On Recurrence, Running & River Rocks

Anyone who has had cancer holds their breath for their regular tests, even when the pattern has been favorable. For prostate cancer survivors, when a PSA begins rising again—or even creeping up—the anxiety level creeps up with it.

That's the situation I’m facing—my PSA rising in two consecutive tests, from a .9 nadir to 1.3 to 1.5 in December (earlier post). I thought these were low and insignificant numbers until my alarmist urologist began talking “salvage therapy” and another “biopsy” and “cryotherapy” and totally freaked me out. 

His position: three rises would warrant more snipping.  He called my little creep-ups “significant.”

Really?  I didn’t want to hear it. The specter of recurrence hit me harder than the original cancer diagnosis in 2008.  Not sure why, but I got upset and depressed for about five days … until I righted that emotional ship again.

I started running more, upping my weekly mileage.  Running has always been my salvation.  I’ve been a runner since I graduated from the University of Florida, back in 1975.  I ran 13 marathons, including a Boston, two New Yorks, and three Chicagos, and covered more than 20,000 miles— a portion of which were therapeutic miles for everyday life crisis’s, large and small.

A creeping PSA qualified for self-imposed therapy. As usual, as my mileage went up, my head cleared. And when I don't feel like running, I have discovered a neat little new trick to get me out on the road.   

River rocks.

Now I love rocks, especially those smooth, tiny, charcoal grey stones that fit in the crock of your hand. Worn to perfection by ages of running water. The skippers.

Out on a run after my last PSA, I found a large pile of small river rocks and began taking one home with me every time I made that run. I made a rule: I could only take a rock if I ran that loop, a 7-miler to the beach and home. It’s always been my favorite run, but now I get a prize for doing it. A cool rock.

Sometimes I’ll run the loop 2 or 3 times a week just to get my prize.  I’ll pick one out from the pile, and rub it in one hand like one of those Irish worry stones. I suppose I'm giving myself good luck on that next PSA test.

Recurrence of prostate cancer happens in about 1 out of 20 guys who catch it early.  That’s about 11,500 guys a year.  That's a lotta guys when you think about it. Enough bodies to fill the end-zone stands of  the largest football stadiums in America.  

All those guys went through hell and back through some traumatic treatment and thought they'd survived, that they were cancer free.

I'll know in two weeks, that's when I'll have my next PSA test, to see if the rises are a trend or a blip on the radar.  For now, when I start worrying if I might fall in that unfortunate group who must face recurrence, I go out for another run. It clears my head. And I get another stone to rub.

Postscript, five days later ....

The rubbing stones worked.  My PSA came back at 1.2, breaking an upward trend of "three consecutive rises" that had so disturbed my urologist, who won't be giving me DRE's anymore. I'm moving on. Hopefully, another PSA in three months sees the PSA drop further toward my 0.9 nadir.

Huge relief is an understatement.