8. Battle Begins Monday

It’s hard to believe that we found out about the pathology last week.

In this last week, we have spent much time with Owen’s new additions to his care team: the medical oncologist and the radiology oncologist.

While most people hear that radiation and chemotherapy are done one after the other, Owen’s team is going in with both simultaneously.

Nobody wants to give false hope, which is completely understandable in the world fighting cancer, but here are a few things that the radiology oncologist said to us Tuesday that brings some hope.

1. He said the location of the mass caused Owen to have immediate symptoms that got him in to see specialists very early. He said early detection.

2. He said on a few occasions that the tumor was small. Much smaller than many patients.

3. He said that Dr. B, the neurosurgeon, successfully removed the entire mass. With GBMs there is a delicate balance of taking out a tumor and how much damage an operation will do on the brain to fundamental capabilities like motor function. Sunday’s MRI shows a slight enhancement which is favored to be effects of the surgery rather than remaining disease.

4. He said Owen won’t feel the effects of the radiation treatments. He may lost a little bit of hair around the operation site, but that’s it. He also said he doesn’t believe Owen will feel any headaches or other side effects from radiation. (This is NOT the case for the chemo treatment. Medical oncologist is going in strong and so we know there will be strong side effects.)

42 days of chemo, close to 7 weeks of radiation.

We are ready to get after it.