Shocking Beat?

In between classes yesterday, I had a quick conversation with my father to get an update on his prognosis and chemo treatment.

He's been in a positive mood since getting the lung cancer diagnosis about four months ago, which is good to have. Not a lot of side effects, amazingly, from the chemotherapy and radiation.

He went in for a checkup and x-rays as well as an initial scan of the chest area to see how the golf-ball sized tumor had either grown, shrunk, or metastasized.

There was one slight problem, though.

They couldn't find it.

No trace of remaining tumor.

It might still be there, but much smaller, and it may require a further PET scan to confirm everything, but the fact that it was easily visible before and can't be seen now is somewhat amazing.

Now, neither they (nor we) are ready to say that it's in remission or anything, but considering the initial survival expectancy of stage 3 lung cancer and clogged heart valves was in the single digits, it's a remarkable turnaround.

Next week, he'll be going with my uncle to Hawaii. I just hope he doesn't do anything stupid like get on a surfboard or climb a volcano or something. It's hard not to blame him for feeling slightly superhuman at the moment even as we remain guardedly optimistic.

It's not over yet, but it's shaping up to be a hard-fought battle after all.