So… Just what DID happen in the past year?
The year 2025 will be remembered (by me, anyway) as one for the record books. It was not the worst year of my life by far, but it was a year of incredible ups and downs.
To relate what happened in the year I have to go back into late 2024, when I took the Cologuard test for the second time, the first being in 2020. This time the test came back as Abnormal, and so a number of tests were prescribed for me. In early February I had a colon exam at Kansas Gastroentrology, and they discovered that, yes, I did have a tumor in my cecum that tested positive for cancer. Early stage cancer, perhaps, but cancer nonetheless. I was scheduled for surgery to remove the tumor at the end of March, but at the pre-op screening a week prior to the scheduled surgery an EKG revealed I had an irregular heartbeat and the surgery had to be postponed.
In mid July I had a procedure done in which one of my arteries was determined to be 90% obstructed, so a stint was placed in it. Ironically, shortly after that was done I noticed my stamina was really going downhill: I was getting winded just going up a single flight of stairs at my hotel. I wondered if the stint was hurting more than it was helping, but later on my ex-wife Martha told me something that put the matter into perspective. Martha is not an MD, but she is head librarian at the University of Tennessee Medical Library. She informed me that cancers will take ingested sugars for themselves, depriving other cells of the energy they need for everyday activity.
On Thursday, October 9, I went to Wesley Hospital in Wichita with the intemtion of going through a procedure to stabilize my irregular heartbeats. It had to be abruptly postponed when, during my preparation, it was discovered I was dangerously anemic. (They discovered my red blood cell level was 7.3%, where 7.0% is considered critical.) The decision was made to admit me to Wesley for treatment of the anemia. I was admitted and received one unit of blood that evening. The original plan was for me to stay all weekend and have the heart procedure the following Tuesday. But on Friday, Oct. 10, we got word that my cardiologist had given the green light for me to have the cancer surgery. So I was released that day.
On Wednesday, November 12, I was re-admitted to Wesley Hospital for the cancer surgery. The surgeon successfully removed the cancer - it turned out there were TWO tumors, not just one - and, as I believe is standard for these procedures, had to take out a small part of my small intestine and part of the colon to be sure all of the cancer was taken. The surgery was done in just a couple of hours, but I needed to stay some days in the hospital for recovery. I was put on a liquids-only diet (which I really started to detest after a few days of the same damn thing every meal). Worse yet, it turned out my lower digestive track had sort of "gone to sleep" following the surgery. While my surgeon informed me that this was normal and not permanent, it meant nothing that I'd eaten the first three days after surgery was going down, and they had to put a tube down my nose (hurts like hell) and into my stomach to draw all the not-fully-digested food out. (It's as much fun as it sounds like.) Luckily, by Sunday evening I was getting evidence that my lower digestive track was working again, and Tuesday evening I got to eat dinner again. (Liquids only, wouldn't you know. Oh well…) Wednesday morning I ate a regular breakfast of bacon and eggs with hash browns, oatmeal and milk, and later that morning I was realeased from the hospital.
As might be expected, there were follow-up visits with my doctors; as I write this there is a good chance I will be told I need chemotherapy. But there was one more matter that needed to be addressed: the heart procedure that was postponed from October 9 had to be performed. So on Tuesday, December 23, I was admitted to Wesley Hospital once again. This procedure entailed locating in my heart where the nerve signals were causing the excessive heartbeats to happen and actually burning or searing that area of my heart to stop the erratic beating. Rather than doing open heart surgery, the procedure entailed making an incision in my groin to access an artery to my heart, running a wire up the artery to my heart and detecting and burning the problem area from inside. A slight problem was that anesthesia would interfere with detecting the problem area. So the first part of the procedure had to be done with minimal or no anesthesia. But I'm pleased to say that, after what I'd guess was about a half hour of not-all-that-bad discomfort, the problem area was identified, I was given anesthesia and the procedure was completed. Once again the doctor wanted me to stay overnight for observation, but I was given the "okay" to go home the next day.
Yhere was a rather bizarre side effect of my cancer.
In January 2017 as part of a health and exercise regimen I had gotten my weight down to 207.2 lbs. That June I took part in the first 10K run I had done in 29 years and successfully completed it. Sadly, also in June my father passed away. My weight stated creeping back up, I'm sure because I was self-medicating with food rather than dealing with my feelings related to my father's passing away. In June of 2019 my mother passed away as well, and I made the same self-medicating mistake I'd made two years earlier. By 2022 my weight was back into the 280's: I had undone all of the weight loss I had achieved since 2013 when I started my health and fitness journey. By 2024 my weight was varying from the upper 260's to mid 270's - a bit of an improvement, perhaps, but still damn overweight.
So what, you ask? So this: On Jan.7, 2025, I tipped the scales at 267.2 lbs. For most of the year I ate without a second thought for health or well-being. Plenty of burgers, fries, fizz, milkshakes, pizza hot dogs, ice cream, etc, etc. And you know what? My weight dropped like a rock. If you read back a few paragraphs to the part about how cancers take in sugars and starve the healthy cells, I think that is what happened. As of December 30. my weight is 230.1 lbs. While that's still quite overweight, it is the least I have weighed since June of 2017.
Having read a number of blogs on this site, I am aware I am not the first person to have achieved notable weight loss and discovered it was due to cancer and not healthy eating. Even people who know me and know of my cancer battle have conceded that I look way better now than I did a year ago. Yeah, my weight loss wasn't for the most exemplary reason in the world, but, hell, I DID lose the weight! Perhaps now is as good a time as any to resolve to ditch the yellow arches and the fizz and get back into the swing of healthy lifestyle again. I reckon, if I can awaken the resolve I had in 2013 when I started my journey, perhaps I can turn this odd turn of events into a comeback.
