(email update)

Hello,

Hope the summer has been well and kind to you. Felt it would be nice to take a moment to share an encouraging update, instead of just treatment changes.

To re-cap, at the end of spring, we reached a point for treatments whereby the general clinical practice was to randomly pull from a grab bag of choices.

No different from actions we observe in our daily lives, when decision making or planning takes too much effort because of variables and unknowns. Whereby the action is to simply draw a random page from the experience playbook. The catalog of actions that produced some result in some past; applicable or not, applied well or not. You see that in the boardroom, in a programmer that can’t think through a solution, in an athlete given hodgepodge training drills, in patients given multiple dissenting opinions, in kids tantrum of choice to; and in my brown thumb as I start with a green plant. Yes, they are all different in their needed level of thoroughness. But the action is the same, there is a yield to the random page of the playbook. Nothing wrong with that, it is life. But sometimes, the yield is too soon, because we choose not to ask the basic investigative questions. And using this random method does not personalize, and is never invested in answering the basic investigative question of who.

And so, back in spring, she was invited to dance a second time with the “red devil”, Dox. Because it was the best of what remained in the playbook, the big bad chemotherapy in the grab bag. In return, the price for the dance is evident in its nickname. We wanted other options, without veering into pseudo-science. And current research and in-progress study data showed an option which was applicable to Annie. We were glad our oncologist was flexible to change her mind and support it.

Since the treatment choice was not par for the course, Annie got the usual full body PET scan, as well as a scan of the liver at the end of last week. A shorter interval between scans than usual. There is no further progression, and there is a partial response. Of course the report would still start with “innumerable hypermetabolic lesions in the liver”. But latter lines would include “volume of hypermetabolic tissue appears to have decreased” and “decreased size and number of hepatic lesions”. Relief, and yes, smiles when looking at the scans.

I am under no illusion that things could have been otherwise. The research data showed that chance. And neither do we know how long this will be for. After some time, this line will fail, and more wounds will be inflicted, and the red devil will offer its wares again.

But till then, we are glad and thankful. We are glad to have had these days of summer. To have ice cream taste like ice cream. To have had side effects, even if not ideal, better than those of the grab bag. To have the means to even consider options. To not need to go into the hospital for IV chemo drips. To have been on the receiving end of cards written, things shared, errands run, treats baked and meals cooked; some by your children no less. To have the company I have to be with outdoors. To have your emails, texts, conversations, laughter. To have spent, and spending, time with you. To have your support, thank you.

They say time heals all wounds. It does not. Time is a shelf that holds all wounds, from the past, to the now, and those yet to come. A shelf you cannot just konmari away, because doing so would wipe away the tangled memories of happiness. It is love, be it by happenstance or choice, that heals and soothes wounds, while etching the arcs of happiness into our days.

so on this warm summer day, I wish you love,
–siang