Caroline's Breast Cancer Blog

     I love living.  It's fun...mostly.  Having stage 4 lung cancer isn't fun, however.  It's a hassle and annoying. Everyday I have to remember to do certain things to increase my chances for living longer.  Entered into my iPhone are five daily alarms for medications and vitamins.  I space them out because some medications I need to take at a specific time with food, while others I need to take two hours before or 2 hours after taking other medications. I have an alarm for a medication I take once a week.  I have scheduled appointments with my oncologist and get an IV infusion of a bone strengthener once a month...and...every four months, I get CT scans of my chest, abdomen and pelvis to see if any tumors have started to grow back.        Most of my fellow stage 4 lung cancer ninja friends get scanned every three months.  It's standard.  In the beginning, I did too.  However, CT scans expose us to a l...

     Although my family and I took many nice vacations before being diagnosed, having serious cancer makes it easier to take the time and spend the money to travel.  Not only is Wynn is on-board with this notion, he encourages it.  In October we spent nearly two weeks in Spain. Neither of us had ever been there so we were excited about this new adventure.  Federico, tour guide extraordinaire            Because we'd had such a positive experience on our Rick Steves tour to Italy in 2013, we decided to sign up again.  He didn't let us down!  Our main tour guide, Frederico, was terrific.  He's so knowledgeable and shared much of Spain's history through well-crafted and well-executed storytelling. Our group had 16 members, mostly from the U.S.; two were from Canada and two from Australia. Like before, this was a really great collection of interesting people.        ...

     Until a few months ago, I didn't know that November is LUNG CANCER AWARENESS MONTH.  Apparently, not many other folks know this either. On October 1st, the first day of Breast Cancer Awareness month, there were splashy pink television, magazine, radio and newspaper public announcements letting us know how common breast cancer is, how to get screening mammograms and where to seek health care services.  They are wonderful notices...women telling women to take care of themselves. The iconic PINK RIBBON speaks for itself. Other than from lung cancer survivors, on November 1st, I didn't see any bump in lung cancer public announcements.       I've wondered why lung cancer doesn't get the same attention that breast cancer does. I've wondered because:  ...lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths among both men and women, ...it causes more deaths than breast, colon, prostate and pancreatic cancers  COMBINED, ...20% o...