Not to mention, I’m going to be in Los Angeles for most of the first week of December. Of course, Ethan is in awesome shape, maybe we’ll get lucky (OH HAHAHAHA, how I laugh at that thought) and he’ll only be in the hospital 3 days instead of 4 or 5, keeping my fingers crossed, not that it has done much good thus far.

So, that means enjoying Thanksgiving, trying to enjoy decorating, and simultaneously doing all the “mom stuff” that has to be done in order to be gone for 3-5 days. Cleaning, laundry, packing, making sure I have what I need to attempt to function online, etc.

Oh, and somewhere along the line make sure that a certain 4 year old doesn’t worry unnecessarily. As it is she’s become quite attached to me lately (remember this is a total daddy’s girl) and I have proof:

She spends a lot of time sitting behind me in my desk chair. In fact, she’s here as I’m typing this post, singing along to Christmas carols and sticking her hands down the back of my shirt. *sigh*

It’s going to be a loooong couple of weeks.

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Truth be told my blog is jacked. A post somewhere killed my RSS feed, something is jacked up in the backroom even though I am using WP’s latest version. My archives are gone for now because that was the only way to get the RSS feed to work that I could figure out. It’s just a bunch of jacked up technological garbage that I have like zero time or patience to fiddle with right now.

Yup, I’m a bad blogger, I haven’t been around to comment or read blogs in ages. I’ve taken to keeping up with a few friends via email because I suck right now.

Thanksgiving is next week… I usually look forward to that weekend because we also buy our Christmas tree and decorate the house for Christmas. Only this year Ethan has surgery the following Monday and I don’t know that I am going to even feel all that thankful this year because I’m fairly pissed off at how everything has gone thus far. I’m honestly looking forward for this year to freaking end.

I’ve been accused of being self-centered, sticking my head in the sand, and being a “big baby” where all of this stuff is concerned. People are just so damn wonderful when the chips are down. I really couldn’t care less anymore. I used to, but then I just figured they have no clue what it is like to be in my shoes so it’s kind of like, “oh, forgive them Amy, they know not what they do” with a healthy dose of my husband begging me not to go on a mass shooting spree or something.

Anyway, there I go again being all self-centered and what-not. I know, I should totally be asking what’s going on with you? How are you? How have you been? I’m sorry. I’ll try to do better… I’ll make it a New Year’s resolution or something.

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The first thing this doctor said to us was that it is a testament to Ethan and how he was raised that Ethan found this and told someone so quickly. He said, bluntly, “When I was diagnosed 1 out of 3 men died from this disease. Now we know exactly how to treat it and how it progresses. And, it’s HIGHLY curable when caught early the way you caught it. Good for you guys.”

I of course liked him because he said when he found his tumor he was “scared shitless.” That is my kind of doctor. ;)

Ethan is having surgery December 1 - again. Fortunately, this is NOT a panic situation! And it is ridiculous to question time lines or why the surgery is Dec. 1 vs. tomorrow. It’s just NOT a freaking “OH MY GOD!!!!! WHAT MIGHT HAPPEN BETWEEN NOW AND THEN!!!” Which, unfortunately, some family members have chosen to take this approach for completely UNSUBSTANTIATED REASONS. The appointment and conversation with the new doctor today assured me of this.

The doctor will be removing a portion of his lymph nodes behind his abdominal cavity. This is the next place the cancer may have spread to. The fact is, as the new doctor explained to me, up until now we have been seeing a Pediatric Urologist, while excellent, this is an ADULT DISEASE and they know EXACTLY how to treat it. It’s a 1 - 2 punch. Removal of the primary (testicle) and then removal of the lymph nodes. We hadn’t been told this before because ETHAN WAS SEEING A PEDIATRIC UROLOGIST!!!!!

Basically, if he opens it up and it looks good, the lymph nodes go to pathology. Here are our scenarios:

A. Best case - pathology says the lymph nodes are clear. That means the cancer is gone and Ethan will just need to be seen every six months for 1 - 2 years, then annual follow up for 3 years after that.

B. Not as good as A - pathology says that there are microscopic cancer cells present. This will require follow up every 3 months for 1-2 years followed by annually for 3 years after. NO CHEMO. NONE. Microscopic means it started to spread there but hasn’t gone any further.

C. Worst case scenario - this would mean that the bloodwork and CT scans up until now have been wrong. Although, this is a really unlikely scenario! It means that the specialist will visibly see the cancer in the lymph nodes. He will remove them and Ethan will require chemo for 3 - 4 months and it will probably knock him out of school for a year because chemo just does that much damage. He said the nausea and hair loss is the LIGHT end of it and this surgery is being done, in part, to AVOID that.

The surgery is pretty intensive taking 3 hours, an epidural, and 3-5 days in the hospital following surgery. The incision will start at the top of his solar plexus and end somewhere below his belly button.

Somehow, this seems better than chemo.. or I’m still in shock because NO ONE told us this was a possibility. Back to the seeing a pediatric urologist scenario…

Ethan is not holding up as well as I had hoped. It was a huge blow. He had a mild panic attack in the laboratory waiting room while we waited to get more blood work done. It’s the first time I’ve seen him really crack during this ordeal and as a mom, it made me want to kill someone. Consider that fair warning, I guess. I’m a woman on the edge now.

I’ve decided that Ethan and I have our own set of coping mechanisms that work quite well for us and anyone NOT on that EXACT SAME PAGE will be held at a distance until they can prove otherwise. Hey, that might sound harsh, but I’m in charge and I’m doing what is best for my son. My way or the highway. PERIOD.

Anyway… that’s it. That’s where we are.

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