Liver's Happy Again. A Foot of Snow Last Night.

I would have posted this morning, but we were without power until this afternoon due to a foot of snow that fell in town overnight. With the leaves still on the trees, the heavy, wet snow broke many tree limbs, and I'm sure took many power lines down with them. We didn't open the bookstore until about 2pm today. I would have posted yesterday, but I was in meetings all day for various things, so I am finally getting to the blog.

I spent the morning unpacking my bag from Denver, and moving summer clothes to the spare bedroom and moving sweaters to the front of the closet. Robert built a fire downstairs, but came upstairs and said his feet were cold. So we crawled in bed with the cats to stay warm and took a nap at lunch time. Robert had checked on the bookstore this morning and sent our employee home because the power was out. He came down again about 2pm to find that there was power on Main Street, but we didn't get it on at home until about 3pm.

Robert took me to chemo on Wednesday in Grand Junction. I was bracing for some bad news as I have felt so crummy lately and was off chemo last week, but my liver enzymes have fallen back into normal ranges and my platelets were actually ABOVE normal. I had been taking Tylenol or Ibuprofen almost everyday last week, and I try to get by with only one or two per pills per day. I didn't know if this would affect my blood chemistry, but apparently not. My red blood cells were still low, so being anemic may have contributed to the flu like symptoms last week. Anyway, we were pleasantly surprised at the results. I did get another shot of Araness to help the red blood cells.

I did look into some clinical trials and spoke to a woman at Mayo Clinic. She told me about an organization called The Emerging Med. They can do searches for clinical trials at no cost. They are also approved by the American Medical Association. Their phone number is 877-601-8601. They have a website at emergingmed.com.

We looked at the website Wednesday with Dr. Bergen. He was impressed with some of the people on their medical advisory board. Dr. Bergen said my bloodwork looks good enough that I could probably go off chemo for a month in order to get into a clinical trial, so we are weighing that option. We'd like to stick with the Xeloda since it seems to be working, but I may not have this opportunity again. Of particular interest is the Avastin & Tarceva trial which the lady from Mayo Clinic said they would be offering. She said she would call me back, but I haven't heard from her.

I have pretty much been told by both the Astra Zeneca people and Mayo Clinic people that I would not be eligible for the AZD2171 trial. (Different clinical trials are sponsored by either the drug comapany or Mayo Clinic.)

I have been feeling better since chemo on Wednesday. The steroids help, and the Araness may be working as well to get the red blood cells back up. I started back on Xeloda on Monday and am tolerating it pretty well.

So that is where I'm at. I made chicken green-chili soup last night, so it'll be nice to have a bowl of that tonight. I better run. I have a store full of people and books to shelve.

Just up here in Colorado, not quite ready for the snow yet. Hope it melts tomorrow! As always, thanks for your prayers and warm wishes!

Sincerely, Caroline