Eric Marquardt

Eric Marquardt is the most amazing and bravest man EVER!! Many of you probably already know his story, but.......


November 2014 Eric went to the ER for severe lower side pain. ER sent him home with pain meds and an appointment for a colonoscopy. At the colonoscopy the Dr. told us "I can't tell you this is cancer for sure without a biopsy, but if it isn't then you are the luckiest man ever and need to go get a lottery ticket". The biopsy confirmed it was cancer. Eric had surgery to remove the tumor and a foot of his colon. The tumor was the size of a clementine and the cancer had spread to "many" lymph nodes. Due to the size and the spread to the lymph nodes This classifies Eric having stage 3 colon cancer.  Eric started Chemo January--June 2015. He was able to work about 3 months of that. He was such an amazing trooper and warrior. His Dr. and us are so proud of him.


Then the "3 month wait"....this is where cancer patients have blood work and possibly a scan....and wait to see if there is still cancer....


Eric was able to return to work in August 2015. During this "3 month wait" Eric's blood work continued to creep up. Finally the Dr. ordered a PET CT scan. Unfortunately there were 2 new spots where the incisions were from the previous surgery.  So back to surgery he went. October 2015 Eric had surgery to remove the 2 new tumors. After healing from surgery came radiation and chemo. December 2015--February 2016 Eric had 6 weeks of radiation and more chemo. But this time the chemo was in pill form and much easier on him.  This classifies Eric having stage 4 colon cancer. Eric was able to return to work in February 2016.


After Eric had healed from the radiation we started the "3 months wait"......


July 2016 Eric's blood work came back higher than it had ever been.  Then came the PET CT scan. The scan showed another spot where the original tumor was. Once again off to surgery. August 2016 Eric had surgery to remove this tumor. During surgery the Dr. saw that the tumor was not operable. The tumor was much larger than the scan had shown, it is wrapped around a major artery and lymph nodes, and is extremely hard. His surgeon and oncologist felt that at this point removing it would be too dangerous. This classifies Eric having stage 4 non-operable colon cancer.