Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Yay! Hospital Food!
I went to the clinic on Friday and got to speak with the nurse practitioner who is Lita's counterpart. I believe she tried to give me good information and assistance, but I don't think I will consent to speak with her again unless Lita has been hit by that mythical bus that's just aiming to kill everyone. I felt things were going fine until she asked me if I had ever had a conversation about ceasing treatment.
Huh? Why the would I be calling asking about my symptoms and trying like heck to get back on chemo if that were the case? Why would THIS be the time to be having such a discussion? I was very upset and later, extremely angry that she would say such a thing to me. She doesn't KNOW me. Perhaps she was attempting in some clumsy way to bring up the notion of advance directives, but I've already gone through that with other people and it's not her business. I don't know to whom I can complain about this, or maybe I should just let it go.
Anyway, after an early morning MRI on Saturday, I got a call from one of the doctors I saw initially about the brain mets that I should go back to the hospital immediately. I was able to go to the floor instead of being admitted to the ER, which streamlined things somewhat, but it did mean having to be in the hospital over night for who knows how long. The plan was to radiate my thoracic spine--the MRI showed that one of the two lesions on my spine had increased in size, and the one in the T9 area is poking into my spinal column, which may account for some of my recent symptoms (but not the shingles). This is seen as an immediate problem, since delaying action can result in, oh, say, paralysis.
Sigh.
I got a private room, which was kind of nice. I also had multiple radiation/neuro people come to my room to have me squeeze their hands, follow the light with my eyes, and have invasive procedures to test the muscle tone of an area one doesn't want to have evaluated multiple times unless one has that particular fetish.
I refused the third "evaluation."
Sleeping was also a problem as they have seen fit to up my decadron to 8mg a day. I finally saw the movie Brigadoon (I have a soft spot for Gene Kelly) and a number of shows on Animal Planet about some amazing dogs that have vastly improved the lives of their owners, including one lab puppy who kept running away from home to be with a lady who eventually had her breast cancer diagnosed after the dog became upset and was poking at her breast incessantly. Dogs have been trained to detect cancer cells by smell, but this dog just did it naturally.
I did get released on Easter; I was expecting to go to my mom's for dinner, but that just wasn't going to work out. Instead, after she arrived at the hospital only to find out that I had just been discharged, we all went back to Canton and Brian's parents showed up shortly afterwards.
I've had three radiation treatments so far; they've scheduled them all at 7am, which is hilarious. This time I don't have to wear a mask; they just have me up on the table. I will have ten treatments altogether, and it will be over April 2. I don't know how long I will have to recover from the radiation before they can resume the chemo. I really hope there are no more hurdles. My other things have to heal and we are all hoping I don't get some kind of inconvenient infection.
Huh? Why the
Anyway, after an early morning MRI on Saturday, I got a call from one of the doctors I saw initially about the brain mets that I should go back to the hospital immediately. I was able to go to the floor instead of being admitted to the ER, which streamlined things somewhat, but it did mean having to be in the hospital over night for who knows how long. The plan was to radiate my thoracic spine--the MRI showed that one of the two lesions on my spine had increased in size, and the one in the T9 area is poking into my spinal column, which may account for some of my recent symptoms (but not the shingles). This is seen as an immediate problem, since delaying action can result in, oh, say, paralysis.
Sigh.
I got a private room, which was kind of nice. I also had multiple radiation/neuro people come to my room to have me squeeze their hands, follow the light with my eyes, and have invasive procedures to test the muscle tone of an area one doesn't want to have evaluated multiple times unless one has that particular fetish.
I refused the third "evaluation."
Sleeping was also a problem as they have seen fit to up my decadron to 8mg a day. I finally saw the movie Brigadoon (I have a soft spot for Gene Kelly) and a number of shows on Animal Planet about some amazing dogs that have vastly improved the lives of their owners, including one lab puppy who kept running away from home to be with a lady who eventually had her breast cancer diagnosed after the dog became upset and was poking at her breast incessantly. Dogs have been trained to detect cancer cells by smell, but this dog just did it naturally.
I did get released on Easter; I was expecting to go to my mom's for dinner, but that just wasn't going to work out. Instead, after she arrived at the hospital only to find out that I had just been discharged, we all went back to Canton and Brian's parents showed up shortly afterwards.
I've had three radiation treatments so far; they've scheduled them all at 7am, which is hilarious. This time I don't have to wear a mask; they just have me up on the table. I will have ten treatments altogether, and it will be over April 2. I don't know how long I will have to recover from the radiation before they can resume the chemo. I really hope there are no more hurdles. My other things have to heal and we are all hoping I don't get some kind of inconvenient infection.
Labels: Brian, Decadron, hospital, Joyce, Lita, mom, MRI, radiation, Roger, shingles, spine
