9/30/22

For those of you I haven't met, I'm Alicia, Matt's older sister.  I can think of no one I'd be more proud to call my brother. I've offered to help share his cancer journey through this website to hopefully take a little something off his and Stacey's plates during this chaotic time.

September just wasn't a great month for the Thompson family. On Tuesday the 13th our mom had a radical open hysterectomy and was diagnosed with uterine/endometrial cancer that had spread to one Fallopian tube.  She's scheduled to start chemo in the next couple of weeks.

Matt had considered canceling his routine colonoscopy on Thursday the 15th to come up to Dallas during Mom's surgery. Ultimately we decided it would be better if he came up on Friday when she got home. Thank God he didn't cancel the appointment because it revealed a 4 cm malignant mass in his colon, and he was diagnosed with colon cancer.

If you don't know, Matt has battled cancer once before. He was in his mid 20's when he was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin's Lymphoma. The doctors don't believe there's any correlation between his previous cancer and the colon cancer he faces today. He's done this before and can do it again.

We considered setting up just one Caring Bridge site for each of them, but they will face many different challenges at different times, and many of you really don't know both of them. There's no doubt there will be crossover, but for those who want to follow Mom's journey specifically, her site is https://www.caringbridge.org/visit/carolthompsonplano

Matt's official diagnosis is moderately differentiated adenocarcinoma. Since his diagnosis, there has been a lot of good news, as far as the terms "good news" and "cancer" can be shared in one sentence.  The CT scan shows no "definitive evidence" of metastasis, and a protein was absent in his blood work that could be evidence of spread.  Through a co-worker who has previously battled a similar cancer, he was able to get in with both a surgeon and an oncologist in Austin that specialize in colorectal cancers.  The oncologist believes it was caught fairly early.

Matt will have surgery on October 20 to resect (take out) the portion of the colon where the mass is located as well as some tissue on either side and lymph nodes in the region for pathology to examine. Then he'll have a much better picture about his next steps. Best case scenario would be that surgery gets it all and there's no follow-up. 

Matt and Stacey are SO grateful for all the support. If they need anything in Austin, they know they have a community of friends and co-workers who would jump right in. As Dad and I help out with Mom's needs here, it means so much to our family to know they're not alone.

I'll continue to post any news as we have any, and if Matt is up to it, he'll likely add his own updates.

Alicia