So remember back at the beginning of this month when I said my goal was to post more frequently? Yeah, me neither. Anyway, I had my follow up today and it looks like its smooth sailing until March, when I'll go in for the 1st of my routine scans that I'll get every 3 months. I even get to get my Port-o-cath out later this week. It's an outpatient process that is general anesthesia only, so I'll be fine. They've also managed to get my blood thinned out and it looks like I'll get to be stuck less often, so going into the Christmas Holiday, I couldn't be happier.
Just wanted to take the moment to wish everyone a happy holiday season. Make sure you take the time to appreciate those close to you and those who play an important role in making your life what it is.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Monday, December 5, 2011
Times they are a changin'
I've attempted to start writing more and have failed miserably as of late. Since I got out of the hospital, I've been trying to recover as well as get back into society in general. Let's face it, since July, I haven't done much outside of the house, in fact I've mostly just beat cancer and eaten horribly while watching A LOT of ESPN. I mean and unhealthy amount of ESPN. Since it's a new month and we've just passed Thanksgiving, I thought I'd let you all know what has changed, not changed, and where I plan on going on going with this thing from now as well as what I'm thankful for.
First off, I can't possibly say enough how lucky I am. Susan and I were talking about it the other day, and it all just kind of hit me. Between June 30 and November 30 of the same year, I was diagnosed with and then beat cancer. That's 5 months!!!! Whether or not you are the religious type, it makes you very thankful to know that everyone who said a prayer for you, threw some positive energy your way, or sacrificed a goat (or possibly a chicken; to be honest, I have no idea what some of you pagans believe (I really mean pagan in the most endearing of ways!), but I know that any of you who did whatever it is you do helped in some way.) I'm especially thankful that I have had the support of my family throughout this as well. Even though there were many times that Susan probably needed support as much as I did, she has managed to not go crazy, which is unfathomable to me, given what she's had on her plate this year. My mom and everyone has also been awesome with helping stay with me or doing whatever needed to be done. I'm truly blessed beyond measure.
By now you've likely heard how well everything went with my surgery, but for those that do not know, here's the breakdown. I had the surgery on my right lung to remove what was left of the lesions and it turned out that it was all necrotic tissue. That means my left lung and all of my lymph nodes are also necrotic. Necrotic means dead tissue, which equals no cell growth which means REMISSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That's right. Cancer can suck it. We won!
So now that brings up what to do with this blog. So many of you have told me how much you enjoy reading it that I thought I should continue writing. Also, since I'm going back to school to be an English teacher, I could always use the chance at writing more to improve upon it. I don't think the subject matter will necessarily change that much, I'll keep writing about my thoughts or general observations I make throughout the day. I'm also going to try and hold myself to publishing every few days which I've failed miserably at before.
What else is going to change? Well, we'll be making the initial donation from the bracelets as soon as we sell the remaining ones left. I think there's about 30 or so left (previously I thought we sold them all, but i found the last bit of them while doing some cleaning this morning). What we'll do is that if you want to buy some, we'll give you 2 for 1. That's right folks. Its a fire sale. Just order the amount you plan to buy (i.e. if you want 2 then order 1, if you want 4 then order 2, etc. and I'll take care of the rest.) As well donations, I'd like to try and keep the revenue flowing through the site in the hopes that each year we can try and donate at least the same amount. So you may notice some ads on the side. I'm going to try my best to keep them relevant and not just crazy everywhere. They're definitely legit, and approved by me, so don't worry about clicking on the links if you feel so inclined. They don't pay much (avg is around $100 every 3 months), but that's $100 that can go to the charity.
So that's whats been going on and what the plans are. If you need a nice stocking stuffer then order some bracelets...
First off, I can't possibly say enough how lucky I am. Susan and I were talking about it the other day, and it all just kind of hit me. Between June 30 and November 30 of the same year, I was diagnosed with and then beat cancer. That's 5 months!!!! Whether or not you are the religious type, it makes you very thankful to know that everyone who said a prayer for you, threw some positive energy your way, or sacrificed a goat (or possibly a chicken; to be honest, I have no idea what some of you pagans believe (I really mean pagan in the most endearing of ways!), but I know that any of you who did whatever it is you do helped in some way.) I'm especially thankful that I have had the support of my family throughout this as well. Even though there were many times that Susan probably needed support as much as I did, she has managed to not go crazy, which is unfathomable to me, given what she's had on her plate this year. My mom and everyone has also been awesome with helping stay with me or doing whatever needed to be done. I'm truly blessed beyond measure.
By now you've likely heard how well everything went with my surgery, but for those that do not know, here's the breakdown. I had the surgery on my right lung to remove what was left of the lesions and it turned out that it was all necrotic tissue. That means my left lung and all of my lymph nodes are also necrotic. Necrotic means dead tissue, which equals no cell growth which means REMISSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That's right. Cancer can suck it. We won!
So now that brings up what to do with this blog. So many of you have told me how much you enjoy reading it that I thought I should continue writing. Also, since I'm going back to school to be an English teacher, I could always use the chance at writing more to improve upon it. I don't think the subject matter will necessarily change that much, I'll keep writing about my thoughts or general observations I make throughout the day. I'm also going to try and hold myself to publishing every few days which I've failed miserably at before.
What else is going to change? Well, we'll be making the initial donation from the bracelets as soon as we sell the remaining ones left. I think there's about 30 or so left (previously I thought we sold them all, but i found the last bit of them while doing some cleaning this morning). What we'll do is that if you want to buy some, we'll give you 2 for 1. That's right folks. Its a fire sale. Just order the amount you plan to buy (i.e. if you want 2 then order 1, if you want 4 then order 2, etc. and I'll take care of the rest.) As well donations, I'd like to try and keep the revenue flowing through the site in the hopes that each year we can try and donate at least the same amount. So you may notice some ads on the side. I'm going to try my best to keep them relevant and not just crazy everywhere. They're definitely legit, and approved by me, so don't worry about clicking on the links if you feel so inclined. They don't pay much (avg is around $100 every 3 months), but that's $100 that can go to the charity.
So that's whats been going on and what the plans are. If you need a nice stocking stuffer then order some bracelets...
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Hospitals are fun, and other falacies... Top Ten #1-5
Alright here it is, the last five from our top ten moments at the hospital this week. Looking back on them I wish I'd felt good enough to live blog them because some would have been sheer gold, but no use worrying about it now. I'll try to recount them back to you as close to how I remembered them. If you haven't read the first post of #10-6 you can go here: http://bit.ly/rAkiZH
5. Down 1 more wire & the constant beeping.
As of now I'm down to just one iv wire. That has been a big improvement over last week when I had breathing tubes, an iv with drugs as well as a sensor that monitored my breathing and pulse via my fingers. The breathing tubes sucked because they were cumbersome, attached to my ribcage, & hard to walk around with (especially if you had to try and rush to the bathroom quickly). The drugs, of course, I didn't mind. They knocked you out quickly and efficiently. You weren't loopy, out of it, or anything. Pain just ceased to exist and you fell asleep. The sensor, however, was the bane of my existence. If your pulse went above 120 or breathing went below 89 (it somehow measured how much oxygen my body used through my finger...) then it would start beeping loudly. It did this A LOT!!!!!! The entire issue with how this works is what I dont understand. When you've had surgery on your lungs there are 3 things that are known. a)you can't move your arms very well b)you have limited breathing capabilities c)you are in pain quite frequently. With those things known, why would you design a sensor that limits your ability to push the button that gives you pain medication. You had to reach over and push a button on its panel to restart it and then you had to get your pulse and breathing to appropriate levels before it would dispense medication. I can't tell you how many nights I was peacefully asleep, but didn't breathe properly at some point so it woke me up beeeping. Of course I jumped up trying to shut it off, which caused immediate pain, yet in the dark, I couldnt get the buttons pushed to make it all stop. once you got it done, you'd end up lying in the bed, shrt of breath, in pain... even though you'd just been peacefully asleep. I HATED thhis machine. like hated it this much:
4. My room door will not shut all the way on its own. You have to pull it all the way until you hear a click. Besides my nurses, no one understands this. It isn't the worst thing that could happen, but inevitably old people wander the halls. One thing I've learned this week about old people in hospitals is that in general they have a fucking staring problem...
3. What would happen if this thing had wheels?
This is apparently an alternative to having a bedpan and actually making it into the bathroom. I also assume that if you are claustrophobi anddon't enjoy going #2 in small spaces such as hospital bathrooms, then this gives you the freedom to stink up the entire room you're staying in and require someone to clean up after you as well. My first thought when I saw this was, What if it had wheels? Don't think that I wouldn't have went out into the hallwaysand wheeled up next to people who thought I probably had nothing on under my gown. I may or may not have also grunted and sounded like one should when using thechair properly. It might be doubtful that I'd actually ever do that, but what I wouldn't give to see some old dude rolling down the hallway without a care.
2. One of the first nights in the hospital, I was able to get up and help myself to the bathroom, but it took me quite awhile to gather up all my wires, collectors, sensors, etc. It hadn't really been an issue so far, but as they pump more and more fluids into your IV, you end up getting out of bed 2 or 3 times a night to pee. It was on one of those occasions that I had to go to the bathroom that I didn't quite fully wake up from my dream first. For whatever reason, I was dreaming that I was Indiana Jones and the Nazi's had sequestered me in the hospital for something. I know I was watching tv (in the dream) and they were torturing people on it. It was at that point that reality and dreaming collided to make me one hilarious person and probably scare the shit out of my mom who had been staying in the hospital with me. I remember her asking me what was going on and my reply was that I needed to get these things off of me because I was about to pee my pants... I was pulling at the leads, wires, and tubes and luckily, I didn't rip any of them out. Mom jumped up and helped me to get free and make it to the bathroom before I peed my pants. No one wants to pee their pants as an adult, especially Indiana Jones...
1.My lasting memory from this whole ordeal may not seem like much to you guys, but to Susan and I, it was phenomenal. There was an older lady in the room next to us and her husband was staying with her. At some point he desperately needed to do one of two things: 1) shit 2) track down her doctor/nurse and ask for something. I don't know which it was, but it looked like the first. Dude was power-walking the shit out of it and all the while he had his cheeks clenched together like he had the secret to cold-fusion hidden up in there. Ultimately it wouldn't have mattered because luckily he was wearing brown polyester slacks...
5. Down 1 more wire & the constant beeping.
As of now I'm down to just one iv wire. That has been a big improvement over last week when I had breathing tubes, an iv with drugs as well as a sensor that monitored my breathing and pulse via my fingers. The breathing tubes sucked because they were cumbersome, attached to my ribcage, & hard to walk around with (especially if you had to try and rush to the bathroom quickly). The drugs, of course, I didn't mind. They knocked you out quickly and efficiently. You weren't loopy, out of it, or anything. Pain just ceased to exist and you fell asleep. The sensor, however, was the bane of my existence. If your pulse went above 120 or breathing went below 89 (it somehow measured how much oxygen my body used through my finger...) then it would start beeping loudly. It did this A LOT!!!!!! The entire issue with how this works is what I dont understand. When you've had surgery on your lungs there are 3 things that are known. a)you can't move your arms very well b)you have limited breathing capabilities c)you are in pain quite frequently. With those things known, why would you design a sensor that limits your ability to push the button that gives you pain medication. You had to reach over and push a button on its panel to restart it and then you had to get your pulse and breathing to appropriate levels before it would dispense medication. I can't tell you how many nights I was peacefully asleep, but didn't breathe properly at some point so it woke me up beeeping. Of course I jumped up trying to shut it off, which caused immediate pain, yet in the dark, I couldnt get the buttons pushed to make it all stop. once you got it done, you'd end up lying in the bed, shrt of breath, in pain... even though you'd just been peacefully asleep. I HATED thhis machine. like hated it this much:
4. My room door will not shut all the way on its own. You have to pull it all the way until you hear a click. Besides my nurses, no one understands this. It isn't the worst thing that could happen, but inevitably old people wander the halls. One thing I've learned this week about old people in hospitals is that in general they have a fucking staring problem...
3. What would happen if this thing had wheels?
This is apparently an alternative to having a bedpan and actually making it into the bathroom. I also assume that if you are claustrophobi anddon't enjoy going #2 in small spaces such as hospital bathrooms, then this gives you the freedom to stink up the entire room you're staying in and require someone to clean up after you as well. My first thought when I saw this was, What if it had wheels? Don't think that I wouldn't have went out into the hallwaysand wheeled up next to people who thought I probably had nothing on under my gown. I may or may not have also grunted and sounded like one should when using thechair properly. It might be doubtful that I'd actually ever do that, but what I wouldn't give to see some old dude rolling down the hallway without a care.
2. One of the first nights in the hospital, I was able to get up and help myself to the bathroom, but it took me quite awhile to gather up all my wires, collectors, sensors, etc. It hadn't really been an issue so far, but as they pump more and more fluids into your IV, you end up getting out of bed 2 or 3 times a night to pee. It was on one of those occasions that I had to go to the bathroom that I didn't quite fully wake up from my dream first. For whatever reason, I was dreaming that I was Indiana Jones and the Nazi's had sequestered me in the hospital for something. I know I was watching tv (in the dream) and they were torturing people on it. It was at that point that reality and dreaming collided to make me one hilarious person and probably scare the shit out of my mom who had been staying in the hospital with me. I remember her asking me what was going on and my reply was that I needed to get these things off of me because I was about to pee my pants... I was pulling at the leads, wires, and tubes and luckily, I didn't rip any of them out. Mom jumped up and helped me to get free and make it to the bathroom before I peed my pants. No one wants to pee their pants as an adult, especially Indiana Jones...
1.My lasting memory from this whole ordeal may not seem like much to you guys, but to Susan and I, it was phenomenal. There was an older lady in the room next to us and her husband was staying with her. At some point he desperately needed to do one of two things: 1) shit 2) track down her doctor/nurse and ask for something. I don't know which it was, but it looked like the first. Dude was power-walking the shit out of it and all the while he had his cheeks clenched together like he had the secret to cold-fusion hidden up in there. Ultimately it wouldn't have mattered because luckily he was wearing brown polyester slacks...
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Hospitals are fun, and other falacies... Top Ten #10-6
So I've been in the hospital since Tuesday. It hasn't been that bad, but overall it has done little to boost my desire to have an extended stay in one again. Let's start with what has happened this week. On Tuesday I had my surgery, the plan was to go in and wedge out a couple sections of my right lung as well as take out the lymph node that was in between my lungs. Good news across the board there, You know from the last post that there was a concern that it would either be a teratoma or dead, necrotic tissue and it was ALL NECROTIC tissue!!!! The actually left the lymph node alone and didn't extract one spot because of its placement in my lung (it was in the middle, meaning losing more good lung tissue to extract dead tissue that will eventually go away on its own). This also means that because my left lung and lymph nodes that were likely involved in the 2nd surgery are of the same prognosis that I won't have to have the 2nd surgery!!!!!!!!! So for all intents and purposes, my cancer treatment is over!!!!!! I'll still have to recover from this surgery, but from here on out it will just be periodic scans every 3 months to make sure I'm still where I need to be at. So that was awesome news! Unfortunately, I've been in some pain, as one would expect a lung surgery patient to be, so I haven't been entirely up to blogging until today. There's also been far less going on than I expected so I don't necessarily have a live blog for you or any really funny diatribes about my stay. What I thought I'd do is to live blog, but that isn't feasible so why don't we just list the top 10 observations made by Susan and myself about this week.
10. Itching like a crackhead.
This what my skin has felt like this past week. It started when I had to get my sponge bath and I'm pretty sure the student nurses did it wrong. They didn't pre-apply any water instead just starting out wet, soapy towels and then half washing those off with barely wet towels. Basically they got the soap just wet enough to coat/liquid enough for it to adhere to my body and then they left it on. So for 2 days after this I had the dry skin of an iguana. The next couple of days I ended up wandering around on my walks looking like a paler version of Tyrone Biggums...
9. So in the above I mentioned my walks. If you've ever had an extended stay, then you know that they like for you to make sure that you get up and move around on a daily basis. As Suz has accompanied me on many walks we often talk about the people walking by us. After noticing, that most of the time, wearing scrubs makes you look like you just took a dump in your pants, Suz would always say, "Dumps like a truck..." as they passed. It was our little inside joke and it was funny until it got to the point where, if I had taken enough pain meds to make me silly, Susan would say the line and then all were subjected to me walking around in a hospital gown singing the Thong Song. I'm not sure what's more sad, that I did this repeatedly or that I knew way more of the song than I thought...
8. Hospital Food. Bleh. I've never seen great examples of it and this place has done it best to keep confirming what we already knew. They apparently don't care if you eat while you are here. Among some of the tops this week, we had a pork chop that looked half-regurgitated and thus they decided to top it with mac and cheese. Only they forgot to make it without cheese. So we open up the tray and its a shitty porkchop with a scoop of congealed macaroni on top?!?!?!?!
The other were the various jello concoctions they included in every meal. the 1st day I had lemon jello? I dont think even knew it existed and given the appearance, certainly had no desire to try it. The other days were mostly the perfect squares of jello with what appeared to be fruit in them. With what it looked like they spent on their hospital food budget in total, I somehow doubted that it had real peaches mixed in with the Jello. So, since we've eliminated that option, WTF was in that Jello?
7. How's you pain? Oh I'd say its bad, possibly just shy of Gene Simmons...
This was the observation that my buddy Burhan made. This line of smiley faces is what they use to determine your pain level. Its left to right, 1-10 with 10 being the worst possible scenario. A lot of the faces look funny and/or awkward. 4 & 6 look a little bit constipated. Which one can only assume that being constipated does leave you in some mild - moderate discomfort, so maybe there's a correlation there. Where it gets funny is around #8, Burhan noticed that they start adding mascara at that point. I assume this is possibly because eye makeup is painful??? I mean if you're a lab rabbit which is having it tested on you? then, yes it is likely painful...
What Burhan suggested was that the 2 longest tenured members of K.I.S.S., Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons were represented here. It makes complete sense. 8 is very severe pain and would give most of us the pouty look you always see on Paul's face as well as the inability to move most of your face, the latter coincides with the massive amounts of plastic surgery that Paul has had, rendering his face immovable. The trouble is that when I tell the nurses that my pain is about an 8, they may actually hear or think that I want to rock and roll all night, party every day.
10 is Gene Simmons. If you look closely the strain on the sign's face resembles the face paint scheme used by Simmons. So worst possible pain = Gene Simmons. Worst possible pain = odd reality tv show about your ego, making yourself a brand, and generally creeping me out. He married Shannon Tweed though, so I don't see how the queen of late night Skinemax being your wife = worst possible pain.
6. My mom took off from work to come stay with me in the hospital this week, which I am very thankful for. If you know or have met my mom, it's easy to see that she is a very easy going, sweet person, that doesn't get bent out of shape over much. Unless your name is Roxy and you are a student nurse... The hospital has no nursing aide's in the section we're in, so they instead have student nurses come in and do hands on learning as well as help out the nurses who always seem to be running at full speed. We had multiple SN's, but our best one was named Roxy. If Roxy were a song she would be this one...
She lingered. Always. Awkwardly & Forever. Since she was a student nurse in the first place, she had limited abilities. They mostly came in and checked your vital signs and handled things like making patients more comfortable/cleaning the rooms (you know, changing sheets, helping with any messes made, etc.). She made odd comments, obvious comments...we were always in an awkward state when she walked into the room. Plus she generally had no clue what she was doing. Therefore, my mom didn't care for Roxy. It got to the point where Mom left the room a couple of times as she came in to avoid the inevitable weirdness approaching.
The one thing she did with a Tourette's-like ferocity was to tell me to use my spirometer...
That's one of these:
Its known as an incentive spirometer. I have no clue what the incentive for using it was, but you'd have thought it was eternal salvation the way Roxy was promoting it. We actually think that it was the only word she'd managed to get good at saying and thus, felt more important when she used a technical term. So if you're on staff at Centennial Medical Center and somehow end up reading this. If you were mad because I didn't use my spirometer enough, blame Roxy. I don't like being told what to do repeatedly. Also, teach her some more words and how/when to exit a room and conversation properly. These are all things that will make the world better.
So, that's my top 10, with posts 10-6 on this one. I decided to split them up into 2 because of the size. so you can look for then next one containing #1-5 coming after this one in a bit.
10. Itching like a crackhead.
This what my skin has felt like this past week. It started when I had to get my sponge bath and I'm pretty sure the student nurses did it wrong. They didn't pre-apply any water instead just starting out wet, soapy towels and then half washing those off with barely wet towels. Basically they got the soap just wet enough to coat/liquid enough for it to adhere to my body and then they left it on. So for 2 days after this I had the dry skin of an iguana. The next couple of days I ended up wandering around on my walks looking like a paler version of Tyrone Biggums...
9. So in the above I mentioned my walks. If you've ever had an extended stay, then you know that they like for you to make sure that you get up and move around on a daily basis. As Suz has accompanied me on many walks we often talk about the people walking by us. After noticing, that most of the time, wearing scrubs makes you look like you just took a dump in your pants, Suz would always say, "Dumps like a truck..." as they passed. It was our little inside joke and it was funny until it got to the point where, if I had taken enough pain meds to make me silly, Susan would say the line and then all were subjected to me walking around in a hospital gown singing the Thong Song. I'm not sure what's more sad, that I did this repeatedly or that I knew way more of the song than I thought...
8. Hospital Food. Bleh. I've never seen great examples of it and this place has done it best to keep confirming what we already knew. They apparently don't care if you eat while you are here. Among some of the tops this week, we had a pork chop that looked half-regurgitated and thus they decided to top it with mac and cheese. Only they forgot to make it without cheese. So we open up the tray and its a shitty porkchop with a scoop of congealed macaroni on top?!?!?!?!
The other were the various jello concoctions they included in every meal. the 1st day I had lemon jello? I dont think even knew it existed and given the appearance, certainly had no desire to try it. The other days were mostly the perfect squares of jello with what appeared to be fruit in them. With what it looked like they spent on their hospital food budget in total, I somehow doubted that it had real peaches mixed in with the Jello. So, since we've eliminated that option, WTF was in that Jello?
7. How's you pain? Oh I'd say its bad, possibly just shy of Gene Simmons...
This was the observation that my buddy Burhan made. This line of smiley faces is what they use to determine your pain level. Its left to right, 1-10 with 10 being the worst possible scenario. A lot of the faces look funny and/or awkward. 4 & 6 look a little bit constipated. Which one can only assume that being constipated does leave you in some mild - moderate discomfort, so maybe there's a correlation there. Where it gets funny is around #8, Burhan noticed that they start adding mascara at that point. I assume this is possibly because eye makeup is painful??? I mean if you're a lab rabbit which is having it tested on you? then, yes it is likely painful...
What Burhan suggested was that the 2 longest tenured members of K.I.S.S., Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons were represented here. It makes complete sense. 8 is very severe pain and would give most of us the pouty look you always see on Paul's face as well as the inability to move most of your face, the latter coincides with the massive amounts of plastic surgery that Paul has had, rendering his face immovable. The trouble is that when I tell the nurses that my pain is about an 8, they may actually hear or think that I want to rock and roll all night, party every day.
10 is Gene Simmons. If you look closely the strain on the sign's face resembles the face paint scheme used by Simmons. So worst possible pain = Gene Simmons. Worst possible pain = odd reality tv show about your ego, making yourself a brand, and generally creeping me out. He married Shannon Tweed though, so I don't see how the queen of late night Skinemax being your wife = worst possible pain.
6. My mom took off from work to come stay with me in the hospital this week, which I am very thankful for. If you know or have met my mom, it's easy to see that she is a very easy going, sweet person, that doesn't get bent out of shape over much. Unless your name is Roxy and you are a student nurse... The hospital has no nursing aide's in the section we're in, so they instead have student nurses come in and do hands on learning as well as help out the nurses who always seem to be running at full speed. We had multiple SN's, but our best one was named Roxy. If Roxy were a song she would be this one...
She lingered. Always. Awkwardly & Forever. Since she was a student nurse in the first place, she had limited abilities. They mostly came in and checked your vital signs and handled things like making patients more comfortable/cleaning the rooms (you know, changing sheets, helping with any messes made, etc.). She made odd comments, obvious comments...we were always in an awkward state when she walked into the room. Plus she generally had no clue what she was doing. Therefore, my mom didn't care for Roxy. It got to the point where Mom left the room a couple of times as she came in to avoid the inevitable weirdness approaching.
The one thing she did with a Tourette's-like ferocity was to tell me to use my spirometer...
That's one of these:
Its known as an incentive spirometer. I have no clue what the incentive for using it was, but you'd have thought it was eternal salvation the way Roxy was promoting it. We actually think that it was the only word she'd managed to get good at saying and thus, felt more important when she used a technical term. So if you're on staff at Centennial Medical Center and somehow end up reading this. If you were mad because I didn't use my spirometer enough, blame Roxy. I don't like being told what to do repeatedly. Also, teach her some more words and how/when to exit a room and conversation properly. These are all things that will make the world better.
So, that's my top 10, with posts 10-6 on this one. I decided to split them up into 2 because of the size. so you can look for then next one containing #1-5 coming after this one in a bit.
Monday, November 14, 2011
It's odd that I've put off this blog post since last Thursday. I guess it is more that I can't figure out how to truly wrap my head around what is about to happen. It always seems when you are sick or have been sick that the beauty of denial can be your best friend and your worst enemy at the same time. It allows you to not freak out, which is usually good, but at the same time it causes you to not share major news with anyone. You know, stuff like when you are having surgery on your lungs at 8:30am tomorrow...
It's what I've spent the last month dreading, but knowing almost to certainty that it would happen. As you most likely know, all of my tumor markers are normal, the lesions on my lungs have shrank to almost nothing, and in general I feel better than I have in at least a year. As good as all of that is, when you had cancer and it metastasizes there are equal chances it stays around in 1 of 3 forms: 1) active cancer 2)teratomas or 3)necrotic tissue. Since my blood work shows normal markers we can eliminate the first possibility. Which is awesome. If there was a way to know what the lesions were without surgery then they would likely just observe them and make sure there was no growth. There is no way to know and while necrotic tissue usually dissipates on its own, the teratoma is the concerning option and reason for surgery. These are the tumors that can start to grow on their own and while not cancerous, they are the ones you hear where people have huge growths that contain hair, nails, teeth, etc. No one needs something like that in their lungs. So, the plan is to take out what is in my right lung tomorrow as well as the enlarged lymph nodes in my chest. All of this, as scary as it is to me, has always been an option and is fairly common practice in cases like mine. After about 5 weeks off they'll do my left lung, which has considerably less trouble spots, and also do the lymph nodes in my stomach area.
Is this all serious? hell yes. Am I freaked out? more than I care to admit. As everyone who knows has told me so far, "Everything will be fine!" I'm sure it will, but if you have a friend or loved one who is about to have some very vital organs cut into, don't tell them that. It downplays the true seriousness of it all. While it is easy for all of you to consider the percentage where something bad happens as minimal and unlikely, my mind despite its usual glass-half-fullness is running into roughly DEFCON 2-3 range. I know it is something I can't control and that I shouldn't be this worried, but I cannot help it.
The good news for all of us is that I'll be in the hospital for 5 days and thus will have ample time to come up with entertaining & funny things for all of us. the good thing is that the rooms are private, but the bad things is that the rooms are private. I had hopes of an annoying roommate with which i could talk about all week. Maybe it will be a nurse or something that comes to the rescue and provides me with the necessary material. we shall see.
Now to end on some good news. We sold all of the bracelets and thus have raised about $900 for the local charity which is awesome. So maybe tomorrow you should all wear your "I Rock One" bracelets. Susan is also checking into something at work where Dell matches $ for $ on any employee donating to charity, so we could possibly have almost $2k to donate. Which would be awesome. So thanks for helping out and thanks for being so supportive over this last half of 2011.
It's what I've spent the last month dreading, but knowing almost to certainty that it would happen. As you most likely know, all of my tumor markers are normal, the lesions on my lungs have shrank to almost nothing, and in general I feel better than I have in at least a year. As good as all of that is, when you had cancer and it metastasizes there are equal chances it stays around in 1 of 3 forms: 1) active cancer 2)teratomas or 3)necrotic tissue. Since my blood work shows normal markers we can eliminate the first possibility. Which is awesome. If there was a way to know what the lesions were without surgery then they would likely just observe them and make sure there was no growth. There is no way to know and while necrotic tissue usually dissipates on its own, the teratoma is the concerning option and reason for surgery. These are the tumors that can start to grow on their own and while not cancerous, they are the ones you hear where people have huge growths that contain hair, nails, teeth, etc. No one needs something like that in their lungs. So, the plan is to take out what is in my right lung tomorrow as well as the enlarged lymph nodes in my chest. All of this, as scary as it is to me, has always been an option and is fairly common practice in cases like mine. After about 5 weeks off they'll do my left lung, which has considerably less trouble spots, and also do the lymph nodes in my stomach area.
Is this all serious? hell yes. Am I freaked out? more than I care to admit. As everyone who knows has told me so far, "Everything will be fine!" I'm sure it will, but if you have a friend or loved one who is about to have some very vital organs cut into, don't tell them that. It downplays the true seriousness of it all. While it is easy for all of you to consider the percentage where something bad happens as minimal and unlikely, my mind despite its usual glass-half-fullness is running into roughly DEFCON 2-3 range. I know it is something I can't control and that I shouldn't be this worried, but I cannot help it.
The good news for all of us is that I'll be in the hospital for 5 days and thus will have ample time to come up with entertaining & funny things for all of us. the good thing is that the rooms are private, but the bad things is that the rooms are private. I had hopes of an annoying roommate with which i could talk about all week. Maybe it will be a nurse or something that comes to the rescue and provides me with the necessary material. we shall see.
Now to end on some good news. We sold all of the bracelets and thus have raised about $900 for the local charity which is awesome. So maybe tomorrow you should all wear your "I Rock One" bracelets. Susan is also checking into something at work where Dell matches $ for $ on any employee donating to charity, so we could possibly have almost $2k to donate. Which would be awesome. So thanks for helping out and thanks for being so supportive over this last half of 2011.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
We've found a way to live blog again!!!!
There's jack shit on TV except for the CMA awards. Susan and I have been sitting here making fun and commenting on everything that has happened. We just had a eureka moment that it should all be written down in live blog form. I'm getting a late start so let's give you a quick rundown of what we've already came to agreement on or what Susan came up with first.
- Reba does not age
- The Band Perry = The Duran Duran of country music
- Zac Brown Band doesn't suck
- Hank Wiliams Jr. prove that all country music artists & fans are Republicans
- Someone was mean to Taylor Swift
- Lionel Fucking Richie just came on the CMA's. There isn't anything else to really say about that. Susan says its proof that you can turn anything into a fucking country song. I've got $20 and a song called Dancing on the Ceiling that says she's wrong.
- Darius Rucker just joined him on stage. Somewhere in the south Charley Pride just shit his pants. Also, if they don't do at least one Hootie song, I'm gonna be pissed.
- Fuck me. I just lost $20
- Judging by all of the entertainers on stage tonight. Somewhere backstage, there's a crazy person holding the next performer at bedazzler point...
- Commercial Break: we just saw a commercial for the new Alvin & The Chipmunks, Chipwrecked movie. There is no humorous comment that can outdo the fact that we are all aware someone spent at least $1 million on this, probably more...
- Judging by the stage setup for The Band Perry, Suz's assumption of them being Nashville's version of Duran Duran is correct. Although it looks more like Duran Duran hooked up with Old Crow Medicine Show. There's a lady in the corner playing an old time phonograph... I was unaware this qualified as an instrument.
- They just showed Zac Brown in the audience. He was wearing a black leather vest with Jack Daniels patches and is drinking out of a red solo cup. I imagine he's a cool dude.
- Matt Nathanson is singing a duet on the CMA's??? If you know who he is, then you fully understand the oddity of him singing a duet with Sugarland.
- The problem with live blogging something like CMA awards is that you have to watch the CMA awards...
- Blake Shelton is tall.
- Martina McBride always sings these serious songs. She also just got a standing ovation, which would be impressive if it wasn't the 17th time they've done it tonight...
- This whole Glenn Campbell tribute seems genuine, but weird. Not in a bad way, just in a, "I dont understand whats happening right now" kind of way. Soooo, I'm done with live blogging this stuff.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Where to go from here
I'll likely post more this week after we meet with the surgical oncologist on Thursday, but I wanted to be sure that I post at least once per week. I've been thinking quite a bit about the direction of my writing (especially since so many of you have asked me to keep this going) and how it all fits into my life after chemo and cancer. Over the last little bit, I've spent some time reflecting on some of my posts and remembering the days in chemo when they happened. So, I think that's the direction we'll head with this thing (I say we because you guys make me want to write more. The fact that people get a kick out of my thoughts and observations is somewhat addictive)...
Unfortunately, live blogging will definitely not happen as often because of the fact that I won't be sitting in a room with strangers for hours on end. That isn't to say that there won't be times when the chance arises (we'll be flying to Texas for Christmas & I'm already anticipating the travel that day will provide an awesome live blog), but in general they'll be less. Instead, I've decided that the best course is to make note of small conversations, interactions, etc. that I have on a daily basis and recant them to you all while possibly involving a running commentary as to how odd, funny, sad, etc. the event struck me as.
For example, as you may or may not know, I've started working at Macy's through the holiday season as a way to get back into real life and have some sort of a normal existence. There are two things about people in a retail environment that I've forgotten about. They're mean and stupid. On occasion they prefer to double dip and be both. Actually, that isn't true. On occasion they exhibit only one of these traits, the majority of the time, they show you that being an asshole doesn't require intelligence and vice versa... During a sale last week, you could spend $100 on men's clothing and save 25% off your purchase. Not a bad deal at all, as many customers took advantage of it, but we had one lad that wanted to take full advantage of it. Advantage isn't actually the correct term; she wanted to treat our discount like The Sisters treated Andy at Shawshank before he turned into H&R Block for the guards. Since she was buying close to $300 worth of stuff, she asked repeatedly that we separate them into thirds so that she could get her 25% on each $100 as well as that would save her more money... I'll let you ponder that scenario for a minute. I swear, all of the employees standing near enough to hear it had to think for a second because it sounded so stupid that we thought maybe she had figured out a way to cheat the system. Turns out she hadn't. I imagine she had to cheat her way through basic math though, as saving 25% on $100, 3 times separately doesn't mean you save 75% on $300. It means you still saved 25%, but you wasted everyone's time, so that you could prove your stupidity.
It makes me wish life were like a hockey game. In hockey, if you do something stupid like hook another player with your stick, you're penalized for 2:00 and the other team goes on a power play where they have 1 less person to play against. Why can't life be like that? You waste someone's time, cut someone off driving, or pull basically any other stunt that involves you preferring being an idiot over considering your surroundings, and you get put in the penalty box. I'm not sure what the times would translate to, nor do I care if it happens to be 2 hours or 2 days, I just want to know that at any point I'm skating on life's version of a power play because you can't park your Prius in a fucking parking spot correctly. It's a Toyota, their turning radii (yeah that's right. radii. its plural as well as badass. we could call the plural of prius as prii, but I prefer to jut call them douchenozzles who paid $9,000 more for a car to save fuel that will not add up to that amount over the time they own it) is unbelievable. Seriously, have you ever owned one? I can begin to think how far up your nose, your finger has to be for you to eff up parking in a straight manner. It isn't difficult, and you aren't special. Don't eff it up, but if you do fix it, because until I can get a power play or make it legal to hit you as if checking you into the boards, I shouldn't have to drive up another level in the garage because you huffed too much airplane glue as a kid...
Unfortunately, live blogging will definitely not happen as often because of the fact that I won't be sitting in a room with strangers for hours on end. That isn't to say that there won't be times when the chance arises (we'll be flying to Texas for Christmas & I'm already anticipating the travel that day will provide an awesome live blog), but in general they'll be less. Instead, I've decided that the best course is to make note of small conversations, interactions, etc. that I have on a daily basis and recant them to you all while possibly involving a running commentary as to how odd, funny, sad, etc. the event struck me as.
For example, as you may or may not know, I've started working at Macy's through the holiday season as a way to get back into real life and have some sort of a normal existence. There are two things about people in a retail environment that I've forgotten about. They're mean and stupid. On occasion they prefer to double dip and be both. Actually, that isn't true. On occasion they exhibit only one of these traits, the majority of the time, they show you that being an asshole doesn't require intelligence and vice versa... During a sale last week, you could spend $100 on men's clothing and save 25% off your purchase. Not a bad deal at all, as many customers took advantage of it, but we had one lad that wanted to take full advantage of it. Advantage isn't actually the correct term; she wanted to treat our discount like The Sisters treated Andy at Shawshank before he turned into H&R Block for the guards. Since she was buying close to $300 worth of stuff, she asked repeatedly that we separate them into thirds so that she could get her 25% on each $100 as well as that would save her more money... I'll let you ponder that scenario for a minute. I swear, all of the employees standing near enough to hear it had to think for a second because it sounded so stupid that we thought maybe she had figured out a way to cheat the system. Turns out she hadn't. I imagine she had to cheat her way through basic math though, as saving 25% on $100, 3 times separately doesn't mean you save 75% on $300. It means you still saved 25%, but you wasted everyone's time, so that you could prove your stupidity.
It makes me wish life were like a hockey game. In hockey, if you do something stupid like hook another player with your stick, you're penalized for 2:00 and the other team goes on a power play where they have 1 less person to play against. Why can't life be like that? You waste someone's time, cut someone off driving, or pull basically any other stunt that involves you preferring being an idiot over considering your surroundings, and you get put in the penalty box. I'm not sure what the times would translate to, nor do I care if it happens to be 2 hours or 2 days, I just want to know that at any point I'm skating on life's version of a power play because you can't park your Prius in a fucking parking spot correctly. It's a Toyota, their turning radii (yeah that's right. radii. its plural as well as badass. we could call the plural of prius as prii, but I prefer to jut call them douchenozzles who paid $9,000 more for a car to save fuel that will not add up to that amount over the time they own it) is unbelievable. Seriously, have you ever owned one? I can begin to think how far up your nose, your finger has to be for you to eff up parking in a straight manner. It isn't difficult, and you aren't special. Don't eff it up, but if you do fix it, because until I can get a power play or make it legal to hit you as if checking you into the boards, I shouldn't have to drive up another level in the garage because you huffed too much airplane glue as a kid...
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
News of the day...
You've noticed as of late (or maybe you haven't) that my posting has all but ceased to exist. There wasn't a reason for the lack of writing really, I just haven't felt like it. Honestly, since chemo has finished it's been a weird month. The best part of chemo was that it gave me a schedule, in a time when I didn't really have much else on my plate besides beating cancer. Once that ended, I found myself with nothing much to do. With not knowing whether I'd have surgery or not, I couldn't really go out a get a job right away, school was mid semester, it was almost like i was in purgatory. Dangling between the lives of beating cancer and what everyone else normally does.
The good news is that after today I know what is happening. I had my ct scan yesterday, and the results were exactly what was expected. My oncologist figured that, due to their original size, I'd have some residual tissue left over from the tumors in my lungs. My blood work shows no growth markers, so in essence there is no cancer, but there is a possibility that it could start growing again. The thing that I find more concerning is that they have the ability to turn into a teratoma. (In case you don't wanna click on the link, they're basically tumors that can contain things such as teeth, hair, bones, etc. which in your lungs would be a bad thing) The decision is that we need to get those out of there. Next week I'll meet with a surgical oncologist (yeah, I didn't know they existed either...) and we'll discuss what the surgery deal is. I know that it isn't as invasive as one would think, but to be real honest, when you're on blood thinners because of a blood clot and someone wants to go rooting around in your lungs, it's hard to not be freaked out. I think that's what has led me to be so quiet about things this past month. I have no reason to be as scared as I am. Given what medical procedures I've encountered this year, I should be fine and in time I may be, but in less than 2 weeks, I'll have had the surgery and then be able to be declared cancer free. No More Technicalities. I'll keep you guys updated more as the next few weeks go by and I promised myself I'd write at least one humorous post per week. My people watching has been nowhere near as prevalent a priority as it should be... I'll make sure I fix that!
The good news is that after today I know what is happening. I had my ct scan yesterday, and the results were exactly what was expected. My oncologist figured that, due to their original size, I'd have some residual tissue left over from the tumors in my lungs. My blood work shows no growth markers, so in essence there is no cancer, but there is a possibility that it could start growing again. The thing that I find more concerning is that they have the ability to turn into a teratoma. (In case you don't wanna click on the link, they're basically tumors that can contain things such as teeth, hair, bones, etc. which in your lungs would be a bad thing) The decision is that we need to get those out of there. Next week I'll meet with a surgical oncologist (yeah, I didn't know they existed either...) and we'll discuss what the surgery deal is. I know that it isn't as invasive as one would think, but to be real honest, when you're on blood thinners because of a blood clot and someone wants to go rooting around in your lungs, it's hard to not be freaked out. I think that's what has led me to be so quiet about things this past month. I have no reason to be as scared as I am. Given what medical procedures I've encountered this year, I should be fine and in time I may be, but in less than 2 weeks, I'll have had the surgery and then be able to be declared cancer free. No More Technicalities. I'll keep you guys updated more as the next few weeks go by and I promised myself I'd write at least one humorous post per week. My people watching has been nowhere near as prevalent a priority as it should be... I'll make sure I fix that!
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
The Latest Cancer News
Had an appointment today to figure out what the next steps are for treatment and thought I'd update everyone with what's going on. As you may or may not know, my oncologist decided to not do the last two chemo treatments. The reasoning behind this is that the tumor levels in my bloodwork have moved to normal levels. Essentially, I don't have cancer anymore, but there are likely still some mass left of the tumors in my lungs. So the next step is to have a ct scan done around the 1st of November (that gives the chemo in my bloodstream a month to continue working and get on out). After that, I will either have surgery to remove whats left of the tumors or they will have broken up to the point that it would be considered in remission and then I'd just have to monitor it with scans every 3 months for about the next year or so.
As far as the surgery goes, it isn't super major surgery, but it does involve going into my lungs, so it isn't like minor knee surgery or something. I'm not sure exactly what it does involve, but rest assured I'll keep you in the loop as everything moves along and I find out what's going on.
This leads to another development, some of which I'm not sure of, but many of you have asked about this blog now that the majority of my treatments are over. I had never really thought about it one way or another being as given my current situation, I had/have a tendency to not think about the future or about anything going on. I'd call it a mild form of denial, but whatever you wanna call it, healthy or not, it was my way of coping. Now that everything is looking much, much better I can think of what to do with it. I went back through and read the majority of my blogs (something I had yet to do before last night). What I discovered is that I've merely been writing about observations in my world. Just because my world is changing (You may not believe this, but there is a part of me that will miss going to chemo. Lord knows it isn't for treatment, but rather for the fact that I never knew what I'd see in there every day) doesn't mean that I won't have equally funny observations. So, I'll be continuing the blog, but it will probably be about whatever randomness I see from day to day. Occasionally, I'll probably go into Wal Mart and ride their power scooters for reactions as well and because a part of me really wants to do that. Keep reading for the updates if you'd like, if not, then thanks for reading during this crazy time of my life. I'll keep you updated as the next couple months go by. 2011 has been a shitty year, so let's hope 2012 will be better!
As far as the surgery goes, it isn't super major surgery, but it does involve going into my lungs, so it isn't like minor knee surgery or something. I'm not sure exactly what it does involve, but rest assured I'll keep you in the loop as everything moves along and I find out what's going on.
This leads to another development, some of which I'm not sure of, but many of you have asked about this blog now that the majority of my treatments are over. I had never really thought about it one way or another being as given my current situation, I had/have a tendency to not think about the future or about anything going on. I'd call it a mild form of denial, but whatever you wanna call it, healthy or not, it was my way of coping. Now that everything is looking much, much better I can think of what to do with it. I went back through and read the majority of my blogs (something I had yet to do before last night). What I discovered is that I've merely been writing about observations in my world. Just because my world is changing (You may not believe this, but there is a part of me that will miss going to chemo. Lord knows it isn't for treatment, but rather for the fact that I never knew what I'd see in there every day) doesn't mean that I won't have equally funny observations. So, I'll be continuing the blog, but it will probably be about whatever randomness I see from day to day. Occasionally, I'll probably go into Wal Mart and ride their power scooters for reactions as well and because a part of me really wants to do that. Keep reading for the updates if you'd like, if not, then thanks for reading during this crazy time of my life. I'll keep you updated as the next couple months go by. 2011 has been a shitty year, so let's hope 2012 will be better!
Friday, September 30, 2011
Update time
I had just noticed as I posted some other stuff that I haven't given an update in awhile. Plus, I only have 2 more treatments after today, so its a good time to bring everyone up to speed. It has been 3 months since I found out I had cancer today. That's weird to think about sometimes, and it doesn't always seem like its been that long as chemo has flown by for the most part. I got my latest blood work back on Tuesday and it was good news across the board. The tumor markers were back down to the levels you would see in a normal person. It doesn't necessarily mean that I don't have cancer anymore, but it does mean that my outlook is extremely good. As for what happens next, we shall see. My options are one of three: 1) Radiation to eliminate whats left of the tumors in my lungs and lymph nodes. 2) surgery to remove them or 3) do nothing and keep everything under close observation. The way my doctor explained it is that the tumors are dead and no longer growing, but due to their initial size, their would always be some critical mass left over. These are basically dead cancer cells just hanging out in my lungs. There's no guarantee they will start growing again, but there's no guarantee to the contrary either. The family is leaning towards surgery, which I admit scared the shit out of me at first (simply because it involves cutting lungs open and I'm naturally not a fan of that...) but now the idea has grown on me a bit. If for no other reason than, it ensures that everything is gone. Radiation isn't too high on my list because I don't like the idea of extending the treatment and since I've never had the urge to stick my head into a microwave, i don't see how I'd possibly enjoy having beams of it shot into my chest and stomach (although I am curious if they can cook a hot pocket any quicker with it.) As for observation, Its easier, but there's always the chance it could come back and I don't really want to chance that. I mean don't get me wrong, this whole cancer thing has really been a blast and all, but...
I don't know what will happen as it all pertains to my last ct scan which I'll get in about another month. Until then I'll just finish my treatment and wait patiently for it. We can all rest easy knowing now that the prognosis has been great and I'm sure good news will follow. I can't tell you all enough how much the support has meant to me. It truly lets you know that people care about you.
I don't know what will happen as it all pertains to my last ct scan which I'll get in about another month. Until then I'll just finish my treatment and wait patiently for it. We can all rest easy knowing now that the prognosis has been great and I'm sure good news will follow. I can't tell you all enough how much the support has meant to me. It truly lets you know that people care about you.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Diversity...We has it as well as a LIVE BLOG!!!
Today started out as a fairly benign day in chemo. I was the only patient and I sat here on my laptop listening to some tunes and relaxing. Then in a matter of 15 minutes this place turned into the Model U.N. As I gaze around the room we have at least 4 ethnicities represented and 3 of the major 4 religions in the world. A quick check on Wikipedia tells me that our friend in the orange robe is indeed a hindu monk otherwise known as a swami. Up until now, my only interaction with a swami was the dude on the Bozo the Clown show and he was pretty badass, so I'll give this guy the benefit of the doubt. Plus, I dont think Hindus can curse people, but just to be safe, I dont think its wise to cross him. In the room we also have our friends from previous visits, the buddhist monk (actually I dont know if he's a monk, I just remember him mentioning that he worked at the temple.), although his friend left him, so I can't possibly translate what they're talking about now. We also have a lady who appears to be channeling her best Erykah Badu impersonation and generally freaking about needles. Might as well live blog the shit out of this...
11:40 - Erykah Badu is really concerned about having the tv on. Now that she's gotten that, she immediately starts making phone calls while on her phone. There is a huge sign by her precious tv that specifically states phone calls aren't permitted. Glad to see she's paying attention to both...
11:42 - I understand that everyone has differences when it comes to tv preferences, but this nutri-system infomercial can't possibly be entertaining to anyone. I mean, it's better than Matlock, but not really.
11:44 - The swami is Hindu, but he has clearly eaten well enough to develop a Buddha belly. This concerns me.
11:48 - The gentlemen next to Erykah Badu is a Chatty Cathy. He has easily jumped into every conversation going on. Except for the Swami's because he doesn't speak whatever language they're jabbering in...
11:51 - Now chatty cathy is talking about his puking while and after he eats while giving Erykah Badu guidance on how to best take a needle into your chest port.
11:53 - The lady that is with the Swami is getting treatment. They ask you to verify your name when they hook you up, her name is Josie. I seriously doubt that's how its spelt or that she knows any of the pussycats...
11:55 - Now the Buddhist guy is talking on his phone. I'm guessing he can't read the phone sign clearly posted. I'm also amazed at the number of older people who don't keep their phones on vibrate only. I think almost everyone I know my age does and manages just fine.
11:58 - chatty cathy is now talking about puking again. its sad that its related to cancer, but I have cancer too, so I can be annoyed. If you're reading this and you don't have cancer, you shouldn't. A button also popped off a machine and rolled under my chair. Chatty cathy jumped out of his chair and crawled under mine to retrieve it. It wasn't awkward at all...
12:02 - Erykah Badu just had someone bring in Chinese food. The Buddhist monk did act a little uppity as if to insinuate that it wasn't authentic Chinese food.
12:09 - Chatty Cathy is now asking if Erykah Badu's nail polish is emerald green. I doubt that he actually knows what emerald green is.
12:22 - Now my mom has joined into looking around the room observing. The swami's friend has a giant ruby between her eyes. Mom seems amazed by this. This somehow seems normal compared to the large hindu monk sitting beside her.
12:33 - chatty cathy has now started talking about Vietnam. I'm 25% concerned he may have a flashback and 75% hoping he does. Unless he has a gun, especially because the buddhist guy over there may be first to go.
12:39 - I've now begun trying to sneak pictures of the monks because I'm a horrible person. I'm also now concerned that both religions have some edict against pictures due to soul stealing or something. I'm sure it doesn't apply to me since I'm not Hindu, but I dont wanna get the Swami in any more trouble.
12:46 - The swami has left the building. :-(
12:47 - The buddhist and I have the same birthday. we should totes throw a joint bday party. I'm wondering if he would pitch in on the keg?
12:51 -This concludes our live blog as I'm finished. I''l keep you updated if the Buddhist and I decide to send out an evite...
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Expectations...
Life is about expectations. When you have cancer and a blood clot in your leg, expectations for most things get thrown out the window. You learn to accept whatever you get (Suz would disagree with me as she says I have become a bit of a diva throughout this. I cannot completely deny these accusations...) This doesn't apply to all areas of your life however, sometimes you only accept the highest quality of products or services. Sometimes average is just not good enough. If you asked me right now what that would be for me, the answer would be grocery store power scooters. From reading the last blog, you know that my time spent on the power scooter at Publix was a glorious time. They basically have the Cadillac of grocery store power scooters. You also know that I now have an urge to test all other grocery store scooters so that a correct comparison may be formed. Well, today we all came one step closer to having a true definition of excellence where power scooters in grocery stores are concerned. I went to Kroger.
Sundays are our usual grocery store day, so I knew it was coming, but to tell you how obsessed I am, Susan says, "I think we'll go to Kroger, their coupon deals are much better." to which I reply, "Agreed, plus I've never tried their scooters." She just starts laughing, but I know she wants to know how each store tests out against Publix as much as I do. So off to Kroger we went...
Suz dropped me off at the door so I wouldn't have to try and fit my crutches in the basket with me. Much like the chemo treatment room, I'm usually the only person under the age of 70 that you see in the store riding these things. I hobble over to where they are and sure enough, Two 70 year olds are sitting in two of the scooters, the gentlemen seemed to be quite focused on the lady, which led me to believe that he was spitting some serious geriatric game to her. While I know nothing about geriatric game, I assume it involves telling the ladies things like: which fiber additive or Metamucil flavor you prefer, comparing which restaurants give the best seniors discounts, and/or opinions on which medicare supplement plan is the best bang for the buck. As I hobbled by, they both looked at me as if I didn't belong when I hopped on the scooter. Upon initial inspection, you can tell that Kroger hasn't updated their scooter fleet in quite awhile. The seat on this thing looks wore out (its either that or this Kroger location has a larger percentage of super fat & lazy people that use the scooters even though they don't need them.) I hop on and go take off, but they take off is more like a sputter. Its so slow that, I'm actually contemplating just hobbling around the store. If the one at Publix went roughly 5-7 mph, this thing at Kroger was as slow as molasses. I actually contemplated racing one of the many old ladies to see if they were faster on foot, but feared losing too much.
The good news is that in a rousing move of solidarity, it seems that all grocery stores have requested that the back-up signals on these scooters to register just under, "jet engine taking off" on the sound decibel list. For these you also have to click another button into reverse before turning around. At least in Publix, the turning radius was good enough that I could avoid an aisle if I needed to, alas here at Kroger I was forced to plow through an old lady's perfume cloud because there was no avoiding it. Sidenote: Do the elderly purposefully spray i on that thick daily or is it to avoid bathing?? I mean this lady had perfume on so thick, she literally could have soiled her pants right beside me and I would've had no clue unless someone called for a cleanup on aisle 5. I also hope she enjoyed her damned green beans that took 12 minutes to select.
All in all, we can conclude that as of now Kroger has the shittiest power scooter fleet. I will imagine Wal Mart is worse, but I cannot stress enough that given what and whom I usually see operating these scooters at their stores, I'm a bit more reserved towards sitting in one myself. I may do it for the sake of research, but not before I soak it in Purel or use at least 2 boxes of those wipes they provide you with...
Sundays are our usual grocery store day, so I knew it was coming, but to tell you how obsessed I am, Susan says, "I think we'll go to Kroger, their coupon deals are much better." to which I reply, "Agreed, plus I've never tried their scooters." She just starts laughing, but I know she wants to know how each store tests out against Publix as much as I do. So off to Kroger we went...
Suz dropped me off at the door so I wouldn't have to try and fit my crutches in the basket with me. Much like the chemo treatment room, I'm usually the only person under the age of 70 that you see in the store riding these things. I hobble over to where they are and sure enough, Two 70 year olds are sitting in two of the scooters, the gentlemen seemed to be quite focused on the lady, which led me to believe that he was spitting some serious geriatric game to her. While I know nothing about geriatric game, I assume it involves telling the ladies things like: which fiber additive or Metamucil flavor you prefer, comparing which restaurants give the best seniors discounts, and/or opinions on which medicare supplement plan is the best bang for the buck. As I hobbled by, they both looked at me as if I didn't belong when I hopped on the scooter. Upon initial inspection, you can tell that Kroger hasn't updated their scooter fleet in quite awhile. The seat on this thing looks wore out (its either that or this Kroger location has a larger percentage of super fat & lazy people that use the scooters even though they don't need them.) I hop on and go take off, but they take off is more like a sputter. Its so slow that, I'm actually contemplating just hobbling around the store. If the one at Publix went roughly 5-7 mph, this thing at Kroger was as slow as molasses. I actually contemplated racing one of the many old ladies to see if they were faster on foot, but feared losing too much.
The good news is that in a rousing move of solidarity, it seems that all grocery stores have requested that the back-up signals on these scooters to register just under, "jet engine taking off" on the sound decibel list. For these you also have to click another button into reverse before turning around. At least in Publix, the turning radius was good enough that I could avoid an aisle if I needed to, alas here at Kroger I was forced to plow through an old lady's perfume cloud because there was no avoiding it. Sidenote: Do the elderly purposefully spray i on that thick daily or is it to avoid bathing?? I mean this lady had perfume on so thick, she literally could have soiled her pants right beside me and I would've had no clue unless someone called for a cleanup on aisle 5. I also hope she enjoyed her damned green beans that took 12 minutes to select.
All in all, we can conclude that as of now Kroger has the shittiest power scooter fleet. I will imagine Wal Mart is worse, but I cannot stress enough that given what and whom I usually see operating these scooters at their stores, I'm a bit more reserved towards sitting in one myself. I may do it for the sake of research, but not before I soak it in Purel or use at least 2 boxes of those wipes they provide you with...
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Chariots of Fire aka my grocery store power scooter
I haven't updated this in awhile due to the fact that everything has been pretty quiet here. Chemo has, for the most part, been uneventful and other than the good report had us in good shape overall...until this weekend. I had started to get what felt like a leg cramp in my right calf on Friday. it continued to get worse through the weekend and by Tuesday, when I went to chemo, I could hardly walk. They sent me for an ultrasound and confirmed what they thought. I had a blood-clot in the veins of my calf. It doesn't affect treatment at all and it is something they see in chemo treatment (probably from me sitting on my ass continuously for 2 months...) although it isn't typical. Here's where it gets good, as treatment they put you on blood thinners naturally. What they don't tell you is that these blood thinners have to be injected daily, in your stomach, and your the one that has to do it. I had to go pick up my shots today and also show them that I could self inject (have I mentioned that I'm petrified of needles?). When one of the nurses comes in and tapes smelling salts to the wall, just in case you pass out, you can see why there might be an issue with you self injecting a needle daily. Other than the typical pain of a charlie horse and having difficulty walking, you'll be glad to know that there isn't much else to worry about. I'll have to be on blood thinners for about 6 months, but that's it. It doesn't affect chemo or anything else, although I really hope this leg cramp/walking is a bitch thing subsides sooner than later...
With me being a half glass full kind of guy, there are some bright sides to this. Susan asked me if I could pick up a few things at the grocery store after my doctor's appointment. Knowing there's no way I could walk around Publix, I had a eureka type moment. With cancer and blood clots in my leg, I finally had every reason in the world to use one of those power scooter baskets they have. If you don't have Publix where you are at, think of it as a nicer Tom Thumb. So as you can expect, their scooters are nicer (i really cant judge the other stores, but I imagine Kroger's are in line with their stores and Publix is a much nicer store...) This thing was awesome!!!!! Much faster than I imagined, an amazing turning radius, & every time I backed up it let out a beeping signal so that anyone in the store could be warned. I also imagined this song playing as people looked at me on my scooter
So off I go through the store at what imagine is roughly somewhere between 5-7 mph. This where it starts getting tricky. The scooter is wider than a cart and so if people don't move over then you cant get through. further proving that old people are fucking oblivious to everything or generally act like that because they're old and they can. I believe that's also why they shit their pants, but that is a post for another time. Anyway, I'm rolling down the frozen foods aisle and Granny McSlowasHell has decided to leave her cart in the middle of the aisle and walk back down and look at everything again. I assume that this means she wants to double check the fiber content of a few items so she can possibly shit on a more regular basis and thus be lighter and hopefully faster, but alas I'm now stuck not being able to get around her and she's oblivious to everything but the processed food in front of her. So I did what any normal (read: only a few) person would do. I rammed her cart and gently pushed it out of my way. I didn't send it flying or anything, but the lady near me did look at me like I was the asshole...
There were a few other old people that decided to play the unobservant, old fart card, but luckily they underestimated my scooter's ability to bust a u turn in the middle of the aisle. However, when you cannot bust a u turn due to the constraints of your surroundings, you can easily put it in reverse and notify the entire fucking store that you are, indeed, moving backwards and possibly dangerous. Seriously, this thing had the same horn they put on locomotives.
The other thing about rolling through a store in a scooter that's awesome is that you get to have Alex help you to your car with the groceries. The other thing I like about Publix is that they hire mentally challenged people to work at their stores. They always seem to really enjoy their jobs and it was clear Alex did. He also enjoyed asking me how I was doing, so much so, that he did it 3 times. It was funny to me and I have no clue why, but its most likely because I'm a horrible person. I will tell you this, there are two things that have changed now having ridden a power scooter shopping cart. You can bet that I'm going to Wal Mart and Kroger tomorrow to test theirs against Publix. (and possibly because Susan thought all of this was funny, so another blog post about it couldn't hurt...) and that as long as I live, I don't think I'll ever be able to forget Alex hopping on my scooter and dragging the empty cart behind him as he rode back into the store.
With me being a half glass full kind of guy, there are some bright sides to this. Susan asked me if I could pick up a few things at the grocery store after my doctor's appointment. Knowing there's no way I could walk around Publix, I had a eureka type moment. With cancer and blood clots in my leg, I finally had every reason in the world to use one of those power scooter baskets they have. If you don't have Publix where you are at, think of it as a nicer Tom Thumb. So as you can expect, their scooters are nicer (i really cant judge the other stores, but I imagine Kroger's are in line with their stores and Publix is a much nicer store...) This thing was awesome!!!!! Much faster than I imagined, an amazing turning radius, & every time I backed up it let out a beeping signal so that anyone in the store could be warned. I also imagined this song playing as people looked at me on my scooter
So off I go through the store at what imagine is roughly somewhere between 5-7 mph. This where it starts getting tricky. The scooter is wider than a cart and so if people don't move over then you cant get through. further proving that old people are fucking oblivious to everything or generally act like that because they're old and they can. I believe that's also why they shit their pants, but that is a post for another time. Anyway, I'm rolling down the frozen foods aisle and Granny McSlowasHell has decided to leave her cart in the middle of the aisle and walk back down and look at everything again. I assume that this means she wants to double check the fiber content of a few items so she can possibly shit on a more regular basis and thus be lighter and hopefully faster, but alas I'm now stuck not being able to get around her and she's oblivious to everything but the processed food in front of her. So I did what any normal (read: only a few) person would do. I rammed her cart and gently pushed it out of my way. I didn't send it flying or anything, but the lady near me did look at me like I was the asshole...
There were a few other old people that decided to play the unobservant, old fart card, but luckily they underestimated my scooter's ability to bust a u turn in the middle of the aisle. However, when you cannot bust a u turn due to the constraints of your surroundings, you can easily put it in reverse and notify the entire fucking store that you are, indeed, moving backwards and possibly dangerous. Seriously, this thing had the same horn they put on locomotives.
The other thing about rolling through a store in a scooter that's awesome is that you get to have Alex help you to your car with the groceries. The other thing I like about Publix is that they hire mentally challenged people to work at their stores. They always seem to really enjoy their jobs and it was clear Alex did. He also enjoyed asking me how I was doing, so much so, that he did it 3 times. It was funny to me and I have no clue why, but its most likely because I'm a horrible person. I will tell you this, there are two things that have changed now having ridden a power scooter shopping cart. You can bet that I'm going to Wal Mart and Kroger tomorrow to test theirs against Publix. (and possibly because Susan thought all of this was funny, so another blog post about it couldn't hurt...) and that as long as I live, I don't think I'll ever be able to forget Alex hopping on my scooter and dragging the empty cart behind him as he rode back into the store.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Live Blog Day!!!!!!
So, Tuesdays are usually the busy days in the chemo room, but with the holiday, today we have a full room and I'm feeling good so that means you guys get another LIVE BLOG!!!!!!!!
10:18 - I am literally the only person under 70 in this place (besides my mom sitting beside me)
Two things that just happened - a nurse just asked a guy if he was making sure to take his folic acid and other pills. Matlock is on tv. I know its always something they make fun of with old people, but they're watching this show like a bunch of toddlers watching spongebob.
10:21 - This episode of Matlock stars a young Patrick Duffy. No clue why I told you that...
10:22 - A lady just had to explain how to turn a smartphone on and off to her husband. He's 75. I don't think this is information he needs.
10:24 - There's a lady in for her 1st treatment. They always go over everything with you and she's lucky because the guy beside her keeps interjecting with tidbits of personal info. The nurse looks like she wants to kill him, and he's oblivious. He also has a cellphone.
10:30 - This guy's cellphone is the same Nokia I had my freshman year of college. It's Purple. He's also using it to make phone calls in the room. I absolutely loathe this. Have the decency to not make us listen to you dialing the wrong number repeatedly. Also, as expected, he's wearing fake TEVA sandals with white socks. His name is Kirby. I don't find that fitting, so I'm giving him a nickname. Due to his accent, I'll dub him Johnny McCajun. I reserve the right to change it if I think of something better, but for now thats it.
10:36 - McCajun WILL NOT SHUT UP!!!!!!
McCajun: "If I didn't have insurance I don't know what I'd do."
Me to Myself: "I don't know, but I'm sure it would involve talking to people against their will."
10:38 - I am now the only person he has commented on or spoken to. I'm not offended, but it is puzzling. Also, the 75 year old gentlemen just returned from the bathroom. I''ll call him Orville. Now Orville has a special skill, he's able to effectively pull his pants up past his chest. His belt might as well be a necklace. Of course, he may be trying to strangle himself because his wife and McCajun are talking about their cellphones. Since she can turn one on and off, she's an expert.
10:41 - Matlock ended. Luckily, In the Heat of the Night follows, and we avoided an old person riot. At this time, McCajun is also coughing up a lung into a trashcan. Right in front of me. All the old people are asking him if he's ok. I might be going out on a limb, but he's coughing while in chemotherapy. I doubt he's ok, Truthfully none of us in here are. However, if McCajun spews all over the place, I bet there's a chance a few others follow suit (myself included). This place will look like this (I imagine)
10:57 - Every commercial break during the last 2 tv shows has included a fiber commercial and one about med alert and falling down and not being able to get up. Given the makeup of this room, this was money well spent on advertising for these companies...
11:11 - McCajun has stopped talking. Bad news is that he's started staring. At everyone. It's not creepy at all.
11:13 - New guy in the room just asked the nurse, Adrienne: "How many people say, Yo Adrienne to you?" "I bet you've hear that all the time..." Adrienne is a very nice, sweet nurse, but she looked like she wanted to kill this guy. My last name is Dick, so I can understand someone's pain when somebody asks a stupid question about hearing a certain joke.
12:13 - The asian guys are back, but since they aren't rearry tarking, I can't do any transrations. This makes me sad.
12:26 - The chemo room has really puttered out now. McCajun has left, Orville ninja'd out on us before I even noticed it, and now its just different old people and the asian guy. His buddy left him, so there's no conversation to work with. So that'll do it for today's blog. Not as much to work with as I originally thought, but either way. Hopefully one day this week will be more entertaining.
10:18 - I am literally the only person under 70 in this place (besides my mom sitting beside me)
Two things that just happened - a nurse just asked a guy if he was making sure to take his folic acid and other pills. Matlock is on tv. I know its always something they make fun of with old people, but they're watching this show like a bunch of toddlers watching spongebob.
10:21 - This episode of Matlock stars a young Patrick Duffy. No clue why I told you that...
10:22 - A lady just had to explain how to turn a smartphone on and off to her husband. He's 75. I don't think this is information he needs.
10:24 - There's a lady in for her 1st treatment. They always go over everything with you and she's lucky because the guy beside her keeps interjecting with tidbits of personal info. The nurse looks like she wants to kill him, and he's oblivious. He also has a cellphone.
10:30 - This guy's cellphone is the same Nokia I had my freshman year of college. It's Purple. He's also using it to make phone calls in the room. I absolutely loathe this. Have the decency to not make us listen to you dialing the wrong number repeatedly. Also, as expected, he's wearing fake TEVA sandals with white socks. His name is Kirby. I don't find that fitting, so I'm giving him a nickname. Due to his accent, I'll dub him Johnny McCajun. I reserve the right to change it if I think of something better, but for now thats it.
10:36 - McCajun WILL NOT SHUT UP!!!!!!
McCajun: "If I didn't have insurance I don't know what I'd do."
Me to Myself: "I don't know, but I'm sure it would involve talking to people against their will."
10:38 - I am now the only person he has commented on or spoken to. I'm not offended, but it is puzzling. Also, the 75 year old gentlemen just returned from the bathroom. I''ll call him Orville. Now Orville has a special skill, he's able to effectively pull his pants up past his chest. His belt might as well be a necklace. Of course, he may be trying to strangle himself because his wife and McCajun are talking about their cellphones. Since she can turn one on and off, she's an expert.
10:41 - Matlock ended. Luckily, In the Heat of the Night follows, and we avoided an old person riot. At this time, McCajun is also coughing up a lung into a trashcan. Right in front of me. All the old people are asking him if he's ok. I might be going out on a limb, but he's coughing while in chemotherapy. I doubt he's ok, Truthfully none of us in here are. However, if McCajun spews all over the place, I bet there's a chance a few others follow suit (myself included). This place will look like this (I imagine)
10:57 - Every commercial break during the last 2 tv shows has included a fiber commercial and one about med alert and falling down and not being able to get up. Given the makeup of this room, this was money well spent on advertising for these companies...
11:11 - McCajun has stopped talking. Bad news is that he's started staring. At everyone. It's not creepy at all.
11:13 - New guy in the room just asked the nurse, Adrienne: "How many people say, Yo Adrienne to you?" "I bet you've hear that all the time..." Adrienne is a very nice, sweet nurse, but she looked like she wanted to kill this guy. My last name is Dick, so I can understand someone's pain when somebody asks a stupid question about hearing a certain joke.
12:13 - The asian guys are back, but since they aren't rearry tarking, I can't do any transrations. This makes me sad.
12:26 - The chemo room has really puttered out now. McCajun has left, Orville ninja'd out on us before I even noticed it, and now its just different old people and the asian guy. His buddy left him, so there's no conversation to work with. So that'll do it for today's blog. Not as much to work with as I originally thought, but either way. Hopefully one day this week will be more entertaining.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Cancer Update
Well, I'll guess most of you have noticed that I haven't posted anything since last week. I haven't been in the best of moods, mostly due to the fact that I had my halfway CT scan last week and didn't get to find out the results until today. I hate not knowing stuff and when it's something this serious, it's even worse! Luckily, I got good news today. The lesions on my lungs have shrank by more than 50% which is a better than expected prognosis! Suck it Cancer! I'm definitely not out of the woods yet, but it's good. The other good news is that we have lot's of people in the chemo room and one guy that wants to talk to all of us. He looks like "The Dude". He's actually super nice and for once I feel worse than normal for even giving him a nickname, but it's not every day that you get to have a conversation with someone who is a white russian and bathrobe away from being a doppelganger for Jeff Bridges. In the room now we have some really odd folks. For starters, almost everyone has an odd as hell look about them. The research lady (I think her job is to coordinate information for those who are participating in clinical trials) creeps me the eff out. She's a "close my eyes when I speak" person, and for whatever reason that freaks me out. This other lady in here has the most wicked stare in the world. Luckily she's reading and not looking around the room. Well its that or she's attempting to set the book on fire with her eyes. I'd put the odds of which is happening at even, with a slight nod to book combustion occurring spontaneously (Fahrenheit 451 bitches!!!!!). I've watched her for the last 10 minutes and she hasn't turned the page...which leads me to believe that she is definitely trying to set it on fire. She also may or may not be illiterate. Which means that I really wish LeVar Burton were here...
Now she's up walking around & talking to the nurse. The stare that she has while talking makes me glad that she doesn't stare at me. I also just figured out that she's a lesbian. That doesn't make any difference to me, it does however confirm some general, stereotypical looks that I observed. I feel like the New Balance shoe in white should be the official shoe of lesbians. You may disagree, but throughout chemo, I've made enough of these observations to have a consistent hypothesis on this matter.
You know these shoes. They are also worn by nerdy white dudes with khakis. I'm not sure what demographic or athletic event New Balance was trying to capture with this product. I am definitely sure, it was the nerdy white guy/creepy eyed lady sector. You can call me an ass for saying it, but without a doubt, you will now judge anyone and everyone who you see wearing these shoes. If you observe anyone other than those I've listed, please comment to tell me, bc like unicorns, I do not believe they exist...
Now she's up walking around & talking to the nurse. The stare that she has while talking makes me glad that she doesn't stare at me. I also just figured out that she's a lesbian. That doesn't make any difference to me, it does however confirm some general, stereotypical looks that I observed. I feel like the New Balance shoe in white should be the official shoe of lesbians. You may disagree, but throughout chemo, I've made enough of these observations to have a consistent hypothesis on this matter.
You know these shoes. They are also worn by nerdy white dudes with khakis. I'm not sure what demographic or athletic event New Balance was trying to capture with this product. I am definitely sure, it was the nerdy white guy/creepy eyed lady sector. You can call me an ass for saying it, but without a doubt, you will now judge anyone and everyone who you see wearing these shoes. If you observe anyone other than those I've listed, please comment to tell me, bc like unicorns, I do not believe they exist...
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Livin' On A Prayer
We're halfway there
I know, technically those lyrics are backwards, but if you're reading this blog and splitting hairs over grammar instead of watching an awesome Bon Jovi video, then I'd consider you a bit ungrateful. The entire purpose of today's post is that I am now HALFWAY through treatment and I felt there was no better way to commemorate that than a Bon Jovi video... Treatments have gone well and honestly, given the state that I've seen some of the other patients in, chemo has not been that bad. I would guess the worst part of it is that I damn near pass out every time they draw blood (which is weekly).
So how did today go? It went great, luckily it was a short day because one of the ladies in the treatment room loves her children and grandchildren. She also oves to tell you about visiting them in Ohio. Did I mention they were from Ohio? You would have thought they lived in the fucking magical kingdom. Anyways, since I had a CT scan directly after the chemo treatment, you guys were robbed of what was likely a great live blog. Don't blame me, blame...well actually don't blame anyone. I'm sure there will be many more chances for things such as that. I'll try to write more this week, but honestly nothing all that humorous has went on, and I feel like 2-3 posts per week about inane ideas or how my day was.
I know, technically those lyrics are backwards, but if you're reading this blog and splitting hairs over grammar instead of watching an awesome Bon Jovi video, then I'd consider you a bit ungrateful. The entire purpose of today's post is that I am now HALFWAY through treatment and I felt there was no better way to commemorate that than a Bon Jovi video... Treatments have gone well and honestly, given the state that I've seen some of the other patients in, chemo has not been that bad. I would guess the worst part of it is that I damn near pass out every time they draw blood (which is weekly).
So how did today go? It went great, luckily it was a short day because one of the ladies in the treatment room loves her children and grandchildren. She also oves to tell you about visiting them in Ohio. Did I mention they were from Ohio? You would have thought they lived in the fucking magical kingdom. Anyways, since I had a CT scan directly after the chemo treatment, you guys were robbed of what was likely a great live blog. Don't blame me, blame...well actually don't blame anyone. I'm sure there will be many more chances for things such as that. I'll try to write more this week, but honestly nothing all that humorous has went on, and I feel like 2-3 posts per week about inane ideas or how my day was.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Bracelet Update
Just a quick update on the bracelets. We've sold more than I imagined at this point, and my mom has a few left in Somerset with her, but there are roughly about 75 total left in the first batch. If they all sell, I'll order more, but in the event you want to get yours quickly, make sure to order them ASAP, since they seem to be going fast. Also, thanks to everyone who has ordered them so far. At this point we've already raised close to $500 I think, and should be close to doubling that once we sell the first batch. You guys Rock...One (Lame Bracelet Plug...)
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Steroids and Corn Dogs
What were you doing at 10:30am today??? Most of you were probably completing some task at your job or doing your best to stay occupied with things other than your job. Maybe some of you hit up reverse happy hour at Kona Grill (I have no clue how I know its on Wednesday Nights) and never made it to work. Still yet, I doubt any of you were polishing off your 4th corn dog. I was, and that is the beauty of getting a nice dose of steroids every week. Sadly, I had hoped that they would result in a svelte figure complete with 6 pack abs (not really, but the alternative of seeing how many corn dogs I can eat isn't exactly ideal either...) Why just as I'm sitting here writing this, there are at least 4 bread sticks from dinner that I'm considering eating as well as the box of truffles that our friends Jodie and Grant sent today that have managed to make their way to my side. Seriously, I've never experienced an appetite like this. Susan has often been impressed (more likely repulsed) by my ability to inhale food, but we are at extraordinary levels here.
It's just another one of those little things that you have to get used to. I've talked about the cravings and they are still going strong. They make you think about things in a different way, too. We hit up Taco Bell yesterday and as we sat in the drive thru, I saw that you can buy a dozen tacos in one box. I'm sure they market these to people who are feeding entire offices at lunch or maybe for a group of people eating together. I calmly looked at them and thought, "I could fucking take down that entire box." I think I could too, I just don't want the indigestion that goes along with that victory. The nausea (this word has now reached, "Kevin can spell it flawlessly w/out thinking about it" status) is bad enough, I don't need that on top of indigestion as well as the shame of having to ask for enough fire sauce to coat 12 tacos...
Update: I went and got 2 of the bread sticks halfway through writing this. There's a small bit of shame in telling you this, not a lot, not "I ate 12 tacos" level shame, but still a little...
It's just another one of those little things that you have to get used to. I've talked about the cravings and they are still going strong. They make you think about things in a different way, too. We hit up Taco Bell yesterday and as we sat in the drive thru, I saw that you can buy a dozen tacos in one box. I'm sure they market these to people who are feeding entire offices at lunch or maybe for a group of people eating together. I calmly looked at them and thought, "I could fucking take down that entire box." I think I could too, I just don't want the indigestion that goes along with that victory. The nausea (this word has now reached, "Kevin can spell it flawlessly w/out thinking about it" status) is bad enough, I don't need that on top of indigestion as well as the shame of having to ask for enough fire sauce to coat 12 tacos...
Update: I went and got 2 of the bread sticks halfway through writing this. There's a small bit of shame in telling you this, not a lot, not "I ate 12 tacos" level shame, but still a little...
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Grow a bitchin' Rat Tail & other things I can't do...
The movie blow is on tv and there's a guy that's bald on top, but has a quasi mullet/rat tail that I'm quite envious of. Just thought I'd share that with you. It would hopefully look as good as this
Maybe when this is all over, I'll grow one (I can see Susan's face now, she's already dreading the fact that I'll have a beard again I'm sure). I realized there are many things that I can & cannot do over these last couple of weeks. As I've shown above, I cannot grow a rat tail, but as in some of my latest blog posts, I can make fun of people I really shouldn't, make inspirational posters related to my chemo tolerance, and live blog while getting pumped full of poison. I can also be cantankerous and generally in a bad mood. (Suz informed today that it had been almost a week straight when I thought it'd just been today that I was pissy.) It's easy to feel sorry for yourself and to always think that no one knows what you are going through. After all, you may be the only one going through "it", at least first hand anyways. This has been tough for me to grasp. I don't want to think that it may be equally as tough for my family or Suz to deal with. That the thought of the tables being turned and me watching a spouse battle cancer doesn't scare the ever living shit out of me. I was talking to my mother-in-law (as always, people want to know what it is like, both mentally & physically) and while I was explaining to her how I was coping with it, I said something that I don't guess I'd ever considered that I was doing. "I have the beauty of denial." and its true. I have the luck of being able to choose not to deal with it, of passing the buck onto another person, or just deciding that I'll be in a pissy mood and not think about anything that day (what I did today).
When you begin to remember that you aren't alone in dealing with and being affected by this disease, it starts to make you feel bad. Here my wife worked all day, my mom put her schedule on hold to take me to chemo, a friend took time to drop me a text or email and check on me, or someone brought me my favorite bbq for dinner. I sat around and moped (I just realized that this word equals moped as in sulked and moped as in small bike with engine and pedals). Perspective is something that you dont always have, but when you get it, its refreshing. Fortunate enough for me, I was able to give myself some today. As for the things I can't do, being pissy has to be one of them. That goes for you too. Things could always be worse...
Sunday, August 21, 2011
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