The news is: holding steady on bloodwork. White blood cells are slightly down but the other main indicators are pretty much in the green, with the exception of Lymphocytes (slightly below the normal range) and Eosinophil Absolute, which has never reached the normal range. So I need to continue to be wary of parasites, allergens, foreign bacteria and outside organisms. It’s a miracle COVID didn’t just kill me outright, I guess. The CT showed no new passengers, so we’re free and clear for another year!
I just got my lab results back from my GP, and from all accounts my cholesterol is in good shape. I was surprised to see they did a comprehensive battery of bloodwork including the stuff I would normally see during a cancer checkup. Overall there’s nothing to worry about; it all looks good (red blood cells are low, but that could be a result of COVID) but the interesting thing is that I’m dealing with two different medical systems—my whole cancer experience was through the Johns Hopkins network vs. my GP who recently shifted over to the Mercy Medical network. Looking at the lab results, Mercy’s thresholds—their high and low ranges—are lower than Hopkins’. Mercy says I’m in the clear, while Hopkins says I still have a ways to go (most of the important stuff has seen no change since December).
I’m sticking with Hopkins, as their baselines are what I’ve been working with since this whole thing started, but I find it funny how two practices see the same results differently.
Update: Updating my files this afternoon, I found a scan of a paper copy of a lab from February 2017—eight months before the cancer diagnosis. I updated my spreadsheet and the four graphs above with the extra information.
Six years ago, I was facing a very serious battle with cancer in my abdomen, and at that time we had no idea how serious things would be. While I faced radiation and chemotherapy, Jen set Finn up with friends who could watch her while she shuttled me to and from the hospital for treatment. One of the fathers of those friends knew what I was up against and offered her homemade marijuana candies to help keep my appetite up and pain levels down, and I gratefully accepted them (we only just got legal weed last year). They were a godsend when the radiation completely fucked up my digestive system and my body was expelling chemotherapy four or five times a day. I never forgot that, and I don’t remember if I ever properly said thank you. That’s been on my mind intermittently for the past year.
We found out he passed away suddenly last week, and I’m kicking myself for not having followed up on that thought.
Jen and I are in Baltimore for my annual cancer checkup, and so far the bloodwork looks very good. Across the board, most of my numbers are up, and crucially, my white blood cell count increased for the first time since a weird blip in 2020, as well as my platelet count, lymphocytes, and neutrophils. The absolute values (an actual count vs. an average) for lymphocytes are still low—just skirting the bottom of the “normal” range. So if my white blood cell and lymphocyte counts can keep improving, I’ll be real happy.
The fact that I can sit in the waiting room between the CAT scan and my checkup, collect my bloodwork results in real time, add them to a spreadsheet on my laptop, and update graphing software to plot my progress kind of boggles the mind.
After early-morning bloodwork and a CT scan, the word is in: no surprises in my chemistry, no new passengers on board. This means we slow my visits from twice a year to once a year, and my chances of recurrence have dropped again. Good news we all needed on a Monday after a long, hard weekend.
I hopped on to Reverb last week to see what the latest comparable offerings to my Steinberger were, and the first one that popped up was a twin to mine, and the only other red XP-2 I’ve ever seen, for sale in Austin, Texas. It looks like pricing has come down some since I listed my bass—the average seems to be hovering right above $2000. The shop selling this one is calling it “rare” and are hoping to get another $500 above average, but it’s also been for sale since last year.
My listing is down, as I only got one inquiry (a trade offer for a Rickenbacker 4003) in the year I’d listed it, and no serious offers. Perhaps I lower the price and relist in the spring. It’s sitting in the corner doing nothing and I’d love to see it move to a good home.
This afternoon, on a phone call, I moved some data into Flourish and built a story around the four main cancer data points: white and red blood cells, and lymphocytes. This is a much easier way to display (and update) the data as I get it.
The update from downtown Baltimore is thus: my white blood cell count is still below average, trending slightly downward since a post-surgery high point in August of 2020. Everything else in the bloodwork seems to be leveled off and within normal ranges, with the exception of lymphocytes and eosinophil, which are specialized white blood cells. We are told that my lymphocytes may never rise to pre-cancer levels as a result of chemotherapy, and I’d guess eosinophil is probably the same. The CT scan showed no new passengers, and my oncologist seems pretty positive about everything. So, that’s good! I’ll take it. If I make it to the five year checkup in October with a clean bill of health they say the chance of any new tumor drops dramatically; let’s hope my rare surprise doesn’t return.
I’ve been wearing my Vaer watch almost exclusively the last couple of months, but knowing I was going to start welding class regularly I figured I should switch to one of my utility watches. I wore my LL Bean watch, and during class I was wondering why time was moving so slowly—until I realized the minute hand was stuck and not advancing. This is not the first time this watch has been in the shop for repairs. I’ve been waiting on having the Ollech & Wajs diver tuned up, but now that I have two that need servicing, there’s more of a push to visit a repair shop. For now, my Timex will work just fine for shop use.
A couple of months ago, two writers from one of my favorite sites, Jalopnik, quit that site and started up a car blog of their own: the Autopian. David Tracy has always been a great read; his exploits with busted jeeps, insane wrenching projects and cross-country shitbox trips are the stuff of internet legend. His partner Jason Torchinsky was the weird beating soul of Jalopnik from its inception, writing about taillights, strange Chinese electric vehicles, and his Nissan Pao, as well as being the illustrator for many of its articles. They have assembled a crew of writers covering odd engineering history, daily car news, bizarre car-related videos, and other random stuff—basically a better version of Jalopnik with more personality and less corporate bullshit (as well as many fewer ads). I don’t see a subscription system set up yet, but when it comes (as it is for Defector) I will gladly send them money. More of this, please.
So, all things look pretty good on the cancer front. There are no new passengers in my abdomen via the CT scan. My bloodwork isn’t yet in the Normal range, but I also just got my flu shot on Tuesday and I’ve felt like I want to take a nap every minute of the day since then. All of the levels seem to be holding steady with no major drops, so I’ll take that as a win.
When they announced the COVID booster policy, such as it is, I made an appointment to get a dose of the Pfizer vaccine at my local pharmacy. Feeling pious about the whole thing, I went in and filled out the forms and waited in line, and then they looked at them and told me that I was a month early and that I’d have to come back in late October for the actual shot.
Tuesday night we took Finn to karate, where she is acting as a class helper by request of her sensei. It means she needs to be at the dojo an hour early, but I think the added responsibility is good for her, and we’re hoping she starts taking things more seriously. In the meantime, with two hours to kill, Jen and I hit the local thrift superstore, where I was able to find a nice Patagonia vest and a couple more of the Harry Potter movies on disc. We only need the Deathly Hallows Pt. 2 to fill out our collection; a few years ago a friend’s daughter deep in a Potter phase borrowed our complete box set and we never saw it again.
Meanwhile, the dog was at home by herself. Jen was experimenting with leaving her by herself for short periods of time while I was gone, and for spans of an hour or two she seemed to do fine. We left her for a full three hours on Tuesday, half expecting to find a hole dug through the wall or a giant mountain of dogshit on the couch, but everything was normal when we walked back in the door. Progress? Possibly, but I’m not going to hold my breath until we get a couple of months under our belt.
I got bloodwork back this morning, and some things are looking up and other stuff is kind of meh. White blood cell counts are rising slowly, but not where they were 10 months ago. Lymphocytes spiked to almost where they were in 2017 before radiation and chemo—a good sign. However Neutrophils are back at their 2019 levels, and red blood cells and platelets dropped slightly. When I see my oncologist in October for the 4-year checkup, I’ll get some more information on what all this means.
Put this on the list of stuff I kind of already figured: Vaccines won’t protect millions of patients with weakened immune systems.
It’s unclear how many immunocompromised people don’t respond to coronavirus vaccines. But the list seems at least to include survivors of blood cancers, organ transplant recipients, and anyone who takes the widely used drug Rituxan, or the cancer drugs Gazyva or Imbruvica — all of which kill or block B cells, the immune cells that churn out antibodies…
I’m not parading around French-kissing strangers, but I’m obviously going to keep wearing a mask until I see that my white blood cell count is back up.