# My life up until today



## Cosmo254 (Apr 15, 2015)

I was born in northern California and lived here all my life until my husband, oldest daughter and I moved to Hawaii so he could work in his mother's floral shop in Waikiki.  She wasn't too good at floral arrangements and my husband was as he had been doing it for several years. To say the least, working with his mother didn't work out and we came back to California with two daughters, our youngest was born in Honolulu in 1968. 

I worked for a communications corporation and retired in 1997 then began working for the Osteoporosis foundation when I found a lump in my breast and learned it was cancer.  I had a lumpectomy, chemo and radiation was out of work for one year due to my blood pressure going crazy with the chemo and radiation therapy. After my one year relaxation I went back to the same communications corporation that I had previously retired from and worked in San Francisco and retired a second time in 2006.

We were living in a two bedroom plus bonus room townhouse in a suburb of San Francisco called Hercules for 27 years but started having problems going up the two flights of stairs to reach the bedrooms and bathrooms on the second floor so in 2006 we decided to put the townhouse up for sale and move north.  But it didn't work out as we planned as my husband had his first attack of pancreatitis and was hospitalized two weeks and when he came home wanted to hold off on selling the house until he felt stronger.  Well needless to say the market crashed and we couldn't sell the house. 

So we waited and in January 2011 my husband came down with a horrible cough that wouldn't go away. Once he started having pains in his side and back I made him see his doctor and so many tests were done in the next two weeks I couldn't keep up with what went on.  The outcome though was stage IV lung cancer.

My husband had gone from 157 pounds to 112 pounds and could barely walk.   We had a Regional Cancer Center near us and we went and spoke with the oncologist there who told my husband they couldn't cure him but could prolong his life and make him as comfortable as possible.  When we came home I checked the stats for stage IV lung cancer on the internet and saw that half the people with stage IV lived 8 months, 10% lived one year, and 1% made it to 5 years. I made arrangements for his funeral without telling him. I figured I would be too upset and emotional when the time came to worry about a funeral. 

Funny things happen when you fight hard, pray hard, and do everything possible to make things work.  He went into remission after the first 7 weeks of radiation and chemo and felt pretty good in 2012. His oncologist put him on Avastin as a maintenance drug but then he had a mini stroke and they had to take him off it, as it was known to cause strokes. His cancer came back and they sent him to have modular radiation treatments. Each of these treatments where the equivalent of 5 regular radiation treatments and he only had 5 treatments. Again the tumors shrank somewhat. 

He was no longer able to go upstairs to his bedroom and I made him comfortable on the couch and bought a baby monitor so is he needed anything during the night I would hear him. We finally decided we had to sell the house, the prices had come up and I wanted to be closer to family, which was my oldest daughter, son-in-law and 3 of her 5 children.  We moved in with her before we sold the house as we thought it looked better without anything inside not realizing it would take 7 months to sell. 

But something wonderful came out of our moving further north. We had to find new doctors and the oncologist I found for my husband was excellent. He asked if my husband had been asked about his DNA from the pathologist tests before they started giving him treatment to see if he could take one of the specialty drugs for lung cancer and we said it was never mentioned to him.  This doctor found that my husband did have the gene needed for Tarceva, a pill that he would take only once a day and if there were no horrible side effects and if it worked he could remain on it all his life. The pill supply costs $6000. per a 30 day supply but with our health benefits and a little help from the company that produces the magic pill we got it for free. 

He has been taking it for 4 months now and this month was the first time in 4 years that his hemoglobin was in the normal range, cancer lives on red blood cells to make it grow, so if his hemoglobin was going up it had to mean the cancer wasn't progressing. He also gained weight and now is at 155 pounds. 
We won't know for sure what is going on in his body until he gets another PET scan next month but I'm a believer in miracles and I believe this pill and with the prayers of all our friends and relatives is the miracle we hoped for. 

This is just a brief explanation as to why I am living with my husband and one fat Chihuahua in a rented house far north of where I grew up and brought up my family in the San Francisco Bay Area, and quite frankly I love it here.


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## AZ Jim (Apr 15, 2015)

I can only hope the treatment works for hubby and life returns to normal for you.


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## Glinda (Apr 15, 2015)

Wow - good for you, Cosmo.  I hope you and your husband have many happy years ahead of you.


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## hollydolly (Apr 15, 2015)

WoW that's quite a story Cosmo, thank you so much for sharing that with us. What a hard time both you and your husband had for quite a few years, and I wish you both good health for many years to come.


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## Ameriscot (Apr 15, 2015)

I hope your hubby continues to improve on the drug.  Sounds like you two are strong people.


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## Pappy (Apr 15, 2015)

Hoping for the best to you, Cosmo. Enjoyed your story.


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## Ken N Tx (Apr 16, 2015)

Pappy said:


> Hoping for the best to you, Cosmo. Enjoyed your story.



:dito:


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## Mrs. Robinson (Apr 16, 2015)

Great story,Cosmo! Hope your hubby continues to improve. My niece is also on a cancer drug (also a very expensive one) but we are now waiting to see if it is going to help her at all. It may have just come too late for her.

Do you mind saying where in NorCal you live? I was born and raised in San Bruno and have now lived in Lakeport on Clear Lake for 23 years. Love,love,love it here-could never go back to living in the Bay Area!


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## SeaBreeze (Apr 16, 2015)

You and your husband have been through so much Cosmo I hope better health continues for the both of you...hugs to your chubby Chihuahua.


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## Woodland (Sep 21, 2022)

Dear Cosmo:  I read your story and wondered if you have an update.  It's been seven years.  I hope all is well.


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## RadishRose (Sep 21, 2022)

Woodland said:


> Dear Cosmo:  I read your story and wondered if you have an update.  It's been seven years.  I hope all is well.


I never saw this post before. Now I too, am wondering. Hope they are well.


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## Jules (Sep 21, 2022)

RadishRose said:


> I never saw this post before. Now I too, am wondering. Hope they are well.


In another thread Cosmo said her husband had died and she had considered moving into an RV on her daughter’s property.  She then decided to move into a senior community.  No news after that.


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## Woodland (Sep 22, 2022)

Jules said:


> In another thread Cosmo said her husband had died and she had considered moving into an RV on her daughter’s property.  She then decided to move into a senior community.  No news after that.


Thank you for the update.  Hope she is doing well in her new community.


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## hollydolly (Sep 22, 2022)

She joined 7 years ago, and her last post was 6 years ago...


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