant beeping, sore throat, and numb tongue from the anesthesia. This unfortunately led to me biting my tongue pretty badly(still hurts pretty bad now), and not even realizing it until the following morning. So all of these extra annoyances that occurred on the first day kind of set the tone for how I'd be enjoying my stay in the hospital. 

Catheter:

The catheter was one of the things that I dreaded the most with having surgery, and my experience wasn't too bad I guess. I never really adjusted to it. I only had it in until the afternoon on Wenesday, but it's such a weird feeling not realizing when you're peeing. I had the urge to pee like all the time, and didn't feel like anything was coming out so it was scaring me. Getting the catheter out was about as comfortable as you'd expect....not at all. And it takes a few hours to get back to peeing on your own. Things get better as time goes.

Wednesday:
Things went much better on Wednesday than on Tuesday. I got the catheter out in the early afternoon, the pain meds were working better, and I got the leg cuff-things off. I don't know what they're called, but they're supposed to prevent leg clotting because they inflate like every couple of minutes. Sore throat didn't improve, and the tongue wasn't numb so it killed me. Still got down breakfast though. On Wednesday I was encouraged with the fact that I was progressing with things. Losing the catheter allowed for this. I met with my surgeon in the morning and she went over why the surgery was such a success. This was the first time that I really smiled after the surgery because all of the pain and crap I dealt with coming out of surgery kept my mind off of how awesome the procedure went for me. I met the therapist, and surprisingly started rehab that afternoon. The arm exercises were very difficult, and painful, and so were the hip exercises. She showed me how to use my cane which she recommended I use over the crutches for many reasons. Even though I was in a lot of pain, I still pushed through it. She was surprised with my resiliency. She was shocked when I was able to walk up, and down the stairs. I even messed up the technique making it more difficult for myself, but still made it look easy. Now for the arm rehab, I have no weight bearing with my shoulder for 4-6 weeks, but I can do passive range of motion exercises. Pendulum swings. I look so dumb doing them, but they are so difficult. I also do active range of motion exercises with my arm. Curls, fist clenches, and wrist rotations? Don't know what to call them. Maybe I'll upload a video of my routine so you can see what I'm doing for rehab. The hip exercises were difficult too. Very painful. I do this rehab 3 times a day. After rehab I had a few hours off until my grandma, and aunt came in to see me. In this time I tried to eat lunch, but made the mistake of ordering from the hospital. I thought that it'd be alright since breakfast wasn't bad, and I wasn't starved or anything. Just wanted to get something more in my stomach before I had company. But as soon as I pulled the lid off of my meal I got extremely nauseous and threw up my breakfast. About 20 minutes after throwing up, I finally urinated for the first time after losing the catheter. Right when I got out of the bathroom(which I was in for about 15 minutes struggling to pee in) my grandma and aunt Diane were there. We talked for a little bit, but they left and came back later since I didn't look too good, and needed sleep. I slept for a little bit, and felt much better when I got up. My dad got me chicken soup from the WaWa across the street. Wasn't too bad, but I had a dark moment with it.

Cancer:
Throughout this whole battle with cancer I can count all of the times that I have been so upset that I cried which I believe is a good thing. One was when I found out that I had a cancerous tumor. Second was actually a few times during my first cycle of chemo. Third was when I thought that the cancer spread to my lungs when I read the lab report. The other three all happened this week. The fourth was when I was sitting in the presurgery room getting dressed for surgery, and right after my family left me. The fifth was right here with the soup. My mom stayed with me while I tried to eat the soup while everyone else went out to give me a little break. This was impossible for me. There was no way that I could sit myself in the chair to allow my left arm to feed myself the soup. So I was forced to have my mom feed me! After about two spoonfuls I got so frustrated, and upset that I just told her to stop, and I only ate the bread. I felt so helpless sitting there getting fed. I just couldn't take it, and neither could my emotions. I just cried for minutes and couldn't stop. It helped me though because I needed to get it out with all of the suffering I had from the day before. The most recent time I cried was on my way home from the hospital, and I'll get to that soon.


After finally getting comfortable I finally was able to enjoy my visit from my family. We talked, and laughed, and had a great time for a few hours. I ended the day on a high note!

Thursday:
This was the day I came home. It started out well, but ended up being such a crappy day. When I woke up the sore throat was gone, the tongue was a little bit better, and the pain meds were keeping the arm, and hip pain at a manageable level. I remember this was the first day that I told the nurse that my arm pain wasn't a 10 in the morning. Early in the day I met with the therapist, and did better with the therapy than the day before. We had a pretty long walk in the halls, and I even finished the walk without the cane! Even though the arm didn't see much improvement I was so pumped with how much my hip improved in just one day. I met with one of the surgeons from the team and he cleared me to go home, and removed my drains. In 30 minutes, the wheelchair came up, and guess what happened at this moment? I sat down in the chair, yelled for the bucket, and threw up my grilled cheese and salad that I ate for lunch.  From here on out the day just sucked. The car ride ended up being 4 hours! I had to go to the bathroom so we stopped at a rest area. What happens here is my fifth time I really got upset. I got out of the car, and got really chilled when I got to about half the distance to the facility. My shivering was putting me in so much pain that I was in tears. I was chilled to the bone! I felt like my shivering was going to ruin the surgery, and force me back into the hospital. What happened next was something that I'll never forget. There was a really kind man who held the door for my mom (who was holding me up), and I. We were like 30 yards away so he didn't have to do it, but he did. Something this little doesn't sound like much, but this act of kindness is something I'll always remember. About 2 hours later we arrived home, and I couldn't have been more relieved. I took my pills, and slept my best night of sleep in days. 12 hours! Much better than the 4-5 hours of sleep I was only getting in the hospital.

Over the next few days things improved for me. Right now my arm is still just as sore as it was back in the hospital, only the pain meds make it manageable. But everything else is getting better. My tongue is almost healed. I'm walking without a limp, and only have a little bit of hip pain during the day. Moderate pain in the hip in the morning. Eating, and sleeping well. Every new day brings more healing. Tomorrow(Monday), I begin rehab at home on my arm. Pretty pumped up for it. Even though I have so much pain when I do the exercises, I still enjoy doing them. It's a new challenge for me; to rehab my new arm. Which reminds me...Don't ever think that you have anything cooler than my new arm. With all of the hardware in my arm. Its pretty decked out. Nothing cooler than it....Don't even argue with me there.

Frankenstein right here

After reading this blog post you might think that I complained a lot here. My answer to that....I'm a very truthful person, and this is my story. To say that last  week sucked would be an understatement. The most important thing that I needed to go well; the surgery, went excellently and I'm very lucky to have been given this gift. But everything else just went terribly. Like I didn't expect to throw up 7 times this week from the medication. Neither did I expect to bite my tongue to pieces, or to be in unimaginable pain from the procedure. If it weren't for the support of my family, friends, and all of you reading this right now along with the awesome care that I received at HUP (thanks nurses, doctors, surgeons, and everyone else involved with my care!) I don't know how I would have done it this week. If you are ever in a hard situation like this past week like surgery was for me, just remember that if I can get through this...So can you!

Alright I'm done. If you made it this far I applaud you. This was very long, and took me forever to put together. It took me a few days to finish this because my arm gets pretty uncomfortable after typing for a while. I still missed a lot of stuff during my week of surgery, maybe I'll mention things in future blog posts. I just want to get this posted already. I've kept you all waiting far too long.

Post Surgery

Just wanted to let everyone know that surgery went well. We arrived at the hospital at 5:30 am. Surgery started at 9:05am. It lasted almost 6 hours. He was taken to the recovery room at 2:45 pm. The surgeon came to see us and informed us that it went well. Michael had healthy margins around the tumor. This means that the cancer didn't go any where else in the arm. This meant that the surgical team didn't need to take as much tissue/muscle as they had originally thought. The other good news was that the bone wasn't as involved with the cancer either. The surgeon had said it was "weird". The bone  was actually speckled. I usually looks more discolored from the cancer. They did have to remove one of his tricep muscles. This means that he will be a little weaker to start with. If you know Mike like I do he won't be hitting the weights too soon. Joel and I were just up to see him in the recovery room. He wanted me to video him but I didn't have the heart to do it. He is having a little bit of a hard time coming out of the anesthesia. He is really out of it. He looks good though. He has a bandage on his right arm and a drain from the incision site. He also has a drain in the hip area where they took healthy bone to cement the cadaver bone. Thank you to every one that prayed for my son. God was listening!!! Please continue to pray for a speedy recovery. He will be going home either Thursday or Friday. He can pick up the blog then.. THANKS AGAIN!!!!

Surgery

This Tuesday is going to be a really big day for me. It's my surgery day to get Jimmy out. With the completion of the surgery it also puts me over the halfway point of my cancer treatment since I already had three chemo cycles, and still have three to go after surgery. It's really amazing to see how far I've come with this. I mean for a large portion of my freshman year of college I had no idea what was causing my arm to hurt, and I hoped it would get better. But nothing did, it just got worse eventually leading me to get it checked on. Soon after came the cancer diagnosis. And now after receiving three months of chemotherapy I'm finally getting what brought me here; my arm fixed. It wasn't the path that I expected to take to get my arm healed, but it's going to be worth it. After I rehab this arm, and get it to full strength after surgery it's going to be amazing. It's going to be the best my arm has felt in a year and a half! My arm is going to help motivate me to keep pushing through these last three months of chemo. Whenever I feel discouraged from now on after this surgery I'm just going to remember how lucky I really am. I mean not only do I get to keep my arm, but I'm going to (hopefully) have a fully functional arm after this procedure. And as long as everything works out I'll be cancer free at the end of my treatment. That day will be the greatest day of my life. 

If you were wondering if this surgery has me stressed out....the answer is yes, but I have been more stressed out before. It's just weird to think that in less than 48 hours I'm going to be knocked out in the operating room having my arm ripped apart. And this will last around 5 hours! But if there's anyone in this world that I trust performing my surgery it's gotta be my surgeon. My surgeon is one of the best in the world at performing these surgeries especially in the extremities. I have complete trust in my surgeon. I guess the only thing that bothers me with the surgery is just the morbidity of it. It's just not normal to have your arm split open with a saw inside of it chopping up your bones, and muscles. Serious complications with anesthesia are very rare, probably more rare than my cancer. And its funny that I say this because the other day I was talking to my brother, and he said that he doesn't like going in the ocean that much because of his fear of sharks and the other animals you don't see down under. I used to be that way, but now after being diagnosed with a rare cancer I feel like the chances of let's just say a shark attack, or complications with anesthesia are lower for me now. I mean what are the chances of being struck by lightning twice right? But getting back to the surgery. I think the worst part of everything will be the recovery, and from what I heard the most pain I will have will be in my hip from the bone graft. I read on this other guy's blog that had the same surgery as me and he felt like his skin was melting off of his hip from the bone graft. Nothing was able to stop the burning sensation. Not even ice. That's not something I'm looking forward to. Hopefully my experience is different from his. I'm going to be hospitalized until Thursday or Friday depending on how I'm doing, and then I get to come home. I can't wait! A lot of these things I am stressed out about I have been keeping to myself, and it was kind of destroying me until yesterday when I had a long talk with my mom about the stress I have been having. To make a long story short I felt so much better after having this talk. Thank you Mom! You're the best!

Now as much as I hate Jimmy. He has been very useful these past few months. There are a few reasons that my treatment regimen has chemo first rather than surgery. One of them is to shrink the tumor to make surgery easier. Another reason is so they can measure how well the chemo works for me. If Jimmy didn't shrink that much, my post surgery chemotherapy would change. So if you were wondering why I didn't just have surgery to start, now you know. I think the only downside to the removal of Jimmy is that I kind of lose the only thing that reassures me that the treatment is working. Now there is nothing really to measure. The only marker to tell whether the treatment is working are the scans. As long as they're clean, and no spreading of the cancer, then I'm good, but my next scan won't be until I finish this treatment. So I will have a little bit of anxiety that will increase as the end of treatment nears. The last thing to mention about Jimmy. There will be no funeral for him. 

Lastly, you readers are probably going to be wondering how my surgery goes. With me being on all of the pain medication, I'm probably not going to be up for this blogging stuff. So I'm going to have my mom write some posts just to get my current status out, and the outcome of the surgery on here. 

Please keep me in your prayers on Tuesday!

Wing King!

Yes, I'm going to dedicate this blog post to chicken wings, but I'm also going to mention some things that I failed to mention in earlier posts. I love chicken wings, and with my cancer treatment I had to limit the amount of spicy stuff because of mouth sores. But I didn't hold back yesterday, with this big break my mouth is completely healed now. I spent like 5 minutes the other day just feeling around in my mouth with my tongue because I have no life. But seriously, with the chemo, my gums and other parts in my mouth were swollen limiting the movement of my tongue. It was really annoying, but I got used to it. But back to the wings....my mouth isn't even sore today after all of the wings I ate yesterday.

Some background on this place. Back in July, actually about two weeks before I found out I had a parasite in my body who would be later called Jimmy, my aunt Diane, and Uncle Paul told me about this awesome restaurant in Stroudsburg called Big Daddy's. They told me about they're awesome chicken wings that they offer on Mondays and Thursdays when the Wing King is there to cook them. Now these are no ordinary chicken wings let me tell you. They have some pretty crazy flavors like Twix, and Jolly Rancher. We made a plan to go out when we got back from vacation, but then....well you know already what happens next. I get back from vacation, and all Hell breaks loose. I get diagnosed with cancer, and now I'm sitting here writing a blog about it. I didn't even think about Big Daddy's until I started getting a craving for spicy food midway through chemo. So I made a bucket-list of things to do during this break from chemo while my body feels pretty well. I completed mostly everything on the list already. The things on the list are to go to Banko's, and Big Daddy's to eat. Hang out with my friends, and lastly to see one of Joey's basketball games. The last one is going to have to wait until after surgery because the season starts after December 10th. Can't wait to see him play in the green and gold!

So at the restaurant yesterday we ordered 116 wings in total. We had two different orders. I ordered Jolly Rancher, PB & J, Twix, Garlic Ranch, The Kings Hot, and Horse Radish. My uncle ordered Pina Colada, Raspberry, Garlic Parmesan, and 3 Mile Island(really hot). Yeah, really crazy combination here. The wings were .50 a piece which isn't bad for gourmet wings. If your skeptical at all about these wings tasting like what they're named... don't be. Like the Twix wing has chocolate on it, and the PB & J has peanut butter on it, and they both taste amazing. My favorites were the Twix, PB & J, and Horse Radish. The horse radish was just a wild card when I ordered it, and I was surprised by how much I liked it. The 3 mile island wings were probably the hottest food I ever ate, and there is still one level up from those at Big Daddy's. I foolishly ate two of them, and my uncle Paul ate 4. I'm trying the Hell's fire next time! We'll see how that goes since the 3 mile island put me into a frenzy. It was all worth it though. It was such a fun night out. Thanks Uncle Paul, and Aunt Diane!

The Crew

So what did I do today. Just chilled mainly. The only exciting thing I did today was play basketball with Joey. I beat him 7-6, and there was no holding back on his end. It was so funny because I beat him on a hook-shot and he was so mad. Still can't beat your big bro Joey. Not even cancer can stop me from beating you hahaha. You might be surprised that I'd have the energy to do something as intense as basketball right now, but I'm not. I was actually surprised how quickly I got tired in the game because I felt so good before we started. It was fun since the last time I picked up a basketball was when I talked about it in my blog back in the beginning.


Wow! This is a pretty long post isn't it. I guess its because I love food so much. Which reminds me to write about my weight gain. Most people when they go through chemo treatment worry about losing too much weight. Not me! I gained 13 lbs! Pretty ridiculous stuff considering I have been the same weight since the 10th grade. Alright I'm done. I better stop before I get on the topic of food again.