In the early stages of Lou’s cancer fight, she and her friends hosted a “Girls Night In” fundraiser for the Cancer Council and smashed all money raising records for any previous events of that kind. She spoke so well and displayed so much courage that The Cancer Council wanted her to be an ambassador. Unfortunately,…
1286 Days Ago…….. “Some of you will now know that last week I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. A rare and aggressive form, which I thankfully found early. Yesterday I went into battle with my first round of chemotherapy. I’ve ridden the rollercoaster of emotions but I’ve landed in a really positive place, feeling strong,…
Today is International Women’s day, it’s about celebrating women’s achievement, raising awareness against bias and taking action for equality. Lou strived for all of these objectives. She was driven in the corporate world, a successful business owner, she orchestrated the family household and she was a phenomenal mother. Louise thought well beyond her cancer diagnosis…
I brought Noah and Evie in to cuddle and kiss their mum today. I’d like to say it wasn’t a facilitated goodbye but while we hope for a miracle, I have to prepare for the worst. I was undecided on whether they should see her. Lou fell into a deep sleep at 1:30 am this…
Someone asked me a few months ago, “when was the last time you cried?” I couldn’t recall. I’ve thought about it a lot and why it’s been so long. Not days, not months, perhaps decades. I’m not proud of it, I think it’s a little strange. The last time I recall tears on my face…
Lou has been in 24-hour medical care with Professor Herzog since the 26th of December. We needed somewhere between treatments that can give Lou the medical support we can’t. The private clinic is in Bad Salzhausen, 55km’s from where our apartment is in Bad Homburg. Lou is in a double room so Lynda, Les or I stay take it in…
Lou’s brain has been scrambled since Friday. This has only previously happened when her liver has been overloaded processing the chemotherapy with TACE. It’s been a little over three weeks since her last liver treatment so there wouldn’t be any chemo in her liver now. A simple blood test measures how well the liver is performing its…
Lou had a good few days to finish off 2018, which we’re very grateful for. She’s struggling right now though. She has no energy, she’s extremely weak and has non-stop nausea. Mentally she’s in the basement. She’s very emotional. It’s difficult to watch when there isn’t anything you can do make her feel one bit healthier.…
Louise was scheduled for her third round of TACE today but her bloods have continued to drop. Her platelets are 10 000 as we speak. A normal platelet count ranges from 150,000 to 450,000 (platelets per microliter of blood). So her platelets are 140 000 short of where we would like them to be…….. TACE…
How is Lou Doing? It’s a question I get asked many times a day. Unfortunately for months now I haven’t been able to give a positive response. In most instances I find myself adding to the answer; “she is doing well considering…” While her physical condition obviously isn’t good, I feel it’s a little more constant…
Louise has had the best three days in a long long time. She’s battling some lymphedema today which tarnished a reasonably clear side effect run. And towards the end of the day, her mind was carrying the weight of our next treatment move but she looked tip-top and has made some great physical gains since Wednesday. I’d love to see…
Louise had a really good day today. 🤗 It’s the best day I can recall since the 11th of October. Let me just ask Google how many days that is…………………………………. 77. Boy. That’s waaaaaaaaay too long, 77 days is a very long time to feel like rubbish. Lou had 1.2 litres drained from her right lung yesterday…
Merry Christmas everyone, from the De-Byrne’s, for this Christmas and the next. We love You! 👨👩👧👦 🤗 Cherish your family today and every day. Be aware of and appreciate the great things you have. 💗
🙏🙌🏽😗💗👊🏾🤗🙏🙌🏽😗💗👊🏾🙏
Well, that didn’t go well. Louise went downhill faster and harder than me on my motorcycle. On Friday after her chemotherapy liver treatment, I made a prediction she would start spiralling on Monday, with the hope it wasn’t too severe this time. Well, nausea and vomiting started prematurely on Friday night. Then on Saturday, we…
Some quotes from Professor T Vogl I jotted down Verbatim: “the amount of tumour tissue in the pleura is better, the reduction of fluid is also becoming now less.” “With the liver, we always have a problem, we treat one area and of course, we cannot treat the whole liver, other areas are still in activity. Overall it’s now stabilising more…
So Lou’s right lung is full of fluid again. If you look up side effects for “pleural effusion” you will get: Shortness of breath A dry cough Pain A feeling of chest heaviness or tightness Inability to lie flat Inability to exercise (or move in our instance) Generally feeling unwell (Understatement) She fits that textbook…
So we’ve finally moved into an apartment, we’re in a beautiful town called, Bad Homburg. It’s a close distance to the two clinics we visit daily. The kids now have play space with neighbouring parks. Hopefully, we get a little time to explore and familiarise ourselves with the area. It feels very German. It’s beautiful.…
That’s not a bag of urine, beer or ice tea. It’s a litre of fluid drained from Lou’s right lung. The reason she hasn’t been eating and has had 24/7 nausea. The tube was still attached in the pic, and the bag drained another .5 of a litre making it a rounded 1.5-litre, collected through thoracentesis.…
The objective is to achieve four individual regional chemo liver sessions (half the liver per session) with Professor Vogle between November and January. In between these sessions, receive as much complementary therapy as possible. Univ. Prof. Dr. med. Thomas J. Vogl Transarterial chemoembolization/chemoperfusion; Abdomen Rotation Vom. Puncture of the femoral. Introduction of a 5F lock.…
Lou is still very unwell but we had our first small win yesterday. Her big tumour on her liver that has been growing uncontrollably has shrunk by 5% in surface area and 7% in volume. This occurred over a seven day period. It is a small win and hopefully validation we are doing the right things…
Lou’s second round of liver treatment scheduled for today was postponed until the first week of December. She’s been extremely unwell since we arrived, with little to zero energy. Her white and red blood cell numbers are down, they’re a tad high for transfusions but low enough to keep her on struggle street. She’s fatigued and…
It was a very long journey door-to-door. Lou got here as good as we’d hoped and the kids were absolute champions. I couldn’t have asked for more. We’ve been here for three days. She’s had one targeted treatment session on the liver with another scheduled for Thursday. She starts some full body treatment today as…
I’m attempting to talk about RCT, I think you’ll find it hard to comprehend while Evie is busy “on the phone.” 😂 I do pretty well at staying on track. (you’ll see her walking around in the background “talking to her cousin Billy” – classic) Hey Evie, the phone is upside down! I think this…
It’s the first week of November, this is the week that we were meant to be reviewing the success of the Immunotherapy (IO) trial. The original plan was to schedule the scans and decide if we were to continue with the trial or not. Well as you know the cancer snuck up behind Lou and…
All the preparation in the world cannot beat the demon that is chemo. It might start ok, and you think “hey maybe this time I’m going to get through this relatively unharmed” and then SMACK, SMACK and once you are down SMAAAAACK!!!!! There is no such thing as chemo and unharmed. And so you suffer…
When we started this blog on the 11th August we never expected we’d be posting about raising funds for Lou. We also never expected that chemotherapy, surgery, radiation, more chemo, more radiation and immunotherapy wouldn’t work either. With the ongoing expense of fighting cancer now outweighing our diminishing income. We’re overcoming pride and asking for help.…
The path we were on has lead to nowhere. We are in no better position than the original diagnoses in June 2017 or learning of the disease spreading in August. In fact, our situation is much more inauspicious. A little draconian I know, but that’s how it is. Due to an ongoing adverse reaction to treatment, plagued…
I was just looking at my calendar and thinking, we’ve had a bad run. Yep, Fuck You Cancer, you’re making us work for it. Lou’s only had a few good days since 10 September. It’s mainly the Paarp pills that are causing severe fatigue, nausea, anxiety and pain. It’s a real kick in the face when…
So you want to be cancer free, what are you doing about it? Minute by minute, play by play? You need to imagine your success, visualize what you want, feel it. You must be focused and know exactly what you need to get from here to there. You need to make your goals attainable, broken…
Your brain covers a lot of distance in many different directions when mortality is on your doorstep. I truly believe Lou will be around much longer than the ominous sentence most pundits prescribe. But when time is an unknown, it keeps your brain humming. If you knew you had months, years or decades, you would…
Three days ago I had a full blown panic attack in the middle of a crowded flight, that had only just taken off, trolleys blocking both my ways out. I knew it was coming. It started with shortness of breath, a warm feeling crawling up all my limbs, nausea, shoes kicked off, sweating, panic, heart…
When you first find out that you have breast cancer, your doctor searches for the presence or absence of three receptors, proteins that live inside or on the surface of a cell and bind to something in the body to cause the cell to react. You may have heard of the oestrogen receptor, progesterone receptor…