Then came Large Bcell Lymphoma, and then came Hodgkins. My mother is a young 75 yr old women. She was first diagnosed with CLL approx 12 years ago. Her battle with chemo treatments started approximately 8 years ago, first with a pill, then the chemo IV, and various other. Approx 3 years ago she was diagnosed with Large B-Cell Lymphoma, and then approximately a month afterwards, with Hodgkins. She has had quite the battle, and doing very well at times.
However, within the past 6 months I have watched her continually go downhill with her health. (Oh, I forgot to mention, she had open heart surgery a year ago to replace a heart valve). The chemo treatments have been very hard on her, especially vincristine, which started to effect her liver and kidneys. Then the doctors attempted IV of Rituxan, which made her have many side effects, so this was stopped. I was told there was a window of prognosis of 1 to 2 months for her, more probably less than 2 months. In the meantime, we have been sent to another doctor for a 2nd opinion, to which he has performed a bone marrow biopsy, (which she NEVER had at any point of her diagnosis), and another pet scan. Bone marrow came back with 40% CLL. Pet scan showed inflamation in the colon/intestines -- colonoscopy performed, pinhead like ulcers are all over her colon, so a biopsy was taken. The new doctor has indicated he may be able to come up with another chemo treatment for her. If this can extend her prognosis, and give her quality of life, I say go for it. But I care for her daily, and watch her suffer with a little bit of pain, as well as she tends to run low grade fevers, her BP is low, to which she is given IV to hydrate her, her potassium is low, so she is supplemented, and she does not much of an appetite, and when she does eat, food tends to go right through her. She is beginning to loose approx 5-10 lbs a week.
She was very week, and at one point, approximately 2 weeks ago, I was home alone with her, and feared she would not make it through the weekend. But, thank god she did. She does sleep alot, but as of lately, has been a bit more awake. She is somewhat weak, so if I do take her out, she is in a wheel chair now, and when we go to appointments, she is in a wheelchair as well. She does have occasional bowel mishaps, but this also seems to have improved.
Is it common for someone to have prognosis like this, and then suddenly appear to be getting somewhat better? I realize I need to talk to the doctor about this, but it gets my hopes up, only to get knocked back down again. I do realize, I can only take one day a time, and be grateful for each day we all have left with her. I hate to see her suffer at times. She also does not want to know her prognosis, which I am pretty sure she is aware of what is happening.