Melanoma: The Long Road

I am sitting in a hospital room watching my son slowly fade away. He is forty-one years old. Melanoma is stealing this brilliant, funny man from our family.

Five years ago we started this journey. That was the first round of two surgeries and chemo using the harsh old drug Interferon. It was a tough battle and as we watched Brad waste away to 130 pounds, we feared we would lose him.  After six months he called us and said he couldn’t go on. We understood his despair of the constant nausea and vomiting which led to him sleeping on his bathroom floor at times. We supported his decision and felt like our hearts had turned to lead.

At his next appointment with his onocologist, his blood work was normal, when they scheduled him for a scan, that came back with no cancer noted in his body. He was cancer free and we rejoiced. He went back to school for computer programming and landed a job at Jenni-O as a supervisor. He was happy with his life and was back in the swing of things with his friends. Cancer was banished to the back burner for four wonderful years.

On April 18th this year, our lives changed dramatically. He arrived at our house to tell us after routine blood work and a pet scan his cancer was back with a vengeance. It had stealthy crept into his lungs, liver, lymph nodes, abdomen and even settled in the atrium of his heart. As a nurse, I knew the prognosis would be extremely poor.

With a new onocologist following his case, (his first one had retired), he was given the option of immunotherapy. Brad jumped at the chance. When he arrived at the clinic to do the first treatment, they found his abdomen was full of fluid. Brad was scheduled for a tap of his abdomen to drain the fluid. They got 3.5 liters. He felt much better and the first dose of chemo began. He tolerated it well and it was a great relief to the family. The joy was short-lived as his abdomen kept filling with fluid and every three to four days it was drained. It took it’s toll on him. The pain increased and he was short of breath. Finally he landed in the hospital.

He has now been in the hospital nine days. He has a drain to remove the abdominal fluid. There is also increased pain so there are more pain meds. He sleeps more. The weight loss has begun again as food is no longer appealing and he is usually nauseated or too full of pain to enjoy eating.

I watch in disbelief as he drifts quietly away. His voice is no longer robust and he speaks in sparse sentences. He has no interest in TV or anything else. Sleep is his escape from the symptoms that he experiences.

There is an infection in his abdominal fluid so he has been treated with antibiotics. His bowels are sluggish as one tumor has wrapped itself around the colon. He is exhausted even walking to the bathroom as his lung capacity is diminished due to the tumors residing there. He needs two people to accomplish the most minimal tasks for moving. Melanoma moves rapidly once it takes hold and races through the body. It is an unforgiving disease.

Now I am sure you think I am going to lecture you about sun screen, hats and tanning booths but I am not. Melanoma can result from something as simple as a sunburn as a child. We have no idea what led to Brad’s encounter with melanoma. It just happened. He did the same things as his brother and sister. He played outside, he worked outside for his employment and he spent leisure hours in the sun. His siblings did the same. For some reason, Brad was the one to develop this type of cancer.

I sit in his hospital room now and help the nurses turn him, I help walk Brad to the bathroom, I set up his meals so they are easier to eat even if only takes a few bites, I stare out the window at the sun today and I think about the yard at home and how it needs to be mowed, the gardens that need to be weeded and new plants that need to get in the soil. My work for the USDA is piling up and deadlines are looming on the horizon. I worry about the money we are spending to stay day after day to be at his side. I sleep poorly when I do finally get to bed. I watch my son wither away.

Melanoma is an equal opportunity disease and quietly steals into your body to rob you of your life. It really takes no prisoners, it just claims their lives and continues on to the next person. It is a true killer that no one can stop yet.