Cancer labs update

 I had some followup bloodwork done a couple of weeks back.  The results came back yesterday.  I'm going to try to explain this the best way I can, but if you have any questions feel free to ask and I will do my best to answer them.  The main test that was done was a liquid biopsy.  The test determines how much cancer dna there is.  It's my understanding that tumors shed this dna in the form of stem cells, and the cells can latch on somewhere else in the body and form a new tumor.  The test does not indicate there is a tumor, or active cancer anywhere.  

My results a year ago in Oct. were 1.6%.  When the test was run a couple of weeks ago the results are 1.7%.  Ideally, the results would have gone down not up.  Remember that the original tumor was in place for 9 months after the first test was run.  Most likely the number increased from Oct to June when I had surgery.  Again, as far as we know, there is no tumor.  I have no indication whatsoever that the cancer is back only that I still have cancer stem cells circulating in my body.  The other thing the test showed is that there is some change in the variations of dna, but again we know that cancer has the ability to mutate. A year ago there was one type of stem cell.  This year there are four.  The numbers are still very low.

My plan right now is to be proactive in preventing recurrence.  What I mean by that is that I will do everything I can to make my body inhospitable to cancer.  This means lowering my inflammation by continuing on a gluten free, dairy free, and sugar free diet.  I may be adding a prescription to aid in preventing the recurrence, but I'm still doing my research so I haven't made my decision about that yet.

So, that's my update.  It seems I'm not out of the woods yet, but I'm also not letting this news keep me awake at night either.