I think my last post was misinterpreted. I wasn’t upset or the least bit put off by my psychologist stating my life expectancy was 2 years – instead of 2-4 years or nothing at all. All of the doctors on my medical team are very reluctant to provide any life expectancy data at all. I use various published papers to produce my own survivability estimates. I then run the numbers past my docs for a reasonableness check. Even then they balk, but I persist.
When I was first diagnosed with Stage IV prostate cancer, The estimate I worked up was 1 to 7 years. As time has passed, more papers were written, and it became clear my cancer wasn’t as aggressive as initially feared. So now, two and a half years after the diagnosis, my crystal ball says I likely have 2 – 4 more years to go.
I use this range as a planning number. I am hesitant to plan anything longer than 2 years out and extremely reluctant to do so for anything 4 years or more out.
This range doesn’t mean I think I will necessarily die within the next 2-4 years. The statistics of a group of people are not directly applicable to any single individual. All the stats say is, very roughly, I will more likely die within 2-4 years than not.
I’ve already shown a better than average response to Lupron. For the majority of men with Stage IV prostate cancer, Lupron fails after 2 years (that failure is a major milestone in the progression of the disease). I’m at 2.5 years now. I find out later this week if the Lupron is continuing to work for me.
What threw me about the doctor mentioning 2 years as my expected lifetime was that it made the 2 years, as a point in time, much more real. I thought when I told people I have 2-4 years left, I was copacetic with the full range of 2 to 4 years. When it was presented as 2 years period, I was blown back and realized I needed to rethink my mortality.
None of this means I think I will die in 2 years, but I feel I need to be ready to die in 2 years. More ready than I thought I was just a few days ago.
Yet Another Prostate Cancer Blog 
It is difficult to think about this kind of stuff and so hard to predict. I had a small taste of this yesterday when I went to see my financial adviser to review my retirement plan. He’s throwing out numbers of how much I’ll have when I am 80, 90 years old and I am thinking, I’ll be lucky to make to retirement age. Still, like you say, you’ve got to be ready.
and like you say, you never know, 5 years from now they might still be saying, “you’ve got 2 years.”
Here’s hoping the lupron keeps working for a long time.
Hi Jim,
I have been following your photos and Barb has been following your blog. It seems to me you are doing pretty well in spite of the situation. How do doctors know how long you will live? If I could go in and get a forecast it would be very enlightening. I am 75, so will they tell me I will live to 76, 80, or something else. If I knew the answer I would do the same as I do now, well maybe quit the diet Barb thinks i should be following. But I like Hot Fudge Sundays and will keep eating. We love you and wish you the best in whatever life you have left.
I completely understand the last paragraph. I felt the same way when I was diagnosed and “given” two to three years. (That was over ten years ago.)
Cancer takes away our power, our control, leaves us feeling helpless in the face of it. I found that having a time frame helped me regain a sense of mastery over my person. Now that I’m in the uncharted territory of having far outlived my “expiration date”, I am once again feeling out of control. Strange.
It is strange and I don’t think I would really get it, if I didn’t have a terminal disease. The vast majority of people tell me to ignore the date range, thinking that it upsets me. In a way it does, but the sense of control it provides is worth it.