Justin Beins

A quick note on how we landed here and hopeful words of encouragement for anyone else who may be going through this as well.  

Justin had been battling for some time back pain, chest pain and shortness of breath.  Due to family history we were focusing on his heart and thinking that is where our attention needed to be.  He had been visiting the Dr. since early August to help diagnose, treat and alleviate the pain he was having.  Including a physical in late October.  On the night of 11/6 and morning of 11/7 Justin's pain became unbearable and had him hunched over unable to cope or manage.  I decided enough and took him to the ER.  It was there we learned he had Testicular Cancer.  With a typical age range of 20-39 (from what I have read and I am no where near a Dr. as we all so I will do my best to only explain what we have found as it pertains to Justin) Justin is 36 so at the older end of the spectrum on this disease.  Thus this was overlooked at the previous Dr. appointments as a diagnosis.  We want to emphasize here that we are told Testicular Cancer is a very treatable cancer. 

While at the ER we also learned his lymph nodes were 10 times the usual size and that the cancer had spread.  With constant chest pain we feared this nasty thang was in his chest as that is where it typically likes to climb if not addressed.  We were sent to Kansas City Urology which happened to be in the same building and decided on an immediate course of action. 

Justin had an Orchiectomy on 11/7 (testicle removal- insert one testicle joke here) which helped alleviate his pain which was welcomed and we then assessed the next course of action.  Thankfully his chest CT came back clean and was the most welcomed news.  The cancer remains in his upper abdomen, we are treating this with three Chemotherapy drugs and started this treatment on 12/11.   The drug protocol we are following is as suggested for his specific level of cancer from Mayo Clinic and MD Anderson.  The plan as of now is three rounds.  Each rounds consists of one full week Monday thru Friday 8 a.m.- 5 p.m. with two follow up Mondays of treatment that are a couple hours each.  We are hopeful to kick the cancer out of his body after the second round and really tell it what's up with the third round.  If we can stay the course, have the intended results, we will be complete with treatment on 2/5 and looking forward to steering clear of hospitals. 

We thank you all for the support, love and encouragement.  

One Love (JB style) 

Tammy and Justin Beins