A Missed Opportunity

I would not get an appointment with my orthopedic surgeon as he had to perform a surgery. My appointment has been instead moved to Thursday afternoon. Subsequently, I visited my chiropractor and had my usual treatment. Originally, I had planned that this would be my last treatment but my chiropractor said I am making some progress, so I am extending my treatment to a few more sessions. I can walk much better and with less pain now. I also asked him if it would posed a risk if I go to India and he said it should not.

After suspending 1 week of coffee enema, I felt a little uneasy. I feel a little lighter when I do my enemas. Through my brother's relative, I brought in 3kgs of coffee powder from Singapore. The coffee would last me sometime. Meanwhile, another cancer survivor told me that I can also buy coffee from an organic shop in Taman Tun. I will check it out and if the quality is acceptable, I rather buy locally.

Sometime back, I wrote an email to the Malaysian Oncological Society for some information on HIFU and it's seems no one is working there. Not only they do not write you back, they don't even acknowledge having received your email. So I tried calling their telephone number only to be answered by the fax machine. So I dropped a "thank you for the disappointing service note" to the Secretariat. My email inquiry to another hospital in India was also left unanswered. Only the Chinese Hospital were responding to my various follow-up emails. I also asked about the HIFU treatment procedure. They recommend that I check in to the hospital where they will perform a CT or MRI scan and then determine the actual approach. They also said "It will be performed under general anesthesia without using laparoscopic procedure. Maybe the other treatment would be combined with HIFU." Totally non invasive. I like it.

I have been corresponding with some other cancer patients and yesterday YSC wrote to me about if she can take the Cyberknife treatment and in the last paragraph, she said "...My lung tumor seem not to listen to me anymore...now it effected my many type of the muscle function on my face, my voice, swallow function, eyes n ...:-(" I have been thinking about this for a while even before she wrote the email, ie. sometimes we are given a treatment window to take whatever therapy. This treatment window is a period of time where the patient is able to do therapy, conventional or alternative. For example, like me when I discovered that my kidney tumor has exceeded 7cm, the treatment window for larparoscopic surgery has closed. What I am trying to say is that when the body is healthy, more treatment options (conventional or alternative) are open but when the patient gives up those treatment and later wants to take them again, he or she may not get another chance for the body condition may have deteriorated. I reread YSC's last paragraph and I imagined myself to be in similar situation. Now I seems to have no treatment options left. In her earlier emails, she has said she wanted to try another therapy but did not do it. For me, it may looks like a lost opportunity or lost a treatment window. Well I hope she can still take that therapy in China. There is fear of death because we just do not know if we are making the right decision, if there was such thing as a right decision for such cases in the first place. Wrong decision means further deterioration or even death. Her email got me thinking what I should do now instead of looking into the future. Besides reading what the treatment is all about, I think I will rely on my feeling if this or that therapy is right for me.