Four months at a time: living between brain scans
I live my life four months at a time. After a good scan I am happy to move forward with my life for a while. In some cases I do long-range planning: I am going to a wedding this summer. My BFF wants to go to Seattle with me in the fall. Brett and I...
Together we’re giant: forgetting about brain cancer for a day
Which team is the best in Major League Baseball? The San Francisco Giants, of course. If you’ve read more than a couple posts here on my blog you may have figured out that I am a Giants fan. And lately some of my posts have focused more on baseball than on cancer. But I’m in...
Baseball: the ultimate cancer therapy
I didn’t grow up in a family that was into sports. My annual exposure to sporting events was the Super Bowl, which was primarily an excuse to consume meatball subs and large amounts of French onion dip. I never played Little League. In high school my favorite P.E. class was singles tennis. I never had the...
Should a 32-year-old with brain cancer save for retirement?
Help me decide: Should one save for retirement when they have an incurable form of cancer with a high mortality rate? There are a few different ways to look at this situation. I could think on the bright side: I may live until I am 85 years old. I should be saving my money in...
Lobbying with my emotions: brain tumor advocacy is conjuring up all kinds of dirt
A typical young adult cancer experience So there I was, lobbying members of Congress on the importance of brain tumor research, funding, and parity for oral forms of chemotherapy, when suddenly I got emotional. I didn’t think it would happen to me. The majority of my cancer experience has been tear-free like a Johnson &...
Brain surgery: the inside story (pun slightly intended)
I volunteer as a “Mentor Angel” with a group called Imerman Angels. This organization carefully matches and individually pairs people touched by cancer (a cancer fighter, survivor or caregiver) with someone who has fought and survived the same type of cancer (a Mentor Angel). I’ve been volunteering with Imerman Angels for nearly six months, and before...
Pets and cancer
Can owning a pet count as palliative cancer treatment? I’ve heard there is a correlation between owning a pet and a reduced cancer risk. It has something to do with pets helping lower stress and blood pressure. I no longer worry about getting cancer (HA!), however, I do want to improve my overall health–and maybe...
To have a slow-growing brain tumor
Three and a half years after my diagnosis my health care system finally hired a neuro-oncologist for the Sacramento area. You’d think the California state Capitol would have a fancy oncologist a bit sooner than that, but apparently neuro-oncology isn’t a popular field (what with brain cancers representing only 1% of all cancers). Kaiser would...
Median survival time
I recently sat down to catch up with a great friend. After a while he asked, “So what’s the deal with the cancer?” “Didn’t you read the email-update Brett sent?” I said. “I don’t read that bullshit,” he said. “That’s for the people you don’t know as well as me.” I laughed at what he...
October 2011 letter to friends
Friends of the Liz Army, Wow, it has been a LONG time since we have sent out an update. Once again, it’s been a “no news is good news” situation. After watching an exciting game 6 of the World Series at Bob’s house in Novato, we drove out to Redwood City on Friday for Liz’s...
Use it or lose it: the no-exercise confession
Confession: I haven’t exercised in three months. Actually, I exercised once since this blog post back in April. I can make all kinds of excuses why, but you know what excuses are like. I felt so bad about it yesterday that I cried. Brett comforted me and even gave me an inspirational speech about how...
Each moment is bittersweet
It has been almost three years since I experienced the first significant symptom that I had brain cancer. It was one week after my 29th birthday that I lost consciousness at work, suffered a grand mal seizure, convulsed uncontrollably for five minutes, then peed my pants in front of the boss. I had no history...
