Lost a friend yesterday

I hate to post this, but I lost a friend yesterday to prostate cancer. He was not on the forum but he was close to me. Mike (his name) was 49 years old and diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer in June 2009. He and I joked because our numbers were so close yet I survived and didn't. We need to continue praying for our brothers fighting this disease. I would love to see us all live long and prosperous lives. We shall beat PCa.

peace and love
Dale

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My PSA at diagnosis was 16.3
age 47 (current)

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/dalechildress

My gleason score from prostate was 4+5=9 and from the lymph nodes (3 positive) was 4+4=8
I had 44 IMRT's
Casodex
Currently on Lupron
I go to The Cancer Treatment Center of America
Married with two kids
latest PSA 5-27-08 0.11

PSA July 24th, 2008 is 0.04
PSA Dec 16th, 2008 is .016
PSA Mar 30th, 2009 is .02
PSA July 28th 2009 is .01
PSA OCt 15th 2009 is .11
PSA Jan 15th 2010 is .13

Testosterone keeps rising, the current number is 156, up from 57 in May

T level dropped to 37 Mar 30th, 2009
cancer in 4 of 6 cores
92%
80%
37%
28%

Sorry to hear that, Dale. My the Lord comfort his family, and bring peace to them. I hate this PC, and for all the brothers we lose to it.

David in SC

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Age: 57, 56 dx, PSA: 7/07 5.8, 7/08 12.3, 9/08 14.5, 10/08 16.3
3rd Biopsy: 9/08 - 7/7 Positive, 40-90% Cancer, Gleason 4+3
Open RP: 11/08, Rht nerves saved, 4 days in hospt, on catheters for 63 days, 5th one out 1/09
Path Rpt: Gleason 3+4, pT2c, 42g, 20% cancer, 1 pos margin

Dale may peace come to his family and you as his friend. I know he must a valued your frienship. Somehow some where there must be a way to advance treatment for PC. the public think it's the most treatable cancer. My heart hurts for this young man's family.

Jeff T
Cajun Country

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Hi Dale,
This is Larry from Cincinnati, we spoke a couple times on the phone (thanks for your help!). Sorry to hear about your friend .. may the good Lord be with him and his family! I hope you're doing better since returning from Zion! Keep the faith and fight the good fight!

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Age:58  PSA 8/06 8.74,  10/09 7.46,  12/22 6.50 Needle Biopsy  11/10/09: 16/16 cores positive 2 - 85% of tissue,

Gleason score 7 (3+4 with tertiary pattern 5). CT,Bone, and PET scans all negative.

Da Vinci laparoscopic prostatectomy performed on Jan. 07, 2010 at IU Simon Cancer Center…  Indianapolis, IN  Prostate size: 42 g Gleason score (primary + secondary):  4 + 3 = 7

Primary pattern (%):4, 60%  Secondary pattern (%): 3, 35%   Tertiary pattern (if present) (%): 5, 5%

Histologic type: Adenocarcinoma   Variant histology present: No   Multifocality: Yes

Extraprostatic extension: Yes   Seminal vesicle invasion: No   Cancer at surgical margin:No  

Bladder neck involvement: No    Lymph-vascular invasion: No    Perineural invasion: Yes

Catheter removed Jan-19-10  Dry Nights 2 pads/day  Baseline PSA checkup appt 2/3/10

 

darn PC ! Just makes me want to fight it all the more.

It also makes me more vocal about telling all my friends about PSA testing. I also did not tell anyone except immediate family and 3 or 4 close friends initially. Now, I am telling everyone.

Maybe I can save 1 man from a premature death.

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Goodlife

Dale,
Sorry about losing a friend. May the Lord provide comfort and healing to his family and friends. Hopefully someday a cure will be found for this horrible cancer.

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Age: 67 at Dx on 12/30/08
PSA 9/05 1.15; 8/06 1.45; 12/07 2.41; 8/08 3.9; 11/08 3.5 free PSA 11%
2 cores out of 12 were positive Gleason (4+4) and (4+5)
Negative CT scan and bone scan done on 1/16
Robotic surgery performed 2/9/09 Dr Fagin, Austin TX
Pathology report:
Prostate weighed 57 grams size:5.2 x 5.0 x 4.9 cm
Posterior lateral lesions measuring 1.5 x 1.4 x 1.0 cm showing focal capsular penetration over a distance of 3mm in circumference.
Prostatic adenocarciroma accounts for approx. 10-20% of the hemisphere.
Gleason 4+4
both nerve bundles removed,
pT3a Nx Mx, Negative margins
seminal vesicles clean, lymph nodes: not dissected
continent after 4 months
8 weeks PSA test 4/7/09 result <0.1
5 months PSA test 7/9/09 result <0.1
8 months PSA test 10/9/09 result <0.1
11.5 months test 1/21/10 result 0.004

So sorry to of the loss of your friend to PCa Dale. Hope that his family has support as they go thru this. Thanks for sharing a friends story with us as well.

Sorry to here about your loss. My thoughts and prayers are with your friends family and with you. Someday there will be no loss from this disease.

Very sorry to hear about Mike. Glad he had a close friend to talk with and not go it alone.

Our thoughts will be for him tonight,
Jake

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Diagnosed 8/2008 Pre-op psa 4.2, Age 60 at dx
7 of 12 biopsies positive 3+3
DaVinci LRP 11/08
Post Op pathology clear margins, confined to prostate, absent extraprostatic extension, vascular or perineural. Gleason 3+4=7, 5-10% of 4 and location in right mid-gland.
3 month psa .1 2/09, 6 month .1 5/09, 9 month .2 8/09
broke ankle bones 6/09
9/21/09 Bone scan clear, psa still .2
11/12/09 chest xray was clear, psa however up to .3,
01/05/10 psa still .3, radiation setup done with tats, 01/19/10 started 39 sessions 70.2gy

thanks fellows for all the care and concern. We are all in this together. This forum is awesome.

peace to you
dale

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My PSA at diagnosis was 16.3
age 47 (current)

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/dalechildress

My gleason score from prostate was 4+5=9 and from the lymph nodes (3 positive) was 4+4=8
I had 44 IMRT's
Casodex
Currently on Lupron
I go to The Cancer Treatment Center of America
Married with two kids
latest PSA 5-27-08 0.11

PSA July 24th, 2008 is 0.04
PSA Dec 16th, 2008 is .016
PSA Mar 30th, 2009 is .02
PSA July 28th 2009 is .01
PSA OCt 15th 2009 is .11
PSA Jan 15th 2010 is .13

Testosterone keeps rising, the current number is 156, up from 57 in May

T level dropped to 37 Mar 30th, 2009
cancer in 4 of 6 cores
92%
80%
37%
28%

My prayers go out to the family..."again gone too soon".  A reminder pc survivors, keep the faith.  Education awareness is very important, often u hear u will die of something else other than pc...as witnessed that's not always the case.  If it wasn't for my family, friends, support centers (especially healing well) and most of all God..I know i would'nt make it.....Lucious

 

Thoughts and prayers go out to you Dale and to the family of your friend.

 

Dale,
I did not see this till just now. I am very sorry for the loss. My prayers for his family and friends will be done.

Peace...

Tony

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Prostate Cancer Forum Co-Moderator

Dale,

Chris, these nanograms and other stat generators are just numbers, not people. I don't know the facts here, perhaps Dale will share them, but with an agressive cancer, there is no guaranteed 100% five year survival for anyone. Doesn't work that way, too many other factors in the mix. I think that people get a feeling of complancy with cancer because they formulate a positive survival number. Prostate Cancer is an evil beast, it does what it wants, and when it wants. It doesn't care about stats or percentages. Each human body reacts differently when cancer is in the body.

David in SC

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Age: 57, 56 dx, PSA: 7/07 5.8, 7/08 12.3, 9/08 14.5, 10/08 16.3
3rd Biopsy: 9/08 - 7/7 Positive, 40-90% Cancer, Gleason 4+3
Open RP: 11/08, Rht nerves saved, 4 days in hospt, on catheters for 63 days, 5th one out 1/09
Path Rpt: Gleason 3+4, pT2c, 42g, 20% cancer, 1 pos margin

Baloney,  Purgatory.  This is an extremely rare situation.  Besides,  he is scaring the crap out of the newly dx. people with posts like this.  There is no constructive benefit to these types of posts.

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Dx 42

Unfortunately Chris,
This is cancer. There are NO 100%'s in five years regardless of Gleason/PSA or any predictive marker we have. That stated, Dale has metastatic lymphatic invasion and G9 PCa. So if his friend had those numbers, he was very high risk. Dale has responded well to treatment (Amen for that).

Studies you read have very limited participation. The current population of PCa survivors is 2.8 million in the US. A study of 15,000 men will miss many cases that are exceptions, a study of 280 is an error rate of P=0.001. We just had a lady posting here whose husband was screened clean at age 45, and passed away at 51. By all accounts that should not happen when you read certain studies. It just does...

We deal in probabilities with this disease. No guarantees...

I hate this stupid disease.

I spoke to Brian, one of Walter's (War eagle) friends two months ago. He is still with us and being stubborn against this disease...God love him. His wife posted on my blog about the same time frame. In his last blog post in July his PSA was still climbing at 111. He was headed in for a second round of Chemo.

Tony

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Prostate Cancer Forum Co-Moderator

Post Edited (TC-LasVegas) : 2/3/2010 5:09:12 PM (GMT-7)

Chris, this is reality for some. Agressive cancers do as they please. Dale's posting of losing a deal friend of this horrible cancer is very appropriate and needed here. It's not all sunshine and happy endings. PC still claims nearly 30,000 lives a year in this country alone.

While its good to here good news and good reports and encouraging developments with the treatments and the cures, this cancer is still affecting so many lives, and still takes too many good men with it. It's better now than it use to be, but still way too many die.

So I don't think it baloney at all. Dying of PC is not rare, its way too common in the cancer deaths of men. That's why I am all about early testing, and appropriate treatments, and public awareness. Too many people are lulled into thinking PC is the "easy" cancer, the "good" cancer, the "slow moving cancer". While it often is, it's not always the case.

David in SC

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Age: 57, 56 dx, PSA: 7/07 5.8, 7/08 12.3, 9/08 14.5, 10/08 16.3
3rd Biopsy: 9/08 - 7/7 Positive, 40-90% Cancer, Gleason 4+3
Open RP: 11/08, Rht nerves saved, 4 days in hospt, on catheters for 63 days, 5th one out 1/09
Path Rpt: Gleason 3+4, pT2c, 42g, 20% cancer, 1 pos margin

Well said, David.
Prostate cancer is the #2 cause of cancer mortality in men. I saw somewhere that more than half of those cases were within the first 7 years of detection. But I can't find that presentation.

Sorry for stating facts. We have a good reason to be hopeful. A vast majority will survive this disease. As my saying goes ~ Stay Positive.

Tony

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Prostate Cancer Forum Co-Moderator

I agree with your positive tone, Tony, in your continued efforts to learn and educate others about this cancer. It's always better to report good news or a good result, but that's just part of the mix in living with cancer. Many will survive their PC, and live on, and die of something totally unrelated.

David in SC

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Age: 57, 56 dx, PSA: 7/07 5.8, 7/08 12.3, 9/08 14.5, 10/08 16.3
3rd Biopsy: 9/08 - 7/7 Positive, 40-90% Cancer, Gleason 4+3
Open RP: 11/08, Rht nerves saved, 4 days in hospt, on catheters for 63 days, 5th one out 1/09
Path Rpt: Gleason 3+4, pT2c, 42g, 20% cancer, 1 pos margin

Thanks for all the post and I do apologize if this was deemed inappropriate for some. To offer some clarity to Mike's situation. He was diagnosed 7 months ago with lymph node and bone mets. He did not have insurance and was rather poor. He was treated however it was to late and he did not respond. The sad fact is he did die of prostate cancer. This is mean disease and we should not let our guard down.
Again thanks to all for posting, I love all of you and appreciate every point of view .That is what makes this forum so good.

peace to all
Dale

---

My PSA at diagnosis was 16.3
age 47 (current)

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/dalechildress

My gleason score from prostate was 4+5=9 and from the lymph nodes (3 positive) was 4+4=8
I had 44 IMRT's
Casodex
Currently on Lupron
I go to The Cancer Treatment Center of America
Married with two kids
latest PSA 5-27-08 0.11

PSA July 24th, 2008 is 0.04
PSA Dec 16th, 2008 is .016
PSA Mar 30th, 2009 is .02
PSA July 28th 2009 is .01
PSA OCt 15th 2009 is .11
PSA Jan 15th 2010 is .13

Testosterone keeps rising, the current number is 156, up from 57 in May

T level dropped to 37 Mar 30th, 2009
cancer in 4 of 6 cores
92%
80%
37%
28%

Dale, it was most appropriate for your original post. While most of us didn't know your dear friend, he was still a brother to us in this war with Prostate Cancer. His case and his story is important to tell and to remember. I am still sorry that you lost him at such a young age. I hope his family and loved ones are taking it the best that they can. My best to you to Dale. Keep the faith and the courage, brother.

David in SC

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Age: 57, 56 dx, PSA: 7/07 5.8, 7/08 12.3, 9/08 14.5, 10/08 16.3
3rd Biopsy: 9/08 - 7/7 Positive, 40-90% Cancer, Gleason 4+3
Open RP: 11/08, Rht nerves saved, 4 days in hospt, on catheters for 63 days, 5th one out 1/09
Path Rpt: Gleason 3+4, pT2c, 42g, 20% cancer, 1 pos margin