James (Jim) Boehm JimBoehm

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So...it has been a stressful time.  As most of you know, we are a busy family with 3 boys.  We just lost my dad to liver cancer after a 3 year battle in May.  We hadn't really had time to process when Jim started having severe stomache pains in July and was hospitalized for about 5 days.  They diagnosed him with diverticulitis and severe colon absesses. The drs said we have to give it a month to heal the infection and then have a colonoscopy to see what is going on inside.   On Aug 17th, he was able to have a successful colonoscopy.  The dr told us that he had a large malignancy.  He ordered ct scans of chest, pelvis, and abdomen. The next day, we saw a colorectal surgeon.  He told us that he had a very large mass, as big as his fist, nearly blocking his colon.  He also told us that he had a spot of cancer on his lung and one on his liver.   We were devastated.  This meant he had stage IV colon cancer.  He referred us to a medical oncologist and a radiation oncologist to try and shrink the colon tumor and take care of the other two.  We met with the radiation oncologist.  He recommended 5 weeks of 5x a week radiation to colon tumor. The medical oncologist recommended chemo via a port introduced on Mon and carried with him until Fri, for at least 5 weeks.  They both recommended a pet scan to see if lung was indeed cancer.  If it was, they wanted to have it removed first. He had the pet scan the following week and hurray!!!! Lung was not cancer!  It seems to be scar tissue from a previous infection.  Thank God! Now the next hurdle is the liver.  It doesn't show well in pet scans so we have to have an mri of that, which wr will do this Fri.  Please continue to pray for good results.  If it is negative too, it will make his battle so much more easy.  He has been very exhausted for about 6 months and has to be on a low residue diet to avoid blocking the colon anymore.  Our best chance for beating this is reducing it as much as possible before we excise it but if it blocks completely before that we won't be able to wait.  We have been so blessed by so much love and support by our family and friends.  I will keep you all updated. Friends are also setting up a site to volunteer as so many people want to help. Jim's family is organizing a spaghetti dinner to help.  We could not get through this without the love, help and prayers of our amazing friends and family.