Ruth K.

About Ruth K.

It started as a simple visit to the primary Dr. for not feeling well . Routine blood work was done including a PSA. The PSA comes back elevated at 9.0. Ok so lets just assume that is a lab error and repeat the PSA. My husband had declined a rectal exam. The repeat PSA returns at 8 point something. I am an RN who works for a group of urologist. Time for my boys to take over and do a biopsy. I am thinking this can not be happening to us but oh yes it is and our world is about to be rocked. Biopsy done and now the waiting game begins. Results are back with a Gleason score of 8. Bone scan and CT abdomen pelvis. Both results negative. Good news. Now to be scheduled for aradical prostatectomy with pelvic lymph. That is done the following month and my husband returns home the following afternoon. Now a waiting game of path results again. Path returns with a Gleason score of 9. Now Dan is facing 42 rounds of radiation. He completes with no problems and the PSA has finally come back at <0.1 just where we want it. But of course it does not remain at that level and now we are looking at adding Lupron to the mix. Lets throw in fatigue and hot flashes that come along with Lupron. We coast along for almost a couple of years with PSA’s remaining <0.1. Of course for our journey all good things must come to an end and that PSA is creeping up. So we add a little Casodex knowing if this helps it will probably be for only 6 months if that because that PSA will go up. Well it did not last for long cause that PSA is on the rise again. I am on an emotional roller coaster and my husband is comforting me asking if I will please seek some mental health help. Which I eventually do and it does help some but being a nurse you know just enough to be dangerous to yourself. I have a constant knot in my stomach dealing with all of these issues. We have no life because our life is consumed by prostate cancer. Now we are looking at Provenge which insurance will only pay for if the cancer has metastasized. Well I certainly do not want that so we pay 150,000 out of pocket with no guarantee it will work. Dan carries on working every day but his mind is consumed thinking about prostate cancer daily 24/7. But yet he still finds time to worry about me and the kids. My old Dan is gone no longer himself because he knows a Gleason score of 9 is a death sentence. We decide to go with another round of Provenge because now the cancer has spread after the results are in from the most recent bone and CT scan. The insurance will now pay since it has metastasized. I saw my poor husband get stuck 7 different times to try and get a line in to proceed. At one point the PSA does go down not much but it is better than up. What a bit of good news for once. But of course that did not last. The PSA is up on the next check jumped almost 20 points. So now Dan has tried the oral medication that the insurance would pay for when the doc really wanted to try the other medication but we must go with what the insurance will cover. Of course the PSA continues to rise and now we can start the Zytiga. Dan feels like crap every day of his life. He fakes it to make it. A new little granddaughter brings joy but yet sorrow knowing he will never get to see her play softball like her mother did. The last PSA is drawn the day he passes so he never knew it had gone even higher. We watch TV that night and he heads up to bed to watch some Netflix while I opt to watch Law And Order SVU. I enter our bedroom one hour later and can tell by looking at him he is gone. Being a nurse I knew. He passed the way he wanted peacefully and in his sleep. He fought a tough battle knowing it was a battle he could never win all the while being my caregiver trying to help me emotionally. He was and forever will be my hero in my eyes. Peace to all patients and their family member currently fighting this battle. If your Gleason score was 6 or less odds are better for you than my husband. Also if I can save one life by making sure that person gets both a PSA and a rectal exam done I will have done my job. Prostate cancer is an ugly disease as are all cancers.  Please find a cure.

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