Summer Fun

Just wanted to put up a few pictures of fun times this summer...
This is Craig and Maddie with Ryder Jeffries who stopped by to visit with his mom and baby brother from Oklahoma. We miss having them in the neighborhood.Maddie holding Ryder, Jenn and baby Cash.John and Trish Lewis, Alix and her husband Clint, Fisher and Annabelle, Craig and I. Jon and Trish lived in our basement apt. on Highland View Circle where Alix was born and in the Commonwealth house. Their cute family has grown up so much. They visited from Idaho.

Todd, Sarah and Eliza Gardner and Maddie in the pool. It's been a great summer for pool time. We love having the Gardner family over. Sarah is due the end of Sept. with a baby boy!Scout with his favorite toy "Bowser". He has had it since he was a puppy and really loves him and doesn't chew him up! Scout is a great dog. The kids say I love him more than them...just sometimes!My brother Kent celebrated his 60th birthday on August 12. Here he is with his daughters Nicole and Kristy and granddaughter Brinley. We love you guys!
All of my siblings together on Kent's birthday...Kent, Kathy, Mary Ann, Craig and me! I love you all, you've been such a great support to me and my family.

Maddie turned 16 on August 15!! Here she is with our good friend Sherrie Thomas up Millcreek Canyon last Sunday. Maddie's friends surprised her with a party at our house the night before.

Our good friends, the Thomas family...Jason, Sherrie, Maddie and Jake. Paola (center) is here from Brazil as an exchange student. Maddie just returned from a year in Brazil. The Thomas family does so much for us and always makes us feel loved. We really appreciate their friendship.
Maddie with her "new" car courtesy of Grandma and Grandpa Doutre and Craig and I. Watch out, there's a new driver in the neighborhood. We obviously don't have pictures of everyone (stop by and we'll take a picture!)...but we want all of you to know how much we love and appreciate you. We couldn't do this alone. We appreciate every call, note, visit and thought in our behalf. Craig is feeling better the last 4-5 days and even went on an excursion to Idaho with Todd Gardner yesterday. So life is good right now...too bad we just got the call for the next chemo. Sept. 1 at 8 am we will report to Huntsman for the 2nd chemoembolization of the liver. New doctor, catheter in and we're ready to go in and kill some more tumors!

"There is HOPE"

Today as we drove home from 4 hours at the doctor's office...Craig said "I feel like there is HOPE!" It makes me cry to write this because it has felt so hopeless at times but today we were buoyed up by a doctor that spoke with confidence and purpose. We met Dr. Carlisle, our new intervention radiologist, and he listened and he offered new ideas and he gave us hope. I can't tell you how much that changes our outlook. He looked at Craig as a whole person with needs and wants and understood his need for quality of life. He offered new options in treatment that would include a new radiation treatment for tumors in the liver. It's new and seeing good results without the downside of chemo. He explained that the tumors are showing signs of necrosis (dying) and even though the size looks the same on the scan, the insides are dying. He thought it would be good to wait a few weeks to do the chemo again before we do the radiation treatment since it takes 6-8 weeks to schedule. We can do both. We can kill this cancer and give Craig the quality of life he deserves for as long as possible. There truly is hope!

These are supposed to be the "good" days...

It's been over 2 weeks since I last wrote. Craig has had good days and bad days. Definitely not the way the doctors had presented it. They said probably 2 weeks of feeling yucky then 4 weeks of feeling pretty good before the next treatment. Well, we're into it almost 5 weeks and he really can't say he's feeling even "good" consistently. His liver is so tender and feels as if it's been beat up. His energy level is pretty low. He can't imagine going back into his liver again anytime soon.

We did get some bad news last week after the CT scan. The liver is stable and there is no evidence of change from the previous scan. The tumors have not changed...he's been through all this and the chemo has not killed any part of the tumors. This is our best option in conquering this disease and the first treatment did not do anything. There is a little good news. The liver function is still good. So his liver is still holding strong even after being blasted with poison.

We meet with the new intervention radiologist, Dr. Carlisle, tomorrow to discuss the next treatment. Hopefully he'll have some encouraging ideas of how he can attack the tumors in the liver. I'll post again after that appointment.

Thanks for everyone's love and encouragement. Craig has got to keep fighting this!

Please refer this pain to someone else...

Craig has some good days and some bad days. The weird thing is now most of his problem is a sharp pain in his right shoulder. This is referred pain from the liver. It is a very strong pain that debilitates him. He can barely move and has trouble even lifting his hand up when this strikes. The oxycodone doesn't really seem to help as much as ibuprofen. He's alternating between the two. He's very worried about becoming addicted so he puts off the meds until he really needs them even though everyone says to "stay on top of the pain". He does appreciate a foot massage which helps him relax. His skin has been very dry since the chemo and his feet really itch. He hasn't lost any hair, in fact he just trimmed it today (yes, he cuts his own hair...what can I say!). His appetite is coming back a little and he enjoyed the food at Kelsie Wagstaff's wedding last night. He is holding strong at 177 lbs. which really looks very good on him! He's still a stud and as handsome as the day I married him! Today he's gone off on a motorcycle ride up the canyon with his good friend Jason. I'll try to get a picture to post when then come back. Today is a good day and we appreciate that immensely! Lots of love to you all...especially to the McDermott family who are an amazing group. Steve is making great progress and we can't wait to see him get out of the hospital soon. Becky is truly my hero. Thanks for everyone's comments on the blog...it really makes Craig's day (and mine) to hear from you.

Craig is feeling a little better every day. He doesn't have a ton of energy but he does get out more each day. He had a doctor's appt. today and everything is looking pretty good as far as blood work and liver function. We had a long discussion about the procedure debacle last week and decided to go with a different doctor for the procedure next time. We'll probably be looking at the next chemoembolization the end of August. He has lost 14 lbs. since last week...quite the extreme weight loss program don't you think? Thanks to everyone for the love you show us. Craig's brothers Scott (left) and Dave (right) have been so great and do so much for us. We love you guys!

Craig the Terrorist

So it happened. The chemo started hitting him Friday night and by Saturday morning he was wiped out. He felt achy, nauseous, hot then chilled, just plain awful. Like the worst flu you've ever had. Poor guy could hardly make it from bed to the bathroom. He drank very little and and ate even less. He slept and took the drugs he could handle. The pain medication and anti-nausea drug knocked him out which helped even more. He said he never wanted to do this again.


This morning (Sunday) he felt slightly better and actually got out of bed and came into the kitchen and ate a little. This picture is from this morning. He thought he looked like a terrorist...just needing a little more facial hair. He seemed to have a tiny bit more energy and actually said he could probably handle this if he only felt extremely awful one day. He slept a little today and was able to stay "vertical" more than horizontal today. We are so happy he felt a little better. We actually walked to the ward and back tonight. We're proud of you Craiger!

Chemo and Catheters

We arrived at 6 am on Wed. July 8 at the Huntsman Cancer Hospital. Our room was a beautiful suite with an adjoining family room. The view was tremendous, overlooking the whole Salt Lake Valley from the Capitol up north all the way to the point of the mountain down south. Craig was feeling uneasy about the whole thing until we were placed in this room and then he felt a sense of relief and comfort. We were able to sit in the family room and get away from the hospital look of his room for a few minutes. They hooked him up to an IV to begin pumping fluids in him before the procedure at 1 pm. He relaxed and snoozed a little while they prepared him for the main event. At 1 pm they took him to the radiology suite by wheelchair. He was placed on a table and told to stay still while they performed the chemoembolization of his liver. He was under conscious sedation so they could tell him to hold his breath when they zapped the tumors. They entered through the main artery in his groin and fed a catheter all the way up to his liver and delivered the chemo to the tumors as best they could. Craig's anatomy has some twists and turns in the arteries which made it difficult to get directly to the tumors. After about 4 hours into the procedure Craig's bladder was full and he had to go real bad. He held it an additional hour, but by then he was so blocked up he was in intense pain. They tried to put a catheter in him to relieve his discomfort. Unfortunately they messed up while inserting the catheter and didn't get it all the way into the bladder so it was stuck in the urethra. All the attention given to his relieving himself made it impossible for him to get much relief. It was a desperate situation for him that still gives him nightmares.

The dr. said about 1/2 the liver was treated with chemo. She said, "A smaller amount of chemo was delivered over a larger area of the liver" where they had hoped to direct a larger amount of chemo to a smaller portion of the liver to avoid collateral damage to the liver.

Once he came back to the room about 7 pm he was in a lot of pain; not from the liver treatment but from the placement of the catheter during the procedure. The catheter was also leaking and he was laying in his own urine. He had to stay still in bed for 6 hours after the chemo so the catheter had to stay in place during that time and maybe until the next morning. The nurses tried to adjust the catheter to relieve his pain but it was so irritated by now that it was impossible to feel relief and everything they did just made it worse. They pumped some pain meds in him which didn't help for awhile so I did all I could to calm him and keep his head down when the pain got intense. After about 2 hours of this they finally reinserted the catheter and got it in the right place and the drugs kicked in and he was able to rest. It was a very tough night for all of us. He made it through the night without a lot of pain and was able to get up in the morning and shower with the incision and IV site covered. He was a new man! He ate 2 omelets for breakfast since he hadn't been able to eat all day Wed. We hung around Huntsman most of the day Thursday while they continued to check his vitals and pump more fluid into him and came home about 7 pm. He had made it through his first chemo treatment! He says that if it was going to be like that each time he would never do it again. We know now what needs to be done before he goes in. Too bad the nurses and doctor hadn't figured that out before this!?!