ianunderhill vs. cancer (RIP Nick)

Thanks for letting us help a little and for all the updates!

Good luck!

Goodness - donations. I knew they were coming, but...wow. You people may want to be careful - you keep blowing my mind like this, and I'll soon have no brain left at all.

Sincerest thanks to everyone once again. I have no idea how I'm going to explain this community to a lot of people I know, but I'll figure it out, I swear.

This sucks, but you'll pull through. And the GWJ community will be behind you every step of the way!

Chiming in with the full strength of whatever support I can offer.

Not sure what else to say, but I'll be thinking about you, hoping for the best at every turn.

Chipped in, hope everything goes well!

Good luck, man.

Thanks again, everyone. I'm still bowled over by all this. Thank you for twisting my arm ever so slightly. It's a bit weird asking for help, but if ever there was a time to get started, I suppose it's now before I'm really into the trickier parts of this whole affair.

In the event anyone sees this thread in the future and is looking for similar assistance, and is looking at donation mechanisms that tie into PayPal, here's something potentially useful for you: the aforementioned monthly transfer limit imposed by PayPal can be lifted by simply confirming more info about yourself in your account. The way the web interface is laid out as of this writing, you should only have to login and look below the tabs at the top. Just under where it says, "Welcome, [user]!" you'll have some links separated by pipe characters ("|") - there'll be one for your account type, one for your status, and then one for your account limits. By selecting limits, it'll not only tell you if you have any limits imposed on your account, but also what you need to do in order to get them lifted. By verifying your information further, they lift Sending and Withdrawal restrictions. You should only be subject to their transaction fees after this, which will no doubt come in handy if you're anticipating anything where you might raise/need to take out more than $500 in a given month.

I chipped in what I could. I'm not good with words when it comes to these things.

I don't think words are strictly necessary when you're happily throwing well-wishes and/or your own money at the problems of someone with whom you've at best had a handful of exchanges on a gaming forum.

Although please let me know if I'm missing some big cultural cue, or if you're just trying to keep me healthy long enough to kill me with a forklift by surprise or something. I really don't want to offend anyone with my having gotten the wrong idea.

ianunderhill wrote:

I don't think words are strictly necessary when you're happily throwing well-wishes and/or your own money at the problems of someone with whom you've at best had a handful of exchanges on a gaming forum.

Although please let me know if I'm missing some big cultural cue, or if you're just trying to keep me healthy long enough to kill me with a forklift by surprise or something. I really don't want to offend anyone with my having gotten the wrong idea.

(whistles, while putting forklift behind his back)

Stanley on a freakin' header, how many times do I have to say "YOU PEOPLE f*ckING RULE!" around here?

Also, chipped in.

Good luck with your appointment tomorrow, bro.

Thanks, ZaneRockfist. I was feeling a bit nervous about it this afternoon, but between all the support that's continued to crop up, both from Goodjers and non-Goodjers alike, I'm feeling pretty strong and ready for anything they might throw at me tomorrow.

My four favorite moments from today:

-A close friend, on learning what GWJ alone had done with the ChipIn campaign so far, urged me to link to it on Facebook, and kept at it until I did

-Shortly after the first thing, a Usenet acquaintance from around 15 years ago that I'm not even all that close to dumped $300 into the ChipIn campaign, just like that.

-A phone call from my bike racing buddy Matt. Matt played big brother to me last year when I was getting my feet wet with criterium racing and is basically the nicest bike-crazy person you could ever meet. He's currently doing a solo charity ride around the whole of Lake Michigan raising money for the World Bicycle Relief effort, and tomorrow's the half-way point; he's doing about 118 miles/day. He'd only just found out about my illness, and not only promised support, but already talking about how hhe's going to try to squeeze in a second, similar ride before the year's out as another fundraiser just to help me. This all blew me away, of course, but just as good was talking about his experience of being out there for days on end, just flying along at 20-25mph for long stretches and feeling invincible. I know this feeling, he knows that I know this feeling, and he could tell what a change this talk made in me. I was envious, sure, but also very happy for him - there's just nothing else like that sensation when it comes down to it. We're already talking plans for doing a long, multi-day ride following my hopeful recovery, and it's making me feel like I've got a lot to look forward to in life.

-A co-worker on Facebook casually tipped off that he hoped it wouldn't be seen as stepping on any toes, but apparently the shop I work at has some sort of donation drive in the works for me, too.

It's all wonderful but extremely overwhelming. Just on Friday, I was talking to one of the RNs about how I never once had imagined having to tell a whole crapload of people about having a serious illness like cancer. Today, I'm realizing I'd never once imagined that so many people were in my corner, either. I don't know how I'm ever going to express my gratitude properly, other than beating this disease back to the stone age and repeatedly annoying everyone by talking about how I couldn't have done it alone. This is all so humbling, I should probably be passing out or something. I'd not really have it any other way, but it's just...well, it's all crazy and unbelievable. I don't know that I'll ever get past that aspect of things.

Enough gushing. Time to try to sleep so I can learn as much as possible from tomorrow's appointment. More to come, as always.

Thanks for the update Of course the money part is important. But having all these people backing you up one way or the other, is a fantastic boost for sure!

Support sounds like it's pretty great. Unfortunately I can't offer any cash-money, but I can advise you to punch this thing in the figurative dick.

Just up and getting ready for today's appointment, and I've already gotten some more fantastic news from the support side of things. A friend from my youth is going to be brewing about 20 gallons of beer just for the sake of helping to raise funds for me. That's not only generous, but extremely cool and in keeping with the sorts of things I love and value in life. I would never have thought of it myself. Now I've got to figure out what style or styles I'd like him to brew. Decisions, decisions.

I'll be posting info from the appointment sometime after I get home this afternoon. It feels like today took forever to get here. I'm nervous, but optimistic.

Good luck today. Take the time to get your questions answered. Our thoughts will be with you.

Everyone's excited about the White House beer recipes that were released recently. Maybe that would interest people?

Fired in my Chip Shot.
iHugs to you Ian!

Chipped in!

Give that cancer the butt kicking it so richly deserves, and keep us posted - we're all behind you 100%.

Sent

ianunderhill wrote:

Just up and getting ready for today's appointment, and I've already gotten some more fantastic news from the support side of things. A friend from my youth is going to be brewing about 20 gallons of beer just for the sake of helping to raise funds for me.

I would buy said beer.

Don't know you very well, don't care. You're a GWJer and that makes you a friend. And friends don't let friends down. I sent what I could, wish it could've been more.

Speedhuntr wrote:

Don't know you very well, don't care. You're a GWJer and that makes you a friend. And friends don't let friends down. I sent what I could, wish it could've been more.

Over $2,000 now! $20,000 next.

DeThroned wrote:
ianunderhill wrote:

Just up and getting ready for today's appointment, and I've already gotten some more fantastic news from the support side of things. A friend from my youth is going to be brewing about 20 gallons of beer just for the sake of helping to raise funds for me.

I would buy said beer.

Yeah buying beer to help kick cancer's ass? Let us know where to sign up!

So just back from the appointment at long last. The team that met today has concluded that the best bet is actually to do surgery prior to any chemotherapy, reasoning being that invasive surgery is a lot harder to recover from once the body's already weak from chemo.

Target date looks to be the 19th of this month, with roughly five days of post-operative hospitalization and then three to four weeks of recovery time prior to beginning chemo. The primary bit of the procedure is an open right hemicolectomy - basically, they're going to go in, take out the affected section of my colon, and ultimately make it shorter. Long-term, this probably means I'm going to have to poop twice as often as I do now. In tandem with this, they'll be doing an omentectomy, in which they're going to be removing the omentum. The omentum is the layer of fat that lines the abdomen. The main reason they're doing this at the same time is out of concern that there might be cancerous material in the omentum, and removing that plus the affected bit of the colon at the same time means that the chemo can stand a better chance at wiping out any cancer cells still in me post-surgery.

The one big negative in all this, beyond the small percentage risks inherent in the hemicolectomy (if things don't heal right, there can be leakage and infection, which means more surgery and possibly time with a colostomy bag), is that it's all so uncertain. Apparently my case is so unique that they can't really give me any prognosis other than "We'll treat it and see what happens." I could almost deal with things better if I were to hear even something bleak, like "most people with this tend to last a year and a half after diagnosis." My case is just so strange and missing a lot of symptoms, and they said there may be hope in the combination of that and my relative health/youth and that there's nothing apparent in my other organs. But outside of the surgery and subsequent chemo plans, I barely know more than I did last Friday. I have no question in my mind that I'm in good hands, it's just super frustrating.

So! That's what I found out. The financial paperwork for charity care and Medicaid is still processing, but I should have an idea of where all that stands by the end of the week. The RN assigned to my case has been very hands-on about all the loose ends and really seems to have my back on making sure I've got all the bases covered, so that's good, at least.

As for the beer fundraiser - if there's a crapton of interest on GWJ, I'll let my friend know so he can plan accordingly, just so nobody who wants in misses out. Twenty gallons is a lot in the first place, but he just brewed nearly as much for his upcoming wedding, and he really knows what he's doing.

As with all before and all to come, I'll be keeping you guys posted. Thanks again for being there, for reading, and for being such a damned fine community overall.

Thanks for the update. We're pulling for ya!