And by that I mean it’s today, Sunday, another weekend day to spend with my wife. We did have a lovely, quiet and meditative walk this morning, although I’m down from an energetic forty minutes a day, to between 20 and 30 minutes at a reduced pace. But that’s OK, morning air is filled with pure Qi; the sunlight, each breath we take in and the nature that surrounds us is the best soul food.
It has been a rough week that started with a trip to Kaiser’s emergency “clinic” last Saturday. I wasn’t feeling too bad Friday night and had made some fish and baby brussel-sprouts for dinner. Ha loved it, so did I but I could only handle two bites of fish and six or seven mini brusslers. About twenty minutes had passed when on the far right side of liver territory the semi-new pain I’d been having for about a month or so, not real bad pain but noticeable, shot up to a fat seven. I hadn’t used any breakthrough pain meds, I call it Jungle Juice (because it tastes like the Primate house in the Zoo smells), in about three weeks to a month. I sucked down two milliliters, one dose, invited my wife to the couch for a hand to hold and some hugs, and waited a half hour. Felt like a nine now so I did two point five mLs., and we called the advice nurse at Kaiser. Symptom talk ensued, the pain began subsiding, and I was given an appointment for the next day.
The next day moved painfully slow at first then way too fast for us towards the end. I could easily write a fifteen-thousand word exposé about Kaiser’s incompetency, but I’ll save that for the book I’ll be writing when I have the more than a third of my brain to work with, sans cancer and drugs. But what ended up happening is, without contacting my oncologist at Kaiser, Dr. Schwartz, they decided that it was gall stones and would be doing an ECRP, or removing my gall bladder. By this time it was the next day, Ha and I had slept in the tiny hospital bed because they never brought her in anything to sleep on even after asking six times, my mom was there by now-of course, and we three huddled and decided to check out against doctors orders and drive home ( they had been giving me IV Dilaudid shots) call the advice nurse at the VA and start over. Very good decision as it turned out.
Saw the twenty-four hour clinic doctor, a Dr. Cole-sharp guy, who said it didn’t seem like gall bladder anything and said that he’d contact my oncologist, Dr. Kelley and that she would call me. Rather than admitting me he asked if I could control the pain, which by this time was controllable with the Jungle Juice, and sent me home. I saw Dr. Kelley on Wednesday, had an ultra-sound and blood-work on Thursday and got this email from her on Friday:
Hi there,
Good news that the ultrasound doesn’t show any evidence of gall bladder infection or blockage – there is no “biliary dilatation” or stones, and there is just mild wall thickening and some sludge in the gall bladder which is definitely NOT a reason to do surgery, probably isn’t causing any symptoms at all, and can be seen in “normal” cases. Also, there is no ascites seen on this study, which is good to know. Hope you’re feeling better!
I have had to add the Jungle Juice back in my regime but so far it’s only been two to three doses a day. And I’m having some other new symptoms as well. I have a real hard time keeping my blood sugar up, and being diabetic which previously I handled with exercise and food, has me taking my blood sugar five to seven times a day, sometimes more. I always have to keep some form of sugar handy because severe drops are way serious. Then there’s the itch, I’ve been kinda itchy for a while but nothing like this, I’m scratching like a fiend all day and everywhere, with the exception of my head, neck, face, pubic area, and the soles of my feet. It started with my lower legs and calves, along with my abdomen then crept all over. Some of it gets red and rashy, some doesn’t. But it itches friggin’ everywhere. And the last one is depression which I’ve never really had seriously enough to seek help, and in wondering about the outcome of all this, would seeking help be helpful? So far my wife and family have been all I need. I think I’ll keep it that way. Also the mind-body work that Dr. Rossman has taught me through the CD’s and our acupuncture sessions are working quite well too.
Gosh, it feels so good to be caught up. Tomorrow is Craig and the Skype, then in the afternoon Mumsy is coming for another sleep-over and to drive me to acupuncture in Marin County on Tuesday. I’m going to try and rest as much as possible this week, it really helps.
It has been a rough week that started with a trip to Kaiser’s emergency “clinic” last Saturday. I wasn’t feeling too bad Friday night and had made some fish and baby brussel-sprouts for dinner. Ha loved it, so did I but I could only handle two bites of fish and six or seven mini brusslers. About twenty minutes had passed when on the far right side of liver territory the semi-new pain I’d been having for about a month or so, not real bad pain but noticeable, shot up to a fat seven. I hadn’t used any breakthrough pain meds, I call it Jungle Juice (because it tastes like the Primate house in the Zoo smells), in about three weeks to a month. I sucked down two milliliters, one dose, invited my wife to the couch for a hand to hold and some hugs, and waited a half hour. Felt like a nine now so I did two point five mLs., and we called the advice nurse at Kaiser. Symptom talk ensued, the pain began subsiding, and I was given an appointment for the next day.
The next day moved painfully slow at first then way too fast for us towards the end. I could easily write a fifteen-thousand word exposé about Kaiser’s incompetency, but I’ll save that for the book I’ll be writing when I have the more than a third of my brain to work with, sans cancer and drugs. But what ended up happening is, without contacting my oncologist at Kaiser, Dr. Schwartz, they decided that it was gall stones and would be doing an ECRP, or removing my gall bladder. By this time it was the next day, Ha and I had slept in the tiny hospital bed because they never brought her in anything to sleep on even after asking six times, my mom was there by now-of course, and we three huddled and decided to check out against doctors orders and drive home ( they had been giving me IV Dilaudid shots) call the advice nurse at the VA and start over. Very good decision as it turned out.
Saw the twenty-four hour clinic doctor, a Dr. Cole-sharp guy, who said it didn’t seem like gall bladder anything and said that he’d contact my oncologist, Dr. Kelley and that she would call me. Rather than admitting me he asked if I could control the pain, which by this time was controllable with the Jungle Juice, and sent me home. I saw Dr. Kelley on Wednesday, had an ultra-sound and blood-work on Thursday and got this email from her on Friday:
Hi there,
Good news that the ultrasound doesn’t show any evidence of gall bladder infection or blockage – there is no “biliary dilatation” or stones, and there is just mild wall thickening and some sludge in the gall bladder which is definitely NOT a reason to do surgery, probably isn’t causing any symptoms at all, and can be seen in “normal” cases. Also, there is no ascites seen on this study, which is good to know. Hope you’re feeling better!
I have had to add the Jungle Juice back in my regime but so far it’s only been two to three doses a day. And I’m having some other new symptoms as well. I have a real hard time keeping my blood sugar up, and being diabetic which previously I handled with exercise and food, has me taking my blood sugar five to seven times a day, sometimes more. I always have to keep some form of sugar handy because severe drops are way serious. Then there’s the itch, I’ve been kinda itchy for a while but nothing like this, I’m scratching like a fiend all day and everywhere, with the exception of my head, neck, face, pubic area, and the soles of my feet. It started with my lower legs and calves, along with my abdomen then crept all over. Some of it gets red and rashy, some doesn’t. But it itches friggin’ everywhere. And the last one is depression which I’ve never really had seriously enough to seek help, and in wondering about the outcome of all this, would seeking help be helpful? So far my wife and family have been all I need. I think I’ll keep it that way. Also the mind-body work that Dr. Rossman has taught me through the CD’s and our acupuncture sessions are working quite well too.
Gosh, it feels so good to be caught up. Tomorrow is Craig and the Skype, then in the afternoon Mumsy is coming for another sleep-over and to drive me to acupuncture in Marin County on Tuesday. I’m going to try and rest as much as possible this week, it really helps.
No comments:
Post a Comment