Still not learning patience

I am so angry right now I could just pop.

I think we have good news about Kurt's treatment. BUT, I have no idea whether or not the news we have means anything. And you would think that in an entire CANCER CENTER I could find one doctor/nurse/security guard to answer ONE SIMPLE QUESTION, but no. So I am fuming.

Here's the situation. Tumors (some? all? I have no idea.) emit proteins called tumor markers. As Kurt mentioned, our doctor requested that last week's blood work also include a test on the tumor markers. Evidently, these tests don't get run every day, like the normal blood work, so it took a bit of time to get the results back. Yesterday, our nurse told us that one of the markers, which was 391.1 when Kurt was diagnosed, is now down to 132.8. This seems like INCREDIBLE news, but I honestly can not get anyone to explain to me what it means.

Does it mean the chemo is working? Maybe. But, Kurt's tests have lots of numbers that can jump around for lots of different reasons. Is this one of them? Don't know. How reliable of a predictor is this? Don't know. How much progress does this represent? Don't know. The normal level for this particular marker, for a person that doesn't have cancer, is 2.5 or less. Given that, 391.1 seems staggeringly high, and a more than 200 point drop seems MAJOR. But, for example, if it were the case that people with Stage IV cancer usually have markers of 5000, then this decline wouldn't be that big, relatively speaking. But I don't know how high the number can range for cancer patients. I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING!! [I am almost breaking my keyboard as I type this.]

We are hoping for a call from the doctor today, and I know he has a huge patient load. But there is a good chance that we won't hear from him until Friday, which is approximately 950,123 years from right now. I really wanted to put up a post that said "yay! Making progress!!" but I just don't know what these numbers mean. The nurse told us that our doctor says this is "good news" but what kind of good news? Good news like "hey, Kurt has lots of energy - that's great" or good news like "holy crap we are slapping this tumor back to the pit of hell where it belongs"??!!??

So, sorry for the temper tantrum but A) I know people are eager to hear of any indication of Kurt's progress; and B) let's be honest, some of you out there get really disappointed if I don't periodically flip out about things. It is part of my charm ;)

You now know what we know. I remain perfectly at peace with the conviction that Kurt will win this battle, and I know that I can take that promise on faith alone. But it is hard not to latch onto whatever evidence I can get my hands on. So I am impatient. The upshot is that Kurt is not nearly as melodramatic as I am, so he remains calm and patient. I am endeavoring to follow his lead, but ... um... may need to try a little harder.