Geoff's Cancer Treatment
Donation protected
Our family is small and very close. Just me, my lovely wife Paula, and my son Nathan, who just started college!
October 2018, I felt fine. I remember mowing the lawn on an unusually hot Friday, and the family and I went out for dinner to a local burger place. After dinner, I had that feeling like I might be getting a cold coming on.
Sure enough, I woke up Saturday morning with a fever and chills. First thing Monday, I made an appointment to see my family doctor. He took some blood and did a chest x-ray to make sure I didn't have pneumonia or something else serious and sent me home with an antibiotic.
By Wednesday, I felt no better and my doctor called me to say he felt the blood tests were odd and that I should go to the ER where they could run a lot of tests and see what was happening inside. So, off we went to the hospital where they admitted me for dehydration, put me on IV fluids and began running test after test to figure out what was wrong. By this time, the fevers were spiking up to 106 F and I had violent shivers, called rigors, that would last for 30-60 minutes.
Within a week, I was in ICU with failing kidneys and liver and learning that I had a rare form of cancer -- a non-hodgkins lymphoma called Angio-immunoblastic T-cell Lymphoma (AITL). After a week in ICU, I received the first of 6 rounds of chemotherapy. After another day, I was well enough to leave the ICU, but not go home. 3 weeks more of fevers and shivers and I received my second chemo treatment. It was like flipping a lightswitch, my fevers stopped, I felt better, and I was able to go home.
From that point on, things really started to look up. We were told by the doctors that even though this cancer is rare, I had a good chance of going into a long remission. The chemotherapy treatments were working well and I really didn't have bad side-effects. I returned to work and had my treatments every 3 weeks and life started to feel normal.
Then, the bills started showing up. I have really good insurance through my work, but even with that, there are deductibles, and out-of-network specialists, and miscellaneous expenses. I tried to keep up, but there just wasn't enough money to go around. Eventually, several of the bills went to collection agencies and we had to take the phone off the hook to avoid the harassing calls.
At the end of my chemo treatments, in April 2019, I had an autologous bone-marrow transplant, which is stem-cells taken from my own bloodstream and then placed back into my bone-marrow to give it a jump-start to root out any remaining cancer. The transplant was a success, and I went home after 4 weeks in the hospital for 4 weeks of in-home recovery. A PET scan showed no signs of cancer remaining, I was in total remission!
In September 2019, I had a follow-up CAT scan, expecting to still be in remission, but a few lymph nodes were slightly enlarged. Not enough to be alarming, but enough that I had to schedule another scan in October.
The CAT scan in October 2019 confirmed that my remission had only lasted a few months and the cancer was back.
So now, in November 2019, I am starting a new chemotherapy, with the goal to get to another bone-marrow transplant. This time from a donor. I will face many months of recovery and risk Graft-vs-Host syndrome even though I will be on anti-rejection medication for months or years.
Statistically, only about 30% of people in my situation will make it 5 years of remission without the cancer returning once again.
Meanwhile, the bills continue to pile up. I haven't gotten out from the collections from the first round of treatment and now the second has started and will be longer. With the donor transplant, I face the possibility of being out of work for months, with reduced or no income coming in to pay for the mortgage, utilities, food, etc., let alone the mounting medical bills.
Please help our family through this difficult time, and help me to provide for my family and not leave them in debt when I'm gone.
October 2018, I felt fine. I remember mowing the lawn on an unusually hot Friday, and the family and I went out for dinner to a local burger place. After dinner, I had that feeling like I might be getting a cold coming on.
Sure enough, I woke up Saturday morning with a fever and chills. First thing Monday, I made an appointment to see my family doctor. He took some blood and did a chest x-ray to make sure I didn't have pneumonia or something else serious and sent me home with an antibiotic.
By Wednesday, I felt no better and my doctor called me to say he felt the blood tests were odd and that I should go to the ER where they could run a lot of tests and see what was happening inside. So, off we went to the hospital where they admitted me for dehydration, put me on IV fluids and began running test after test to figure out what was wrong. By this time, the fevers were spiking up to 106 F and I had violent shivers, called rigors, that would last for 30-60 minutes.
Within a week, I was in ICU with failing kidneys and liver and learning that I had a rare form of cancer -- a non-hodgkins lymphoma called Angio-immunoblastic T-cell Lymphoma (AITL). After a week in ICU, I received the first of 6 rounds of chemotherapy. After another day, I was well enough to leave the ICU, but not go home. 3 weeks more of fevers and shivers and I received my second chemo treatment. It was like flipping a lightswitch, my fevers stopped, I felt better, and I was able to go home.
From that point on, things really started to look up. We were told by the doctors that even though this cancer is rare, I had a good chance of going into a long remission. The chemotherapy treatments were working well and I really didn't have bad side-effects. I returned to work and had my treatments every 3 weeks and life started to feel normal.
Then, the bills started showing up. I have really good insurance through my work, but even with that, there are deductibles, and out-of-network specialists, and miscellaneous expenses. I tried to keep up, but there just wasn't enough money to go around. Eventually, several of the bills went to collection agencies and we had to take the phone off the hook to avoid the harassing calls.
At the end of my chemo treatments, in April 2019, I had an autologous bone-marrow transplant, which is stem-cells taken from my own bloodstream and then placed back into my bone-marrow to give it a jump-start to root out any remaining cancer. The transplant was a success, and I went home after 4 weeks in the hospital for 4 weeks of in-home recovery. A PET scan showed no signs of cancer remaining, I was in total remission!
In September 2019, I had a follow-up CAT scan, expecting to still be in remission, but a few lymph nodes were slightly enlarged. Not enough to be alarming, but enough that I had to schedule another scan in October.
The CAT scan in October 2019 confirmed that my remission had only lasted a few months and the cancer was back.
So now, in November 2019, I am starting a new chemotherapy, with the goal to get to another bone-marrow transplant. This time from a donor. I will face many months of recovery and risk Graft-vs-Host syndrome even though I will be on anti-rejection medication for months or years.
Statistically, only about 30% of people in my situation will make it 5 years of remission without the cancer returning once again.
Meanwhile, the bills continue to pile up. I haven't gotten out from the collections from the first round of treatment and now the second has started and will be longer. With the donor transplant, I face the possibility of being out of work for months, with reduced or no income coming in to pay for the mortgage, utilities, food, etc., let alone the mounting medical bills.
Please help our family through this difficult time, and help me to provide for my family and not leave them in debt when I'm gone.
Organiser
Geoff Sulcer
Organiser
Stow, OH