Wayne's Battle With Cancer

Your life can change in an instant, ours did. My husband Wayne DePietro was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer with a 10 centimeter tumor in his stomach and 3 spots on his liver. This happened on that horrendous Marathon Monday. A day we will never forget for so many reasons. My heart goes out to all the victims and families of such a dispicible terrorist act in our own backyard.Wayne had been feeling extreme fatigue, loss of appetite and fevers at night. Those were the symptoms he had. Silently but deadly.
Chemo was started end of April and Wayne ended up in the hospital for 8 days from the horrible side effects of the chemo.
Went to Dana Farber in Boston for 2nd opinion they recommended a chemo that they use with less side effects on Wayne.
Wayne tolerated that much better than the other one.
A scan was done in July that showed the tumor did not shrink but 2 of the liver spots were gone.
Radiation and chemo were then everyday for about 1 month.
Had a great Surprise Party for Wayne's 54th birthday at our house. It was a great party, he said it was the best he ever had. Countless friends rallied and showed their support for their friend Wayne who may not see his 55th birthday.
The original prognosis was 9-12 months with chemotherapy for the rest of his life.
In September Wayne woke me up he thought he had a heart attack something bad happened.
Rushed him to the hospital where we got the news that the cancer spread to his brain.
Some more tests were done and then Wayne had Radiotactic Stereosurgery a gamma knife procedure of radiation at MGH.
Wayne has had neuroligical symptoms again stemming from the swelling in his brain. Now he is on mega steroid dose that seems to be abating his symptoms.
He cannot remain on such steroids and needs to be tapered down. When he gets down the symptoms come back. Saw Neurolical Oncologist and Neurosurgeon at MGH they suggested Avastin chemotherapy which he started yesterday along with his regular chemotherapy. He was more exhausted than usual. If this does not work, he will have to have brain surgery to remove the tumor with more risks that I don't even want to think of.


Wayne was always a hard working man providing for his family. When Wayne's 12 weeks of unpaid FMLA were up his company terminated his employment. He worked for NTB for about 8 years and they just discarded him like it didn't matter to them.
Well it did matter to me I have been trying to pay the bills on my paycheck. I have nothing left in savings from paying the mortgage and trying to pay some other bills. The hospital bills are astronomical I don't think I will ever be able to pay them.
Thank god I have the health insurance through my job.
NTB left Wayne with no Life Insurance when they let him go. I don' know what I am going to do.
It is so overwhelming with all the trips to the ER and treatments and so forth and worrying g about our house.
Life doesn't seem very fair right now. Because I have an income we are not eligible for any benefits through the government.
Maybe if we weren't born here thinks would be better we would get all the helpwe need. Sorry if this offends anyone, but I think America should take care of its own people.