Journal entry by Heather Keelty —
Hi everyone,
Its been a long time since we have updated you all and I hope this finds you all healthy. Overall, Justin is doing well as he continues his fight. He just completed his 6th of 24 rounds of his maintenance chemo- 1/4 the way done! Maintenance therapy has been a bit more challenging than we had expected, but we seem to have finally settled into relative stability. 🤞🤞 Justin tolerates his daily and weekly chemo meds well and receives monthly infusions along with some complementary drugs. His doctor has settled on a dose that seems to work for him, which is the challenge of this phase- they want to get as much chemo in him to minimize his chance of relapse, but not so much that he has all the same side effects as during his first phase of treatment (severe anemia, no immune system, scarily low platelets).
Life is busy with our 2 boys and that helps Justin and me as we adjust to life in this stage- he is still very much immunocompromised and we try our best to limit our exposures to many people with all the illness going around. We learned the hard way what it was like to be immunocompromised during the summer as he was pretty sick for 3+ months with one virus after another that he just couldnt kick. It brought him down hard but thankfully he has been feeling pretty well for about a month now. We are adjusting to how to navigate life in this state and are finding ways to see people in very small groups with the help of testing, trust and fresh air.
I wanted to just take a moment during this thanksgiving week to thank everyone again for your support over the past 15 months. Justin is a month or 2 away from his halfway mark through his treatment and we feel so grateful for all the love and support we have had through this. We couldnt have done it without you. As I am sure many other families in these situations feel, we feel grateful for every holiday, every milestone and every connection we have, as nothing is guaranteed. We are fortunate that Justin was diagnosed with a cancer that is treatable and that he was healthy at the start to endure this marathon treatment. And we are beyond lucky to have the family, friends and colleagues to help us along the way. Happy Thanksgiving to all of you and your families! We will cheers to you!
Its been a long time since we have updated you all and I hope this finds you all healthy. Overall, Justin is doing well as he continues his fight. He just completed his 6th of 24 rounds of his maintenance chemo- 1/4 the way done! Maintenance therapy has been a bit more challenging than we had expected, but we seem to have finally settled into relative stability. 🤞🤞 Justin tolerates his daily and weekly chemo meds well and receives monthly infusions along with some complementary drugs. His doctor has settled on a dose that seems to work for him, which is the challenge of this phase- they want to get as much chemo in him to minimize his chance of relapse, but not so much that he has all the same side effects as during his first phase of treatment (severe anemia, no immune system, scarily low platelets).
Life is busy with our 2 boys and that helps Justin and me as we adjust to life in this stage- he is still very much immunocompromised and we try our best to limit our exposures to many people with all the illness going around. We learned the hard way what it was like to be immunocompromised during the summer as he was pretty sick for 3+ months with one virus after another that he just couldnt kick. It brought him down hard but thankfully he has been feeling pretty well for about a month now. We are adjusting to how to navigate life in this state and are finding ways to see people in very small groups with the help of testing, trust and fresh air.
I wanted to just take a moment during this thanksgiving week to thank everyone again for your support over the past 15 months. Justin is a month or 2 away from his halfway mark through his treatment and we feel so grateful for all the love and support we have had through this. We couldnt have done it without you. As I am sure many other families in these situations feel, we feel grateful for every holiday, every milestone and every connection we have, as nothing is guaranteed. We are fortunate that Justin was diagnosed with a cancer that is treatable and that he was healthy at the start to endure this marathon treatment. And we are beyond lucky to have the family, friends and colleagues to help us along the way. Happy Thanksgiving to all of you and your families! We will cheers to you!
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