Victoria's Fight

Victoria found herself back in the hospital roughly one week after being released from her reconstruction surgery. It was a Thursday morning when Victoria called me at work. She had just finished taking Brodie to the park and her only remaining drain was filling up with blood and filling up fast. The rate was alarming, roughly 50cc per 15 minutes. I immediately left work and sped home fearing that I would have to take Victoria to the Emergency room. In the meantime Victoria had called the plastic surgeon to notify him of the situation. He wanted her to come in immediately. After arriving home I took her to the doctor’s office. The surgeon walked in, examined Victoria, told her to sit tight and calmly walked out of the room. We could hear him through the door talking on the phone. “I need an anesthesiologist to meet me immediately at Arrowhead Hospital”. There was a pause as he dialed another number. “I need an operating room immediately, it’s an emergency”. The doctor cam...

Just a quick update to let everyone know that Victoria is out of surgery. She seems to be doing much better than the last surgery. Her pain is under control, she has good energy, is eating well, and is in good spirit.

Hi All, Victoria had her final chemo treatment last week. This was a very good day for the both of us. Prior to recieving her final chemo she had a bone scan and a CT scan. The doctor reviewed the results with us prior to going into chemo and confirmed that she is in complete remission and there was nothing suspect on either of the scans. He said Victoria could have her port removed and that he would see her in 6 months. This was quite the emotional experience as just over a year ago Victoria had been diagnosed. The doctor gave Victoria a big hug and told her it's time to put this behind you and live your life. Currently, I am sitting in the hospital waiting for Victoria to come out of surgery. She is having the tissue expanders taken out and having the permanent implants put in. I'm expecting an update any minute, and will post again later today after she has come out of recovery. Although, I do not like these surgeries and I do not like to see Victoria go t...

Happy New Year! As you all know 2012 was an especially challenging year for Victoria and a year that we are happy to put behind us. If you saw or talked to Victoria today you wouldn’t even sense what she has been through. Her strength and positive attitude through every challenge along the way has been absolutely amazing! I’m proud to be the husband of somebody with such resiliency. The last time that I blogged Victoria was roughly two thirds the ways through her radiation treatment and we were preparing for the Race for the Cure. We had a wonderful turnout for the race for the cure and the team rose well over $2,000.00, which was donated to Susan G. Komen. The tail end of Victoria’s radiation was extremely brutal. Her skin was significantly burned, and turned a dark purple. She was in an incredible amount of pain due to the burns and there was little that could be done to help ease the pain. Victoria did see a wound doctor who was eventually able to manage the pain s...

Hello All, Our wonderful friends have put together a team, in honor of Victoria, to participate in the 20th annual Phoenix Susan G. Komen Race For The Cure. The race will take part on 14 October 2012 here in Phoenix. Victoria has been an incredible inspiration to me and I'm sure to many others. She has faced this battle courageously and has never lost sight of the goal to win this war! Fortunately, Victoria has had access to excellent healthcare and an unwavering support system composed of a loving family and incredible friends. Unfortunately, breast cancer is not selective of it's victims and there are countless people that have and will continue to benefit from Susan G. Komen. So, how can you show your support for Victoria and Susan G. Komen? Visit the team page for Victoria at: http://phoenix.info-komen.org/site/TR/RacefortheCure/PHX_PhoenixAffiliate?team_id=233258&pg=team&fr_id=2646 -Sign up to join our team -If you can't join our team, but want to sho...

It's been a busy summer for Victoria, Brodie and I. We finally moved back into our house and have had to travel out of state for a couple of weddings. Normalcy is beginning to finally settle in, well somewhat. Victoria is doing extremely well! Her attitude couldn't be better and she seems to be feeling great. Her hair is coming back, thick, beautiful and brown, yes brown! The medical and surgical oncologist both recommended that Victoria see a radiation oncologist to determine whether or not she need to receive radiation treatment. Prior to meeting with the radiation oncologist both Victoria and I agreed that the doctor would have to present a pretty strong case regarding Victoria's condition in order for her to go through radiation. We left the appointment not knowing what direction to take as the doctor had essentially described Victoria as being in a "grey" area and did not clearly provide any significant reason for Victoria going through radiation. Ho...

Victoria and I met with the surgical oncologist today and we couldn't have received better news. The pathology report came back from the lymph nodes and all of the breast tissue that was removed during Victoria's surgery and no cancer could be detected. The doctor told us that Victoria had a full pathological response and is in remission. This happens in about 15-20% of patients with Victoria's type of breast cancer. The chemotherapy did it's job and killed all of the cancer cells! As you can imagine this was very exciting news for us. Victoria and I are definitely ecstatic about the news and are looking forward to the road of recovery ahead of us. She will still finish out another 7 months of herceptin infusions, and will be on tamoxifen pills for the next 5 years. The herceptin is to prevent the type of breast cancer that she had from returning in what little amount of breast tissue she has remaining and the tamoxifen is to prevent cancer from showing up somew...

Terrible! That pretty much sums it up. We knew the day would come and we knew that it would be tough, and no matter how much Victoria or I mentally prepared ourselves we knew that it was going to be an emotional day. Driving to the hospital in the morning Victoria expressed to me how much she loved me and how much she loved our son, she was very scared about the surgery and as positive and strong as Victoria is she was worried that she might not make it through. It wasn't Victoria's first time having a major surgery, but this one especially worried her. I tried to be strong, encourage her, and tell her that she wasn't allowed to think those thoughts. But then I decided to let her be as emotional as she wanted, she needed to get it out and I believe it calmed her down a little. We arrived at the hospital for Victoria's pre-op appointment and she seemed okay. I didn't ask her how she was. Instead I just told her that it would be okay and she had a lot of peop...

I just finished talking with the doctor's and Victoria is doing very well. I'll be able to see her soon. The surgery went well. Three suspect lymphnodes were removed and all tested negative in the early pathology report. I will write more later, but wanted to get a quick update out. Thank you all for your words of encouragement, prayers and thoughts!

Victoria finished her final chemo treatment last Wednesday, 16 May. I'm so thankful that she is finished going through this and that we can close this chapter in her treatment plan and move on to the next. The chemo has certainly taken a toll on Victoria. I think with each treatment it got a little worse. It took her a little longer each time to shake the brutal side effects of the chemo, and by the time this final session came around she was ready for it to be over. Aside from feeling completely wore down and horrible for a week after chemo, Victoria has obviously had the physical changes like hair loss, water retention (causing swelling and weight gain) due to the steroids, and most recently she has lost the majority of her fingernails. The medical oncologist has said that the finger nail loss was due to the Taxotere and aggressive chemotherapy regimen. I don't know if much more can be taken, physically, from a woman. Prior to the loss of her fingernails Victoria co...

Victoria had her 5th, or second to last chemo session on Wednesday. Chemo went well and like all the previous treatments she feels pretty horrible this weekend. I think Victoria has just gotten to the point where this isn’t becoming any easier, but she knows what to expect and handles the side effects remarkably well. Victoria is closing in on the end of chemo and will move onto surgery in roughly 5 weeks. We met with the surgical oncologist on Wednesday for a consultation. He is by far the most serious and straightforward of all the doctors that we have seen. He is also very precise and explains the options in a detailed, yet understandable manner. The surgeon began the consult by performing a physical exam, which would help him determine what course of action to suggest. When we first met the surgeon prior to Victoria receiving chemotherapy he had examined her and basically determined that a mastectomy would be her only option, unless the chemo, in his words, had a “profound ...

Victoria finished her fourth chemo treatment about a week and a half ago. The treatment went well and again the side effects were manageable, but nothing that any of us would look forward to dealing with. Unfortunately, Victoria’s chemo was the Wednesday before Easter, so she wasn’t feeling her best on Easter morning. She still managed to put on her best face and made it to the 7:00 am Mass followed by making conversation at her Father and Step-Mother’s annual Easter brunch celebration. Things are going for the most part very well. Victoria has two more treatment sessions and should be through with the chemo. During our next session we will have a consult with the surgical oncologist who will go over the next phase in Victoria’s treatment plan, surgery, and what options she has. We are anxious to hear what options he discusses, as well as knowing when the surgery will be scheduled and approximately how long the recovery will take. All in all things are going smoothly. Vic...

Victoria finished her third chemo treatment last Wednesday and her cancer is responding well. Her lab work and physical exams continue to come back positive showing that she is receptive to the chemotherapy. The doctor is hopeful that when Victoria goes in for surgery she will have no remaining cancer cells, her chances are about 40%, which to us is exciting that she has that type of probability. Victoria's third treatment also marks the half-way point in her chemo treatment plan, thus the reason for the use of the expression the glass is half full. I can't express how happy I am that Victoria will only have to go through three more sessions. I am so proud of Victoria and how strong she has been through this grueling treatment. Although, I wouldn't say the side effects have become any worse, I would say that she is becoming weaker and it is taking her longer to recover after each session. I can understand why. Imagine being injected with an insane amount of chemi...

There are many difficult things about this disease. Victoria losing her hair, dealing with the side effects of chemotherapy, and when you live in another country…well saying farewell. For us it was to our home, to our friends, to our favorite restaurants, and to our co-workers. Victoria and I have been married for 6 years and over half of that time has been spent in Italy. Our first home together was in Italy, when we returned for the second time we were lucky enough to live in the same house that we called home and share that with our son. We were able to build upon old relationships, and create new ones. We were able to recreate fond memories of past trips and develop lasting memories of new ones. This past week has come to an end and we have returned “home”. “Home” to Arizona. Although, returning home was the right decision for Victoria’s treatment, and we are ecstatic to be amongst our very supportive family and friends, we will always miss our first home, as a married co...

Victoria just finished up her second round of chemotherapy and seems to be doing really well. She didn't sleep well the night before chemo, primarily due to the week ahead of us that we have coming up going to and moving back from Italy. We had to be out to the Cancer Treatment Center at 6:40 a.m., so they could draw her blood, send it to the lab, and have the results back, to ensure she was healthy enough to receive chemo. Our medical oncologist was very happy with the results as both her white and red blood cell count was in the 85 percentile of all women. Needless to say, she was very exhausted going into the chemo. Shortly after she was pumped full of all the fluids, drugs, steroids and whatever else they administer prior to beginning the chemo, she was out cold. I was happy to see her get a good nap in her chair. The side effects have been on the lesser side of extreme. The chemo takes a lot out of her, so she is very tired, her stomach doesn't feel right, her appe...

Saturday, February, 18, 2012. Victoria and I celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary. The day began about as normal as possible. Victoria's Mom arrived in the morning to take care of Brodie for the remainder of the day and night. I had an eventful itinerary planned. Beginning with lunch and horseback riding in North Scottsdale, accommodations at the swanky Hotel Indigo located in Old Town Scottsdale and an evening of dining at the quaint Petite Maison French Restaurant. We enjoyed our lunch and horseback riding and after checking into the hotel we spent about an hour lounging on the outdoor patio, taking in the beautiful Arizona sunset, and having our fill of one of our favorite activities, people watching. With about an hour to go we decided it would be wise to retreat to our room to get ready for dinner. As you may recall from my last post Victoria's hair has been falling out. Understandably, Victoria wanted to wash and do her hair for our dinner. I heard a phrase ...

Yesterday, Victoria and I went to see a Genetics Counselor. The purpose of the appointment was to determine if Victoria is a candidate for genetics testing. We went to the appointment expecting that she would be a candidate mainly because she has breast cancer at such a young age. There are many factors that go into determining if one should have a genetics test to determine their risks for various types of cancer. Many people are tested that do not have cancer, due to the fact that a certain type of cancer, or lots of cancers run in the family, or even just based on their family origin. Victoria is a candidate for the testing, primarily due to her age, as cancer does not run in the family, she is the first with breast cancer. Her blood was drawn and is sitting in a lab in Salt Lake City waiting to be tested. Specifically, what she would be tested for is a mutation in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene. To simplify a mutation in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene does not guarantee somebody will get ...

Okay Folks, so we are one week past Victoria's last chemo treatment and she is feeling great! The first few days were a little rough, but thankfully we didn't have any visits to the porcelain goddess. Victoria was very achy (similar to the ache you get before a fever - but she said it felt 5x worse). She didn't feel like much food wise, but I did my best to get her whatever she wanted. She was also extremely tired. She would sleep in and take 3 hour naps with no problem. Wednesday was the first day she left the house (and basically the couch) to take a walk around the block. Thursday, which was one week from the treatment was the first day she felt like herself. The hardest part for her was not being able to get on the ground and play with Brodie. She still has a constant chalky taste in her mouth, her stomach is upset every once in awhile, but besides that she says she feels great. We hope that this is as bad as it gets after every treatment. Victoria fears...

Today marks what might as well be a National holiday for the most widely watched event in American sports, Super Bowl Sunday! We watch as two teams full of warriors battle it out during 4 grueling 15 minute quarters to crown a victor. These warriors may inspire us temporarily, but the glory or pain for that matter, of what they have endured wears off quickly. My warrior and wife Victoria inspires me. I know this road ahead will be long and at times bumpy, but inside she harnesses the same tenacity and fight that we will see on the grid iron today. Victoria hasn't felt so well the past couple of days. I think it's primarily due to the Nuelasta shot that she received Friday. She has some aches and is a bit fatigued. I want her to feel 100%, but understand that a lot of the post chemo days will probably be like this. To top it off our little guy, Brodie, isn't feeling very well either. We took him to the pediatrician yesterday, just to find out that he has a viral infection ...

Day 1 after Chemo has gone relatively smoothly for Victoria.  She woke up feeling great this morning, no nausea or fatigue, pretty much a normal morning.  The nice thing about the hospital that we are at as I believe I mentioned in an earlier post is that they do alternative treatment that compliments all the medical treatment that she will be going through.  Alternative as in they have you meet with a naturopathic doctor, who can recommend  different herbs, vitamins, and foods for you to eat while going through treatment, along with recommending massage therapy, acupuncture, physical therapy, and chiropractic care.  All of which is available within the hospital. This morning Victoria had an acupuncture appointment, which she seemed to enjoy.  She had a red dot between her eyes where they stuck a needle when she came out.  She said the appointment was pretty neat, at one point she thought she was done, raised her head and there were a ton of nee...