The Fuzzy Space

Many of you have inquired about my knitting, reading or any form of entertainment that I might be doing to pass the time. First of all, if I could concentrate long enough, I would be working, but the numbers get fuzzy and I last about 4 minutes. Reading is the easiest way to knock me out to sleep. I couldn't tell you what I read even if I read it out loud.

Knitting is an interesting dilemma, first of all you have to count and that is not happening to coherently lately and secondly, it is rather important that I make decent choices for the colors of the sweater I am making. The Percocets put me in a very happy "every color is a good color" mood, but the outcome will be disastrous.

Mr. Haus, a) take your Yankee team to somebody else's blog and b) you can always make an appointment for knitting classes once I am recovered. I am sure L would love a sweater.

Sopranos

Did anyone cathc the Sopranos episode this last sunday? It hit a little too close to home. Then again, it is nice to trully understand where they were going with the script.

Nothing new

hello everyone, not much to report. I seem to be in LA LA land a lot and somehow using the grey mass on top of my shoulders is very difficult. Between Paul, Eileen, Lester and Rene I have 24 hour care and every possible need fulfilled. I just don't remember much from one day to the other.

I have even tried very hard to concentrate and do some things for work. That usually ends ups being passed to Frank.

Turning a lung inside out

One of the exercises you need to do if they take a portion of your lung, or if they really mess up with you is to re-learned to fill your lungs with air completely. As I just learned recently, when you are panting, only 25% of your lung capacity is being used, vs the infamous in your nose out of your mouth SLOWLY type of breathe.

Well after all this training, you get this loose junk in your lungs (don't ask, you all know what it is). The reflex is to cough it out one way or the other, the catch is that coughing hurts, sometimes it hurts so bad you think a lung will be expelled any second. In addition, when those coughs are happening you think your sternum is going to blow up. To avoid the sensation of the explosion, the hospital gives you this little pillow that is rather hard. You are supposed to squeeze the pillow against your chest and cough. Somehow, the stupid pillow does the trick, but damn it is unpleasent

Too early to feel trapped?

You can't drive for 4 weeks, if you do get in a car it is on the backseat. Don't walk to much, do exercise you are not eating enough, you are eating all the wrong things. Sleep on your back (6 more weeks) Don't pick up anything that is more than 10 lbs.

And then you wonder why I feel claustrophobic sometimes. I might do a 180 lifestyle change and just confuse everyone!

Meditation & Breathing

Since I am relearning how to breathe, it was suggested to me to get a meditation cd. If anyone knows of a good meditation cd that emphasises breathing and concentration, please let me know.

numbers

Just becasuse I decided to do some calculations... I have been diagnosed for 110 days and surgery was 14 days ago. It appears to me that both events happened months and months away. I suppose it is all the magic of drugs that make the whole memory very fusy.

A note of thanks

This is sort of a secret post. There is one particular agent of the conclave that has done an incredible job on factual news dissemination within the family that I need to thank OK?

Gaining Speed

My walks are simple... up and down the hallway, usually one or two laps. Yesterday I was probably going about 3 miles per hour at top speed.

Today I think I clocked 5 miles per hour since I was leaving a wake on my path.

Visiting Nurses

I am in awe of the nursing profession, however I am blown away by the concept of the visiting nurse. I've had two of them come in and check my bandages, check my vitals and my breathing and in general give me an "eyeball test" It is remarkable that they do what they do day in and day out. I am sure working in a doctors office or a hospital would be easier, but I am glad for their choice, it has helped me tremendously.

Escape Key

I realize that the escape key doesn't work at 3:00am in the morning, but at least the reset one should work?!?!? I am too hot, I am too cold I can breath fine, I feel I can't breath. My head is playing all kinds of games with me, and I can't resolve them by myself.

This is just so much fun! After watching the Sopranos, took all my meds and expected a 6am wake up... nope, 3am and all is quiet..

Olive Oil

My morning shower takes a little while... about 45 minutes with all the special interest side sections that might need special attention. Today, Paul was obsessed with taking all the remaining 3M adhesive of my skin. Mind you there is a lot of it which I lovingly just call goop.

They can invent the amazing Post-It note, which leaves no residue anywhere, bring it next to the skin... black adhesive goop everywhere. Band-aids.. goop, electrocardigram pads...goop that pulls hair, tape rto hold tubing... goop.

One wonderful reader of the blog, suggested olive oil to take care of the goop, it worked! it did take a little while, and I smelled like a salad, but I only have about 5 inches of linear goop left.( I had about 50 inches before)

Happy Easter

Sunday April 8th

Late Saturday afternoon, the visiting nurse came in. Besides check out all the paperwork, she strongly suggested that I up my percocet consumption by one before going to bed in addition to the Ambien. HALLELUJAH for her. Slept from 9:0pm to 6:45am (with only 2 stops)

OH DAMN IT... a room-mate????

Saturday April 1st

Saturday redefined hopsital time... we were desperately waiting for a room to open up in the cardio ward vs the ICU, in the meantime, they were reteaching me how to walk. So we would go around the ward over and over again. One round at a time.

Finally around 6:00 or so, we got the work, there is a bed opening up down at Cardio. It was like a little homecoming since it was the original ward that I visited when this whole joke started. OH DAMN IT... a room-mate? I supposed it can't be THAT bad...right?? WRONG WRONG WRONG... this guy thought I was his personal request line to the nurses station. Every hour on the hour he would need something, what a pain the ass!.

Have a nice trip

Friday - March 30th

Today's highlights were going too be the removal of 2 of the drainage tubes from my abdomen. It went ok as long as you did it on the respiration count, but let me tell you...it feels just damn weird! I was scheduled for some fancy IV thing placed on my upper left arm. the staff nurse couldn't find a vein, the IV nurse said it was cruel to find a vein so finally it was decided to use an x-ray guided iv probe lunar landing module to do this.

I was transported down to radiology and they gave me IV Ativan while they did the procedure. For the next 6 hours, I communed with nature, my father, a big head (I am not sure who) needless to say I seemed to have scared the shit out of my poor sister on this trip!

What is there to remember..

Thursday March 29th

There is one thing to remember about Thursday, THE Intubation some vestigial torture system from the middle ages that is supposed to help monitor my breathing. I will tell you this, I am scared for like since every time I can't seem to breath I want to blame that tube, and b) it is the most horrible experience since they tie your hands to the sides of the bed. DUH NEWS FLASH people don't want a tube down their throat!

Thursday night, I just couldn't not get to sleep because I was short of breath and simply going crazy. There was also a small issue of my blood count being way too low and the doctors not being able to figure out where it was going. 3 blood units ended up supplementing my blood count.

Surgery - The beginning

Wed-March 28th
Since we were all incredibly anxious we were at BI by 5:30. Regrettably for us, surgery check in on Wednesdays only had been moved back to 7:00am from 6:00am... Nice way to start the day. They finally take me to the prep area and it is like walking into a movie set; there are people everywhere. I am now on complete overdrive, we have reached the point of no return. They start hooking me up to all kinds of monitors and the surgeons drop by for their last family visit. It is time to say goodbye to everyone and succumb to the anesthesia... I am soooo fucked

New drugs New Sleep

Made every effort to stay up until 10:pm to see if I could sleep the night. Took my new handy Ambien, and off to bed I went. At around 3:30 woke up to go to the bathroom but was able to quickly return to bed and continue sleep. At 4:30 woke up sick of the position I was sleeping in and tried anything. I am back to sleeping on my back at a 30% angle or so. That only lasted till 5:15 when I said "Enough" I did sleep about 8 hours which is a blessing right now. I am breathing relatively normal so I think that head and body are finally on the same page!

The best shower idea ever

I took a long ass nap in the afternoon ( 3 hours) and then with Paul's help I took a shower. You have to realize that 30 minutes standing up is an eternity right now. In addition I seem to be always cold and that takes a tremendous energy from me. So I took my shower and dealt with all my sutures and holes, and tried to take of some of the tape from the band-aids (anybody has any idea about an easy was to take that adhesive off?

As I was about to dry off, Paul hands me two towels that just came out of the hot dryer... OH MY GOD....he is going to heaven

My Standing Guard

Paul stayed with me till 2:00am and my sister arrived at 4am, all the nurses where aware of my mental state and were just incredible. At around 8:00am during round the doctor officially decided I was ready to go home. so 11:30 was the time to leave. After an incredible pep talk from my morning nurse, who I will be eternally grateful for all her help, it was off to home... BACK HOME TOTO..... let's go!

Draining of the lung

The doctor told me it would not hurt, ok, just a little, but that it would be weird sensation. They gave me Ativan on my IV and I was already on percocet. The medical side of this entry is that I had something like 850 units of fluid in my long cavity, the not so good side was that I went on a very disturbing hallucination (TWICE) This was not going to be a good night. I was able to prove that later.

Short of being written up for bad behavior, I was not looked upon as a good patient, which I was not. I was now concerned about behaviour I was doing without knowing. Tonight, I requested to Eileen and Paul to stay with me all night. not only was I afraid of dying from not breathing, but I needed to sleep without hallucinating weird stuff. Oh this is such fun

Well Hello and welcome back to the BI

Your room number will be 5 until suitable accommodations are founds, Thank my lucky stars that Eileen and Paul were there, cause sometimes you want to choke these people... (what were you in for last? you got to be kidding!!)

My oxygen levels were low, I had a fever and I my lungs sounded like the gas tank of Rene's veggie oil car. So next in my cards was a CT Scan and an electrocardiogram. At the same time I am starting to realize that my inability to breath is directly tied to my anxiety attacks over all this nonsense. So we have a mental component (just what I wanted) and fluid in the lung cavity which is restricting me from taking deep breath. This I know, because my Breathing meter thing rating was down by 1/2.

I get admitted to the hospital officially and a lung fluid suction procedure is prescribed.

Well hello emergency people....

We watched the Today show (Don't care if Ms Couiric is on or not) and then Ellen. Got a few call from the health professionals from the insurance company and the home nursing people. Around 10:45 I asked Eileen what information did we need to call an ambulance because I just couldn't breath and it was getting worse and worse, to make matters worse, I though my chest hurts like hell.

911 Operator what is the emergency and where are you located? A host of city and Town people 9 in total showed up. They hooked me up to a greatly wanted and needed oxygen tank... OH FUCKING YUM Strapped me to the stretcher and off to the hospital at high speed... just what I fucking wanted).

So I sleep like crap

and I am desperate... took 4 pillows to the dinning room table and tried to sleep sleeping down. However, I keep feeling like I can't breathe. Finally around 4am Paul give me a stern talking and convinces me to go back to bed and to give it another try. He stand next to me like a good soldier waiting for me to fall asleep. It lasted about 1 hours. 6 o'clock comes and goes. I had a 7:00 appointment for a shower with supervision. After all I had not showered yet. It took about 45 minute (I gad to go slow and rest a lot) but I felt so human!!!!

8:00 or so was time for the shift change, ,my sister arrived and we settled in for what we had hoped to be a tranquil day

I'm home!!!

yes I am home, it is 10:21 pm and already woke up twice. I think this is going to be a long long night, as a clue, look at the posts time, btw, if a post is bolded it is catching up with the week that just occurred; otherwise is present time. For the time being I am incredibly achy, but incredibly happy with the outcome of the surgery. It is the surgeons belief that all the cancer is out, and only 1 lobe of the right lung was taken out. I also have a few non-factory installed vein parts around my vena cava.. The scar is not too ugly, but my chest hurts like hell.