Metastatic liver cancer

Eclairs covered with lots of chocolate was father’s new cancer treatment as in …a treat that brought a smile on father’s face!

Love is the best medicine!

Love doesn’t cure cancer and for sure chocolate is not a treatment for metastatic liver cancer. But love is the best foundation to give the much needed care a terminal cancer patient needs.

Parents love their children and devote lots and lots of their time and energy in raising their kids. The same effort will be needed when you are taking care of a loved one with cancer.

With kids, parents have a dream that they will end up like this or that… when talking about secondary liver cancer your dreams are on hold. The reality is that non of the metastatic liver cancer stories we gathered on our site talks about a cancer survivor.

Cure, Care or Chocolate?

There will be a moment you have to decide between:

• will we try every treatment to cure the metastatic cancer or
   
• will we admit we cannot cure the cancer and need to make the best out of a bad situation

You need to know that the longer you fight for a cure, most likely the more time the cancer patient spends in hospitals surrounded with doctors and nurses who don’t love them as much as you do!

Making the best out of a bad situation means going for "quality of life". Doctors use the term lightly. My brother’s first answer to what is quality of life?

father should travel to Norway…

…The next year my brother went on holiday to Norway. We never ever heard father talking about Norway in his entire life…

So what is quality of life? It’s different for each person!

You need to love and know the person
in order to know what he likes in his life and
you will have your answer to
what is quality of life.

For father, he loved to eat the above pastry: eclairs with lots of chocolate on top. Everybody knows that fat and chocolate are not good for the liver. But then you can choose:

• give father a liver cleanse and put him on a strict boring diet without taste or
   
• put a smile on father’s face when he receives his chocolate treat

When people smile, you know they are in their "quality of life" - zone.

A happy face was our guideline for giving father "quality of life". It’s in the small things of life that father enjoyed. It’s for sure not found between the 4 walls of the hospital.

We are still waiting for a new treatment for metastatic liver cancer. Father passed away in his sleep with a smile on his face…

Technorati Tags: cancer care, cancer cure, Cancer treatment, chocolate, eclairs, hospice, new cancer treatment, Palliative care, quality of life, smile

Laura’s mother (75) has cancer of the small intestine that spread to her liver. Her mom started having colonoscopy’s at the age of 50 and nothing showed up ever…

Unfortunately a colonoscopy test only looks into the rectum and colon
through a long, flexible, narrow tube - the colonoscope. It doesn’t detect anything in the small intestine because it never looks there. (The small intestine starts where the colon or large intestine stops, see picture below)

So there you are : well informed, doing what you have learned to prevent cancer and yet again you end up with metastatic liver cancer?

Again modern medicine focuses way to little on cancer prevention. How many times have you seen Dr. Oz and Dr. Drew promoting colonoscopy, Dr. Drew even going so far to film his own colonoscopy for everybody to witness?

Now this is great for the colonoscopy industry, but useless for Laura’s mother nor for my father who also had done colonoscopy tests without anything bad showing up…

Laura’s cancer story

Laura told her mother’s cancer story at 2 responses to metastatic liver cancer.

My mother who is 75 and has always been the picture of health was diagnosed with cancer of the small intestine which has metastized to her liver.

She had a colonoscopy a few months ago (she began having them at age 50) but nothing showed up.

Her liver is double the normal size now and she is jaundiced.

This has hit our family like a ton of bricks!

The Dr. gave her 2 weeks to live, but maybe more with chemo.

She is doing the chemo for my Dad’s sake. They have been married for 53 years, and he can’t imagine life without her.

She is in great spirits and has a wonderful attitude.

She told me that she is sad for us, her family.

She had a blood transfusion and it gave her so much more energy for a day and a half and then she became very tired again.

We are taking one day at a time–or at least trying to-and cherishing our time with her.

Comparing father’s metastatic liver cancer with Laura’s mother

Similar facts

• both are 75 years old when diagnosed with metastatic liver cancer
• both had done colonoscopy’s without anything showing up
• both have a life-partner they don’t want to leave behind
• both have an oversized liver
• both are easily tired

Differences

• Laura’s mom is in good spirits, father wasn’t.
• Laura’s mom knows her primary cancer. Father didn’t.
• Being in good spirits and knowing the primary cancer, Laura’s mom has better prospects to undergo chemotherapy. Father’s chemotherapy would have been too strong to survive as it would try to target all cancers (due to not knowing which the primary cancer was)
• father never had jaundice
• father was told he would live 3 to 6 months, which was an accurate prognosis

Please leave your hugs and prayers for Laura’s mother and family in a comment!

Technorati Tags: CANCER STORIES, cancer story, chemotherapy, colonoscopy, Metastatic Liver Cancer, Secondary liver cancer, Small intestine Cancer

Why is metastatic liver cancer so unfair asks Lyndsey in a comment on Alan’s liver cancer story?

Unfortunately we have no answer to this question…

We also asked ourselves why lots of people get away with bad things and a hard working father who always tried to do the best for his family and friends has to end up with metastatic liver cancer.

It just doesn’t make any sense at all.

Oprah will answer you that God or the universe is trying to tell you something. But you just don’t understand it yet…

If you know what father went through the last few weeks of his life with secondary liver cancer, you really wonder why God or the universe hasn’t better ways to get their message through.

And why do we have to get this message and not big decision makers who could make a huge impact on cancer prevention and cancer treatments?

All our hugs and prayers go to Lyndsey, her family and her father who is diagnosed with metastatic liver cancer in February 2008, that is about 5 months ago…

Lyndsey’s metastatic liver cancer story

In Februari 2008 my dad was diagnosed with secondary liver cancer! He is only 56!

He used to be the life and soul of the party!

But since he was told about this rotten disease it is like he has given up on life!

I’m finding it very tough at the moment because I know deep down the survival rate is none!

I don’t think I could cope with losing him!

But reading the stories I realize what people went through! It makes me so sad and bitter about life! Why is it so unfair!

But we must stay positive for his sake! He means the world to me! So fingers crossed!

Technorati Tags: cancer story, Liver Cancer, liver cancer story, Metastatic Liver Cancer, Secondary liver cancer