"I'm through with you Londy.."

I had my post surgery follow up with Dr. Goff on Monday. It took a lot of effort. He only takes early morning appointments. The nurses on the surgical floor gossiped to me that this was because he "was a Mormon Bishop and worked early in the morning so he could attend to church duties later.." I had to rise before the sun was up, shower, drive to the hospital, find a parking place and get an x-ray several hours before I normally rise. He wanted an x-ray right before he saw me. Okay.. the radiology department and his office are on opposite ends of the hospital... a long walk early in the morning. Great.

I got the required x-ray; no problem...and I managed to time it just right so that I arrived in Dr. Goff's waiting room moments before my appointment time. I was exhausted. Since I was driving myself I didn't take any lortab before I left, so make that exhausted, sleep deprived, hurting and somewhat impatient. After waiting for half an hour I inquired of the receptionist "how much longer?" She said it could be an hour. He hadn't returned from his hospital rounds yet and eventhough I was his first appointment that morning, two people arrived before me so she put them in exam rooms and I had to wait until they were seen. I told her I felt sick; like I may vomit and that I was afraid to re-schedule because I thought I had an infection. Her eyes got wide... "oh...." she says. I lied about the vomit part.. I was just in pain; but I have learned that vomit scares people. She offered to put me in an exam room and make me the first patient the doctor sees when he gets there. Fine.

I get in the exam room and I can overhear the doctor talking on the phone to an obviously distraught family member.... I forgave him. Gotta give him credit for talking time when he is behind and at the start of an incredibly busy day to help someone who is having a bad time. That and the dedication to his religious duties make me think the is a pretty unselfish guy. I decide to let him off easy.

I was serious about the infection thing though. One of my tube-holes is in a most unfortunate place; right where my bra sits on the side under my breast. What my sister Joan would refer to as "the pencil holder.." We once heard somewhere that the test to determine if you could go bra-less was to stick a pencil under your boob. If the pencil fell out you can go without a bra. This was so absurd to us because well.... we could put a whole office supply store under there without any droppage.

So this hole I believe, is infected. It hurts and starting the day before my appointment, was oozing crud. (Hope you are not reading this while eating lunch.) I also have tightness in my chest that is only relieved with a maximum dose of mucinex and periodic inhalation of my rescue asthma inhaler. I also from time to time nearly lose my voice or it sounds like I have a cold. The voice thing has been going on for a long time; since I started chemo. The other stuff started in the hospital.

The doc finally breezes into my room with an apology. He quickly brings my xray up and does a quick comparison with an xray taken in July. I have to admit my lungs now look amazing in comparison. Just a small spot down on the very left side that is blocked. He says by some fluid, maybe 100-200 cc's. Not much and that it may go away in time by itself. He pronounces this a huge sucess.

I tell him that I wasn't experiencing the instant relief I expected. He for the most part brushes that aside. Says that it takes awhile to "feel" like the new breathing is normal because there is soreness and it hurts, but the more active I become and the more I use the incentive spirometer the better it will get... um okay. What about the mucinex? He says just to keep taking it if I need it. What about the voice? this he doesn't know, but offers the explanation of "mucus getting stuck on my vocal cords from time to time".. yeah that could be... okay. He says to ask Dr. Johnson about it and if I can't get any resolution on it he would be happy to "refer you to a nose/throat guy who can stick a scope down there and.... " oh yuck... I'm so over "scopes". Maybe once I get breathing easier whatever is bugging me there will get coughed up or resolve itself. He concurs.

He then looks at the holes in my side; apologizes for the unfortunate placement of the one. He thinks if the gets the stiches out of them they will be fine. He pulls them, bandages me up and says "I think I'm through with you Londy. There's no reason for me to have to see you again."

So at this point in my life I have graduated pulmonology. I hope I never have to come back.

It's been a couple of days since that appointment and he was right. Things are healing better without the stiches. I still need the mucinex and from time to time my voice gets gravely. But I'm now up to between 2500 and 3000 on the spirometer. A huge gain from 1500 pre-surgery. And yesterday I actually made it all the way through a shopping trip at the grocery store. That's new. Before I had to send the nanny and my son while I waited in the car because I would get about 1/3 of the way through and nearly collapse. Yesterday I walked all the way through the store, shopped and loaded the car and I could breathe without huffing and puffing. Awesome!

As for what's bugging my lungs? I don't know. Corey the chiropractor says "fungus" and prescribed an immune building formula. I'm taking it. The Native American medicine man said I need "mare's milk". What? huh? you mean milk from a horse? yep that is what he means. I haven't taken that too seriously because of the yuck factor and a few other reasons. But Linda did. She has been visiting horse farms in the area in seach of a nursing horse that wouldn't mind giving me some milk. Linda is just cool like that. Imagine having the balls to stop at a strange horse farm, walk in, tell this story and ask if they have any milk? Only Linda can do that. BTW horse farms here are a huge zillion dollar business. So these aren't just little nearby farms she is visiting. These are huge operations. I've decided that if she really gets some I will only drink it after I see her do it and she is carefully observed for several days and we get a full medical history of the donating horse... lol.

20 days... shouldn't I be better now?

It's now been about 20 days since my surgery. Not the instant relief I expected. I still feel like I am working very hard to breathe. I'm not sure why. I know there is progress. When I first went to respitory therapy before my surgery they said I was operating at 63% of my lung capacity. They showed me where this was on the "incentive spirometer". It was a mark of 1500 upon inhaling. I can now on occasion get it up to almost 2500, but it's hard work and everything has to be just right. Dr. Goff told me that I could be "doing aerobics the day I was released"...ummmm not exactly.. lol. I have my follow up appointment with him next Monday.
I have days where I feel really good and then my ambition gets the better of me and I fly around working like crazy.. only to wake up the next day exhausted and hurting all over. I think that is partly the painkillers; they make you feel better than you are and then it is easy to do stupid things.
I feel bad that Dr. Goff told Lee and Linda that I might only have a "couple of years"... oh man. That was right after surgery and he thought my scar tissue was some sort of cancer. He proclaimed to have "gotten most of it; and may have given her a couple of years..." He was positive it was cancer and had all sorts of hows and whys for them. They went through a weekend of hell. I had no idea. I can see though that this type of thing will could possibly come up in the future; any time I have a spot or bump or pimple... the first conclusion a doctor will come to is "cancer". I'm going to have to be tough to face that and fight for proper treatments etc. I'm rather peeved at all the times they tapped the fluid and didn't test it because "we have to assume that it is...".. it wasn't.

Our Day

My son thinks it is time for me to update my blog and tell everyone how I am doing now that I'm home from the hospital.

First, he wants me to tell you about our wonderful nanny. She would like a new boyfriend. He must be tall, dark and handsome, with qualities like Prince William. I told him I wanted a new boyfriend too and he replied, "that's what you have me for Mom, I'm your boyfriend." So true; but if the universe wants to send a new tall, dark and handsome prince my way, that'd be okay.

Today was back to business. Thanks to Linda and my son's help we got Jungle Roses orders out without to much difficulty. I'm looking forward to the fall season and planning our holiday offerings. I'm also working on my "Pink in the Jungle" package with profits going to the Huntsman Cancer Center and am hoping to launch it within the next couple of weeks for breast cancer awareness month.

My son thinks everyone is updated now... lol. He wants to work on his science projects. I bought him a polymer lab from the discovery website. He mixed slime yesterday and today he wants to mix "goo." This should be fun. I love doing home school with him. It's amazing how much "school" can be fit into ordinary activities.