Hello friends, I've read and re-read your messages on this thread. Thank you all so much for your caring words and prayers. I am so sorry for all of you who have suffered the loss of a loved one with cancer or otherwise. The blood tests for tumor markers are in infancy stage; the results are not accurate. There are statistics of false negatives as well as false positives. My oncologist did the tests when I had cancer, but did not rely on them at all. My mother is on Arimedex, a hormone therapy for breast cancer. If a drug is used to treat cancer, it is called "chemo" even if it is not the devastating chemo therapy we know of. I am not a fan of Arimedex, a drug I was also on during my breast cancer. I stopped taking it because the side effects were worse than the 2 percent chance of the drug having any benefit. It is my mother's decision to take it or not, but I don't believe she has an informed decision. You see, with the Alzheimer's she does not really know what is what! As long as she is on a form of chemo, she is not eligible for hospice. A patient can have hospice for 5 years if that is the way it goes. Hospice would come to her, offer her support, offer care-giver's relief for my step-father, etc. This is really hard for me to think of my mother there in AZ while I am here in CO. My mom is stable, but stable and dying. I don't even know if she knows she's dying. She stopped asking "Will I live through this?" I think she knows the answer. She also knows she is starting to forget her grand children's names. I can hardly stand it. By the way, my mother had been complaining of shortness of breath for years. But she had been diagnosed as a hypochondriac (when in a psych ward years ago) and was even told within the last 8 years to go home and get over herself. Who would of thought that for all these years, the cancer was choking out her lung away, taking her breath away. I understand all the reasons for her hypochondria, and I have a lot of compassion for that. In my book, where I examine my relationship with my mother (SA perpetuates for generations) I talk about the good memories as well, like when Mom created tea parties for me. That examination had started with a list when I was perusing childhood pictures she had sent me. Yes, she did say to me when I was in a psych ward: "Were you born to make my life miserable?" but that is redeemed when we are together now and she says "Did God send you to me, like an angel?" My grandmother said the same thing 2 years ago when we thought GM was dying, and I was caring for her. Now GM will be 101. She is a breast cancer survivor too, and yet she understands in her old, old age that her daughter will pre-decease her. Am I rambling? I am all over the place in my mind, and in my activities. The only thing I really want to do is stay home and clean. But there is the world at large, and I've got to participate. Eagle, that does sound like divine intervention. I mean what are the chances of meeting the PR person in Cuba of all places?