We Could Have Done Without This

Besides hearing, "hey what's this red stuff" uttered by your doctor,  the worst thing he or she could say is: "it's back."
After nearly nine months of recovery from a stem cell transplant, my wife's cancer is back.
Son of a bitch!  Just when she had begun to feel like all of this had been a bad dream it comes back like a punch in the gut.

We got the news two weeks ago and it felt like somebody was pelting our house with rocks, or, in Linda's case, a home invasion.  Every morning the knowledge that this sneaky bastard of a disease had once again slipped into our lives made the temptation to just stay in bed seem like a good plan.  We're over that now and are ready to kick some large B cell lymphoma ass.  Linda begins with a brand new (just approved in April) chemo drug the first of next week.  This one promises not to leave her feeling too bad or--even more important as far as she is concerned--BALD.  After meeting with her primary oncologist we are feeling quite positive about this drug's ability to do the job.  If it fails there are other new miracles  of medicine to be tried including  the possibility of another trip to Seattle and a re-education of her CAR-T cells.  I have no idea what that's all about but it seems to be succeeding in early trials at the Cancer Care Alliance and at the Mayo Clinic.

Linda is a native of Rapid City, South Dakota and, as another child of that great state and longtime friend, Doug Steckler, said to me, "NEVER piss off a girl from South Dakota....No NEVER."  Steckler is a lunatic but I can't remember the last time his insight was incorrect.  She is pissed!  Cancer doesn't stand a chance.