A very good friend of mine and of a lot of you on this forum, has a very serious health issue. Our favorite chicken bestowed the name Snowman on him because his last name is pronounced Blizzard but spelled Blysard. I call him Houston Ed.
Ed was diagnosed a few months back with lung cancer. He went thru all the processes that go along with that diagnosis and everyone thought he had beat it. He found out about a week ago that they found more cancer - this time in his brain. He has had, again, more treatment and is now home.
Ed is not one to dwell on his problems, but cannot yet type too well or put his thoughts on paper. This should improve with time. So he asked me to tell you all that he will be back on the forum just as soon as he has improved enough to be able to handle thinking and typing.
I will leave it to you to send messages to Ed. If he has trouble reading them, he has a big family that will always be there to help him.
And maybe, sometime in the future, he will gift us with another short story for us to read and enjoy.
And to keep this on the subject of trains: Ed worked for Port Terminal Railroad in Houston Tx - where all the refineries are located. He is retired from there now.
Brain cancer isn’t necessarily a death sentence. My daughter found out about her breast cancer spreading to her brain, after being off chemo for a couple of months after her old regimen quit working. They used radiation on that, and–although she now has permanent hair loss…that was a wig on Jeopardy!–it had no effect on her cognitive capabilities. As far as I know, they got all of it in her cranial area.
From what I’ve read, Ed won’t be going back to work. That sounds serious. I’m pretty sure treatment in general will depend a lot on how quickly it was discovered in the first place. Linda had had problems for at least four months before diagnosis and treatment. Mine, on the other hand, was diagnosed with blood tests and I have yet to feel any discomfort from cancer itself (surgery and subsequent treatments are another story).
Hang in there, Ed! We hope to hear better news soon!
Thanks for the information, Jen. Many of us have been here for quite a few years, so the odds are very high we’ll learn of troubles from one or more of us…hopefully. Some slip away without us every knowing, and that’s kinda sad…to me.
Ed, if you can read this, I wish you the very best of care, energy, motivation, empathy, comfort, and recovery that your team can muster for you. Be positive, don’t fret, and enjoy the sunny days as they come.
Ed Blysard will be in my daily prayers, along with Senator John McCain.
Thanks for notifying us.
I had a serious cancer problem myself. I was told I would have to have surgery or go blind. With the help of doctors, an innovative treatment was proposed, and I agreed to be an experiment subject. It involves a particular medication, and also involved my health fund (insurance, doctors, treatment, and hospitals in one brand, and there are four competing in Israel, and insurance is compulsary for citizens) agreeing to my being an outpatient in a competing health fund’s hospital. But one of the students at the Yeshiva also suggested that frequent doses of Lemoline and Louisa herb tea are proven cancer blockers, and I use a mixture of that with cinemon, and no longer need the special medication. I also am a vegetarian, but eat fish and eggs, and minimize both sugar and alcohol. Dad was diabedic and used Insulin, and to date I have not had to use Insulin and hope to keep it that way.
If Ed wants to try this kind of diet, he is more than welcome, assuming his doctor approves of course. Of course I have regular appointments with the doctor, and would go back on the medication if told it was necessary. So far for about a year, it has not been necessary.
The particular doctor usually had treated my kind of cancer with radiation before the special medicine was developed. He did feel I had made the right decision to reject surgery.
While a subscriber to the Juedo-Christian ethic I choose not to belong to a church. Each one says all others are doomed and I don’t believe that. They all have merit but sometimes conflict with one another.
Regardless of whether one has beliefs or not Ed Blysard has long been an informative poster here. He is, in my mind, one who should be held in the highest respect for sharing his knowledge.
Mookie’s post was not what I wanted to read on a Sunday morning.
Norm, I respect your opinion about religion, but I do have hard evidence to prove you wrong on one respect. I can attach proof of this statement presented not to prove anything religious, but simply to provide more peace between people of different views:
Today’s religions respect one another. “My belief system is true for me, but I respect that your belief system is true for you.” This is true whether your belief system is atheism or any of the world’s rellgions. Obviously it is not true if “your” “religion” demands that everyone think like “you.”
I just received a marvelous document that proves this, and I’ll be glad to share it with anyone writing me at daveklepper@yahoo.com.
And let us not get into a religious discssion with bringing up current excesses and mayhem they cause. I can even prove that at one time worldwide Islam was a very tolerant religion. And I think most Muslims still are.
I certainly did not mean that because I pray for Ed’s health that you should also. And I certainly did not mean that people should pray the way I pray.
And the others who said they have Ed in their prayers also did not insist that you also pray. OK?
Ed, I noticed that we had not heard much from you lately. I always looked forward to your posts as the voice of knowledge and reason when the rest of us were getting carried away with speculation and off-the-wall ideas. We all wish you the best and look forward to hearing from you for a long time.