It was starting to look like Alex Trebek was invincible after he seemed to come back from the jaws of stage 4 pancreatic cancer, but now the trivia titan is back on chemo after his ‘numbers’ exploded.
“I was doing so well” He told GMA this morning. “And my numbers went down to the equivalent of a normal human being who does not have pancreatic cancer. So we were all very optimistic. And they said, ‘Good, we’re gonna stop chemo, we’ll start you on immunotherapy,'” he said before, “I lost about 12 pounds in a week. And my numbers went sky high, much higher than they were when I was first diagnosed. So, the doctors have decided that I have to undergo chemo again and that’s what I’m doing.”
When Alex refers to his “numbers went sky high” he is referring to his tumor markers. Carolyn Vachani of OncoLink advised me that tumor markers are a substance that shows up in the body when cancer is present. For more information you can check out her informative site.
He also revealed his battle with depression that started when he was first diagnosed saying that sometimes he feels a “surge of sadness” and “depression.”
“When it happened early on I was down on myself. I didn’t realize how fallible each of us is in his or her own way … I talk to the audience sometimes and I get teary eyed for no reason. I don’t even bother to explain it anymore, I just experience it. I know it’s a part of who I am and I just keep going.”