Does a Vacation Make Me Healthier?

…it sure seems like it does

I really doubt if my PSA or blood pressure or cholesterol level actually improves much when I go on vacation. A vacation rarely results in weight loss (just the opposite) but often does improve my tan and mental outlook. So I may or may not actually be healthier after a week or two of R and R.

We’ve been away from a very busy and stressful few months of moving, repairing the old and new houses, packing, hauling, unpacking, and building new rooms on the new house. The good news is that the move has happened and the new deadlines are now a little softer.

After two weeks of relaxing on the Arizona desert I’m sleeping better and longer, able to focus on doing absolutely nothing, and we hike and jeep on the desert every day. We even get lost now and then – but always find our way back home - it's actually fun.

Now we're back home in the Oregon rain, with a house full of boxes to be unpacked, and many, many, many large and small tasks to be done. But, in yet another month, we’re headed out for another short vacation. It seems to work for us.

If you should come across any evidence that indicates vacations are NOT good for mental and physical health – just keep it to yourself.

axman

Weight Loss - Blessing or Curse or ???

I'm finally losing some weight after all these years

And I'm not even trying. I gained about 20 pounds in the seven years since my PC diagnosis in 2003.

That wasn't good or healthy and I honestly tried to manage my eating and drinking and exercise - sort of. It was like, "The Devil made me do it" whatever IT was.

For the past six months Carol and I have been participating in a clinical trial focused on strength training and stretching. That's the only really different thing in our lives - except for moving this summer and fall. Losing 15 pounds puts me close to where I was and want to be. It's a far cry from my anorexic days of ultra running but it meets my relaxed old geezer standards.

Will I lose more, gain it back, or stay the same? Stay tuned.

axman

When the Meds Quit Working

You never know when it’s going to happen – but it will

It was a long seven years ago when I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. For the first year or two I was confident that I would be cured. My doctors were optimistic and all but guaranteed success with my prostatectomy and later with external beam radiation. But it came back. And there were no more surefire cures to try.

Next was a clinical trial – but I had to wait until my PSA was high enough to qualify – had to get unhealthier. The pill I took turned out to be about as effective as a sugar pill – but it didn’t taste as good. And my PSA just kept edging up. Five years into my cancer I started low-dose hormone pills and they kept my PSA at bay pretty well for a couple years. Now I’m taking slightly higher doses of hormones. I am happy that my PSA has been creeping up and not leaping up.

So what happens when the hormone pills don’t work any more (and that time WILL come)? I suppose I’ll get newer and more expensive meds to see if they help. Then there’s always chemo (I have too much hair anyway). With any luck I’ll keep trying newer and more exotic treatments until I’m about 90 and then somebody will finally find a cure. It could happen! The shock of that would probably give me a fatal heart attack.

axman

Who’s Taking Care Now?

Most of my life it was my turn, but…

The cycle of life is a bit strange – you start our being taken care of by your parents and 40 or 50 years later you may be taking care of them. In between you have your own kids and grandkids to care for. I was prepared for all those things to happen but now it appears that the next step (way down the line of course) will be somebody trying to take care of me.

Our kids are already talking about who will do what and when (probably the “why me” discussions). I don’t want to be taken care of – at least not for a long, long time. I’m not at all sure that I have the temperament to be taken care of (with the exception of doing whatever my wife tells me to do).

I don’t even want to think about the time when my cancer or some other nasty disease or condition will keep me from driving or making medical decisions or even walking.

Granted, planning ahead is a good idea but at some point it means giving up some of my independence. This is going to be a struggle. Or my mind may check out and I’ll never know the difference…

axman

Little Things are becoming More Important

Or it could be that’s all the energy I’ve got…

Maybe it’s just my senility kicking in but I’ve noticed that a lot of the good things in my life are really pretty simple and basic.

I’m probably getting a little more simple, too of course. In addition to my worldwide adventurous life (in my fantasies, anyway) I find that I enjoy:

• Taking a long walk with my wife (and maybe a dog or grandkid or friend from time to time)
• Sitting in the hot tub and sipping a hot mug of coffee at six in the A.M.
• Petting my pesky cat while she’s snoozing on my lap and I’m watching TV
• Nodding off in the recliner for an afternoon catnap – which doesn’t happen nearly enough
• Reading a trashy detective novel for a couple of hours of brain dead time

We still spend time with kids and grandkids, travel, go to concerts, jeep through the desert, and camp out in the mountains – we enjoy every minute of it. But the everyday low key activities (or non-activities) are probably just as enjoyable – and a whole lot cheaper. That’s got to be an upside to getting older.

axman

How Terribly Strange…

...to be seventy

With apologies to Paul Simon (Old Friends from the Bookends album 1968 when I was relatively young); it IS terribly strange. Never in my wildest dreams and fantasies did I ever imagine being seventy. Not that I planned an early demise; but being that old just never seemed real or important.

In my younger days (see, I sound old already) many of the seventy-year olds I knew seemed decrepit, senile, and sometimes couldn’t even care for themselves - at least it seemed that way to me. Just like my kids and grandkids think of me now – at least sometimes. Certainly not all septuagenarians are frail, but numbers count – retirement age, Social Security, and Medicare are based on age and mortality tables. The government is betting we die before we collect very much. Ha! I'm already collecting!

Various and sundry body parts don’t work as well as when I was a mere 50 or 60 but I’m still able to walk and chew gum at the same time – if I’m real careful. Strangely, I don’t feel old (except for those sore knees and arthritic hands and a slipped disc or two). I’m almost always able to find my way home from the grocery store; but just in case there’s a problem I carry a GPS in the car with a Go Home button. It doesn't hurt to be prepared.

When do I start feeling really old? When did you? Let me know. Tell me twice; I’ll probably forget the first time.

axman

Moving On – More or Less

No, not moving on to a better world; just a better location. Maybe this 26th move will be the last one…

We’re moving in a month or so – lots of people move every day so it’s not really a very big deal. For the past 19 years we’ve lived in the same place. We didn’t plan it that way; it just happened. That’s a record for us. A quick count in my head (always open to review) came up with 26 different places I’ve lived during my life. There may have been more – the 60s and 70s are kind of hazy. Sometimes it was only across the street and sometimes it was 2,000 or 3,000 miles.

This time it’s only seven miles. No big deal geographically. But it seems like a major event. Maybe it’s just that we’re older, sicker, and more tired. And there’s a few tons of junk to deal with – do we trash it, garage sale it, put it on Craig’s list, abandon it, or move it? We’re moving into the country – six wooded acres.

The plan (assuming it works out) is that this will be our last move – until that move to the County Home for the Helplessly Senile, of course. We’ll have plenty of space for us, kids, grandkids, and friends; not to mention dogs, cats, goats and all that privacy. We can do all sorts of strange and exotic things and nobody can see us!

axman

Maybe the PSA saves lives after all - NCI study

Federal Government Reverses Course,Now Sees Benefit of PSA Testing...
NCI Admits its Previous Prostate Cancer Study was ‘Contaminated’ Following the Release of New Data that Shows PSA Test Saves Lives

The nation’s leading authority on cancer has thrown out its own study on prostate cancer screening, now saying that PSA testing reduces the prostate cancer death rate by nearly 50 percent.

In its July 13th bulletin, the National Cancer Institute says findings from the Göteborg Randomized Population-Based Prostate Cancer Screening Trial - a study NCI partially funded in Sweden - shows “PSA screening substantially improves cancer-specific survival without the extent of over-diagnosisand overtreatment.” The Swedish study showed testing reduces the prostate cancer mortality rate by 44 percent. That prompted NCI to admit there was a “significant amount of contamination” in its earlier Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian study (PLCO), which suggested there was no mortality benefit with the PSA test.“Careless mistakes like this may be costing men their lives. You can’t publish that there is no value in getting tested if you don’t have the right data to back that claim up,” said Skip Lockwood, ZERO’s CEO.

“Admitting you were wrong is the first step - the American Cancer Society has yet to swallow its pride and come clean – so now NCI needs to take action to make things right,” said Lockwood.
In the bulletin, NCI says the PLCO data was contaminated because of “men in the trial who had already undergone screening with a PSA test, which a number of researchers have said may preclude the trial from ever demonstrating a cancer-specific survival improvement.” Regarding its new data from the Swedish study, NCI goes on to quote Dr. Eric Klein of the Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute who says the “data suggesting that a baseline PSA in men in their 40s and subsequent PSA velocity (the rate of increase in PSA levels) can predict both lifetime risk of developing cancer and potentially lethal cancers.”

Why are Sick Old Men so Damn Funny?

…at least they THINK they are

Of course I’ve always considered myself wittier than the average geezer (my wife says half-witty) but recently I’ve noticed that most of the old guys I talk to who have prostate cancer are always laughing and joking. They seem to share a set of common characteristics:

• They are very knowledgeable about their condition and know what treatments have been tried, which worked (a little), and what their prognosis is so there are no surprises or illusions
• They are willing and able to discuss prostate cancer intelligently with anybody and don’t get into ‘poor me’ scenarios
• They are mostly cool, calm, and good natured
• And they have an underplayed, wicked, irreverent, dark sense of humor – particularly regarding their incurable condition. Jokes about incontinence and impotence abound (not much else can be done about these conditions at this point). Side effects, such as enlarged breasts, also make for witty, if not politically correct, repartee.

Is this the result of denial or senility? Possibly. Should we all be more serious? Maybe, but I don’t think so. Laughter is good medicine; even when it comes from bad jokes and unpunny puns. And we need all the good medicine we can get.

There will be plenty of time to worry and be serious later. There is NO evidence that being sane and serious lengthens life. So for now, let the pun times roll!

axman

You Sure Don’t Look Terminal

Prostate cancer doesn’t make you look very sick…

Whenever I go to one of my doctor’s offices (a disgustingly common occurrence) there will be people in the waiting room in wheel chairs, on crutches, holding oxygen tanks, coughing, bandaged from head to foot, or just sitting with a totally vacant stare. But I (prostate cancer and all) don’t show even the slightest symptom (unless you count gray hair and wrinkles)! I seem out of place around all those sick people.

When I’m around friends or in classes or even meeting people at social events and the conversation comes around to cancer (it always seems to among the old folks in my social circle) I answer their questions about my cancer. Then there’s always the, “Now way,” “Can’t be,” “You don’t look sick,” and “Are you sure” statements. Maybe if I was pale or limped or drooled (more)… I DO have a scar but don’t usually offer to display it in polite company or during casual conversations.

Most cancers, of course, don’t have a lot of visible symptoms – and in fact that’s not really so bad at all. Believe me, I’m happy with my invisible symptoms and hope I never get to the point when I’m obviously sick – even if it means not getting a lot of heartfelt sympathy.

axman