Columnist Beth Kassab
writes about the treatment process after a biopsy revealed that her husband has brain cancer.
The brain surgeon walked out of the operating room, made eye contact with me and motioned for our family to huddle in a more quiet hallway.
We all remember hearing him say the words “primary brain tumor.”
The operating team had quickly frozen a sliver of my husband’s brain and delivered it on a slide for the waiting pathologists to analyze.
It had been two months since my husband, Grady, collapsed from a seizure on our living room floor. In those months, doctors speculated it could be complications from the flu or encephalitis. Now, a look through the microscope revealed the cells at the root of the mystery and a diagnosis we didn’t want to contemplate: Cancer.
In those first moments after the biopsy, the doctors couldn’t tell us everything just yet. We would need to wait another few days for the full pathology report.
That analysis gave a name to our monster: anaplastic astrocytoma.
This type of tumor is aggressive. It ranks just below a glioblastoma, the worst and most hardened offender in the mugshot line-up of tumors that can wreak havoc in your brain.
Anaplastic astrocytoma is kind of like that guy’s little brother and he plans to grow up someday.
The best way to stop him is to have surgery to remove as much of the tumor as possible followed by radiation and chemotherapy.
I wrote that last sentence with so much confidence.
Because that’s where I’m at today. But then? Months ago when I couldn’t even pronounce astro-cytoma … in those first days after the biopsy, we didn’t have the faintest idea about what to do.
That’s so often the case when a new diagnosis quietly taps a family on the shoulder and whispers, “Boo!”
First it scares the bejesus out of you. Then you have to figure out how to contain it.
And you don’t always have the luxury of time.
Grady was recovering from the biopsy, which required a small piece of his skull to be removed and reattached, leaving a large horseshoe shaped incision from the top of his forehead to just past his right ear. So I did some research.
I listened to our doctors. I called more doctors. We read as much as we could from foundations that devote themselves to providing information to people with brain tumors. (Note to users: Do not read random web sites that are poorly sourced or rely on YouTube videos that are junk in the form of well-produced propaganda. We will dive into how to know the difference in a later column.)
If you know Grady, then you know that once he was feeling better, there were multiple spreadsheets involved.
We went forward with a second
surgery to have as much of the tumor removed as possible.
Today we are focused on working through the rest of the treatment process. There have been defeating setbacks. But also mini-victories.
Grady has had several unexpected hospital stays. But he’s also returned to work, watched our son’s baseball games and sat in the front row for our daughter’s piano recital.
Our ordeal certainly isn’t over. In many ways, it’s barely started. We know that. And we are adjusting to this new life as well as we possibly can.
There will be more setbacks and more victories along the way.
Grady says he feels like Rocky Balboa in the corner of the ring.
He’s just focused on one round at a time.
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