April 2013.
It may seem weird to think that one would actually enjoy having an IV treatment twice a week, but this process has become extremely therapeutic. My new treatment plan is sooo different from chemo and radiation. This time I truly feel like I am putting good stuff into my body. Helping it. At this point, I don’t think I realize just how much these new treatments are repairing my body after all of the damage inflicted by the chemo and radiation.
I have been coming to Dr. Sanjay’s office three times per week and have been sending my blood off to a lab in Germany to get the CTC testing done every three months. The CTC test continues to show unfavourable results. After an initial dip from 31 million to 5 million, my numbers have been increasing steadily ...18M, 30M and then to 35.5M. This has been a terrifying experience. The test indicates that cancer is travelling through my body looking for a place to settle again. It tells me that my therapies aren’t working. While the Vitamin C IVs and Mistletoe injections are slowing it down, the cancer continues to multiply. I decided to have the hormone drug, Tamoxifen, tested in Germany to determine the efficacy of that particular drug for me. The test is performed using a blood sample and the same test can be used to check chemo drugs as well. I had asked about this test back in January 2012 before I started chemo.
The test comes back and indicates that Tamoxifen is less than 40% effective for me and with the continuous increase in my circulating tumour cells, the German lab determines that this drug is not doing its job and they recommend that I should be switched to an aromatase inhibitor. I jump into full-blown panic mode. I am in trouble, big trouble. I will learn much later in this process that Tamoxifen, which I have been taking for almost a year, was declared a “known carcinogen” by the World Health Organization … in 1996! Tamoxifen causes cancer. How can a drug that causes cancer be used to treat cancer? And, if we have known this since 1996, why is it still be used to treat women with breast cancer? I have my six-month check-in with Dr. O coming up. She will know what to do.
When I finally meet with her, armed with all of the new information that I have gathered, she is less than interested in what I have to say. I explain the German testing and ask for my hormone drugs to be switched. She reviews the documents and tells me that she is not going to change anything. This test means nothing to her. She is going to stay on the current course of action. I will continue to take Tamoxifen for the next four years. It is the best option, she tells me. I am a bit shocked. She seems a bit closed minded about the information that I presented. I am unsure of what to do next. Wait and see, I guess. I have a blind trust in this whole medical system. They know what they are doing, right? Maybe the German test isn’t reliable? What do I really know about all of this cancer stuff? A lot less than Dr. O., that’s for sure. I succumb to her decision even though I know; deep down, that this is the wrong thing to do. I tell Dr. Sanjay that I want to stop doing the CTC testing. It is too upsetting. Dr O. will not use the information to alter my treatment plan and I am doing all that I can with him. I just have to have faith that what I am doing is working.
My decision to stop doing the CTC testing and to continue taking Tamoxifen is the second critical mistake that I will make in the care and keeping of my own health.
I have just screwed myself, literally.
- Kim
photo: the internet