Topic: Cancer Treatment

There was a recent "malpractice" lawsuit (click on "A Dangerous Precedent for patients.) against an oncologist, NOT for the wrong treatment, NOT for treatment that didn't work, but because they said it was the DR's fault that the 75 year old patient still drove his car and had a wreck. Since when is it the DR's fault that a patient doesn't have/use good sense?

100 cc's
Mood:  smelly
Topic: Cancer Treatment

Yesterday we went back for the first in a series of tissue expansion proceedures. It was actually pretty simple . . . There's this magnet around a self-closing "port" that is part of a "balloon" that's behind my pectoral muscle. They use another magnet to detect the right place and then the Dr. took this syringe and put 100 cc's of saline in the "balloon" and that was done. I didn't feel the needle stick and it really didn't feel as if anything was done -- until I stood up, and the area around it DID feel strange. Later on there was pain and it made me feel about like I did a couple weeks ago. This would be so much easier if it were the left side instead of my right. I have to stop and think NOT to use my dominant hand so much. And on the way home today, I got my second choice for a drink because my first choice was in the convenience store's top shelf. (Steve was still outside getting gas in the car.) ASKING for help in little things is a nuisance. Learning curve here . . .

 TGFM.

 

Research
Topic: Cancer Treatment
I just looked up some meds that I've been prescribed.  It's hard to say whether or not they're right for me. I'm very glad to be going after a second opinion. At the moment, the meds ALL look bad to me, there are so many side effects.

Home Oncologist's Appt. Today
Mood:  bright
Topic: Cancer Treatment

My Blood Work and Home Oncologist's appointment were all fine today. He congratulated me for getting through this. . . I can't quite accept congratulation for what my body is or isn't doing. (If I had that much control, I certainly wouldn't have gotten cancer in the first place.) I never thought I'd choose this, but when he said that I could get my port-a-cath removed, I said that I thought I'd wait a while, and see what my plastic surgeon wants me to do--since I have one more big surgery to go. I was just a bit worried about what the surgical IV's had done to my one remaining hand that was "sort-of" OK to put an IV in. (It SOOO annoyed me that I had a perfectly good arm vein AND a port, and they chose to put the IV in my HAND. HEY, guys! I USE my hands--for fine detail work; don't you think you should put the IV somewhere else?)

Boob in a Bag Time
Mood:  surprised
Topic: Cancer Treatment
Well, today I FINALLY went (I had to FORCE MYSELF to go.) to get fitted for a temporary prosthesis while getting reconstruction. It wasn't terribly uncomfortable--although nothing is particularly comfortable these days. (My mom absolutely HATED hers--but then she refused to take enough pain meds--EVER, so I suppose I shouldn't be totally surprised.) Anyway, it looked OK on the outside. The REALLY BAD news is that my body has been substituting fat, flab, and extra fluids for the muscle that I used to have. UGH!!! And weight-bearing movement and full extension of arms is close to excruciating unless I've had recent pain meds. Tomorrow I go back to the home oncologist . . . I suppose I have to have  the port flushed (OUCH!)

Driving!
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Cancer Treatment
Sunday PM and Monday AM, spent driving to UVA. Stitches out; now I have glue and steri-strips holding my incision together. Then we got a confirmation of the "NO Cancer" pathology report. Great news.

Drain Pipe
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Cancer Treatment
The plastics's Dr., who saw me last Monday and took out one of my two drains, to save us an extra 500 mile trip, told Steve to go ahead and take out the other drain when it got down to less than 30cc/day. Well, that was yesterday and today. Steve got it out with no trouble. It turned out that the drain tubing (about 8" or more inside and looked like a miniature house foundation drain pipe--minus the corrugation, of course) had gotten clogged. It was a good thing we had all nearby surfaces covered, cause we had backed-up fluids that needed to drain. Ugh! Anyway, it's gone  and I don't have to carry it around or empty and measure anymore. (Two weeks was MORE than enough for me.)

Surgery Tomorrow
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Cancer Treatment

6:00 AM! I sear that surgeons have to be masochistic (and a bit sadistic?)  to put up with that sort of schedule.  My brother is coming to be moral support for Steve.  (Thanks Dick.) I won't need much moral support; I'll be asleep. Prayers, on the other hand . . . Those I can definitely use.

 

Post Surgery Blahs
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Cancer Treatment

Post Surgery Blahs--I should be getting used to all of this, but somehow it still  takes me by surprise. Yes, the pain meds make me feel weird, lightheaded. Yes, I'm one of the worse-than-useless (hope it doesn't last too long.); I do not like being a patient, even though it's easier to BE the patient than it is to take care of one. I DID get a few more funeral thankyou cards done; maybe I'll get to more of the paperwork for Mom and then write some music tomorrow.

TGFM!

Bx Today
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Cancer Treatment

Did a nuclear medicine procedure yesterday, a lymphosentinal-ography--which means that the medical geiger counter found my sentinal lymph node. This ranks right up there above a mammogram in the discomfort zone, since the radioactive contrast element has to be "helped" to move from the breast to the lymph nodes. OUCH! Steve came in and massaged my feet to distract me from the pain. It WORKED.

TGFM and everything else.