[nfb-talk] Asking for prayers

[Sarah Baughn]

Joseph, I am so sorry to hear this, and I'm also very sorry that I have been 
delayed in my response to this, but you can count on my prayers.  I was down 
in Louisiana at that time, but now am home catching up on email, and will 
include you in my rosary today.
Sarah
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "T. Joseph Carter" <carter.tjoseph at gmail.com>
To: "NFB of Oregon mailing list" <nfb-or at nfbnet.org>; <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2010 2:00 AM
Subject: [nfb-talk] Asking for prayers


> Hi everyone,
>
> Word's already circulating to some extent, but I wanted to wait until they 
> had done some tests so we know what we're dealing with.
>
> I won't be attending national convention this year, because I found out on 
> 6/21 that I have an unusual cancer called a sarcoma.  Being me, it would 
> figure that this particular cancer is quite rare, even among other 
> sarcomas.  The good news is that there is no metastasis (spreading to 
> other organs) which is one of those things that cause them to start giving 
> you survival statistics.
>
> The other bit of good news is that being the rare sort of cancer that it 
> is, it's located in fat tissue.  Even though it's a 7 cm tumor of what 
> they call intermediate grade, because it hasn't spread it's not the kind 
> of thing that would become life-threatening with modern cancer treatment.
>
> Being in fat tissue, obviously there will be surgery to remove the tumor 
> and some surrounding healthy fat tissue.  There will probably be radiation 
> and a pretty good chance of chemotherapy as well.  People react to these 
> differently, but aside from my weight I'm actually very healthy, which 
> works in my favor.  (I did of course suggest that the doctors could remove 
> extra fat tissue during the surgery, you know, just to make sure they got 
> it all!)
>
> The question remaining is what order do we do the things that we are 
> likely to do?  Emerging research says that chemo before surgery might give 
> me a lower chance of recurrence in the future, but the chance might 
> already be so low that giving me some relief might be in order.
>
> I see a medical oncologist tomorrow after OHSU's sarcoma conference meets 
> to discuss cases like mine.  My surgical oncologist has already consulted 
> at least one other sarcoma specialist from Baltimore.  So really, I have a 
> team of experts in this kind of cancer treating me, and they are 
> consulting with other teams.
>
> Even so, this is pretty serious, so I welcome your prayers.  I'll miss you 
> guys (and the wardrobe update of blindness-related T-shirts of course! 
> *grin*
>
> Joseph
>
>
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