This week has been full of highs and lows. Monday, we received good news and bad news. The good news is that my previous spots are responding to chemotherapy. The goal SUV < 2.5 on a PET scan. Prior to chemotherapy, my largest spot had a SUV of 9.9 in my aortic node and 12.6 in the spleen.  Today, my PET scan showed improvement in the sites which is great news.  The bad news is my thyroid had an uptake of 23, which wasn’t there during my PET scan in August. There are two possibilities for this uptake. The first is that the lymphoma has spread.  This would be worst case scenario and would result in a new treatment regimen.  The second possibility is that I am having a severe reaction to the Pembro, part of my therapy regimen. My BMT oncologist stated that he has seen this reaction once in practice and the patient had to be intubated due to the severity of the swelling and difficulty breathing.

For the past two weeks I have been battling increased HR, increased blood pressure, horrible sore throat and mouth pain that makes it difficult to swallow. I have also had flushing with cold chills followed by sweating constantly. After taking all those into consideration, we are hopeful that I am indeed having a reaction to Pembro. So with these findings, I was started on three new medications, one being a high dose steroid in hopes that my thyroid drastically decreased.  I have also gained 4 new appointments this week, including a follow up with the BMT oncologist and endocrinologist this week.

The other good news is that we aren’t stopping my BMT work up because of this set back. I am currently taking medication and we are going to see how I respond to therapy. There is a chance that I will have to have another PET scan prior to bone marrow transplant to confirm that it was indeed a reaction, but that will be further down the road. 

This week is full with appointments. We have 11 additional appointments, including a bone marrow biopsy TOMORROW. We will start the morning with my BMT oncologist to discuss my thyroid ultrasound results and our plan moving forward.  Then we will head to the main campus for my biopsy in the afternoon.

Unfortunately, it is more of the unknown and waiting for more results which harkens back to the beginning of this journey. At times this week, it has made it very difficult to remain positive as it seems like at every turn there is something new that occurs. Somehow, Terry continues to lighten the mood and remain positive with his horrible dad jokes yet doing his best to keep us grounded in our current situation.