Diagnosed in August 2018, I'm living with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

Graciously, God has provided to me the care and wisdom of my wife, my children and my physicians. Thankfully, I’ve listened to their wise counsel…most of the time. ha!

I’m just like you…I have genetic defects. One of them is at the BRCA1 allele. This “broken” gene allows for defective cells to avoid cell death (apoptosis) and continue to survive in a mutated state. These mutated cells are co-dependent in a sense so they tend to congregate for fellowship with other similarly mutated cells…this gathering of the mutated cells shows up on an ultrasound, MRI, PET Scan and CT Scan as a tumor. Mutated cells only know how to do two things - consume energy and reproduce. And they are good at it. So good, sometimes the tumor kicks some out of the home base and they spread to distant organs - metastasize.

Mutated cells and tumors and metastasizing to distant organs is a scary, new vocabulary. I tell people I’m not scared of dying - I believe in an afterlife and heaven. However, I’m scared shitless of the part just before death - the painful, grueling, weakened state I watched my mother endure during her cancer journey. I also watched all four of her sisters die from breast cancer. Not only those, but I’ve seen many deaths in my short life…some immediate and without warning and some from terminal, long term disease. The ones from terminal, long term disease …those days and hours before death? Yeah, that’s what scare me. It scares me so much I’ll do whatever it takes to avoid it for as long as possible! Guided imagery (hypnosis) and acupuncture so I can better deal with chemo side effects from toxicity - count me in! 10 day water only fast? yup, I did it. 5 day water only fast before my last chemo? Yup, I did it. Four rounds of Ipilumimab and the subsequent intestinal challenges that led to months and months of 8-15 bouts of diarrhea per day? Been there done that. Wanted to terminate my own life the day after my 4th chemo when they told me the first four was just the beginning? Yeah, I seriously considered it - for about two hours…then I remembered how hard my mother fought and what she went through and she never quit, never checked out on her own. No way I’m getting to the other side only to have the first thing I see is my 4’11”, 103lb mother looking at me with disappointment…that’s a punishment WAAAAAAY worse for this 6’1”, 235lb son than any of the chemo side effect I experienced! So here we are. That’s a little bit about me. It’s a crazy ride, but it’s my ride.