I don't really like to do advertising but this is a unique opportunity!
Bob and I are going to attend the Sarcoma Walk at Piedmont Park Baseball Fields, at 7pm Friday July 24 (his birthday- but he will kill me for annoucing that ). It is a short walk with no registation fee. The will sell tee shirts for $15 that all go to the SE Sarcoma Foundation. This is part of Emory and the doctor that heads the research is Gina D'Amota. When I think of all the big cancer foundations that get well deserved research money, it is amazing to think that a lot of the research that may well save my life is being done right here in Atlanta- and by the woman and her team that would be my chemo doc, heaven forbid I have to go that route again. She is bright, funny and commited to her work. Since there are only 9000 patients in the US that get Sarcoma each year, we do not get a lot of research money like some of the more "popular" cancers.
If by chance you are interested in joing us you can contact Ned Crystal, a volunteer and fellow Sarcoma patient who put the whole foundation together. He is truly amazing and really doing something to save his own life. Ned can be reached at 678-779-8572 or at ned.crystal@gmail.com. You can also pre-order "Walk for Awareness" t-shirts. Afterwards some folks are going to hang out at a local resturant at 12th Street and Peidmont. I know Friday nights are tough, but it is a great cause-one I take pretty personally as you can imagine.
A bit of an update -I have all my pre- surgery tests July 27. They will call me probably tomorrow for a surgery date.
We still have no sign of Robin, our bat friend. We keep all the bedroom doors shut most of the time but we do forget. I make Bob do a "bat check" each night just to make sure he is not sleeping with us and will not appear when all the lights go out. At some point we are going to have to give him up for dead. I cannot image what he is eating or drinking. If he is finding bugs in this house and leaving, I just soon ignore him But there is the part about him maybe having rabies that scares me a bit. We just don't know what to do about it!
Cindy is all set to be my surgery partner once again. She is great in the hospital. She will have the night shift for the first couple of nights till I am not chained to IV's, leg things, cathetres (sp) and Bob takes over during the day. We have a routine down about washing my hair - or my non hair head as the case was last time. There are so many things Bob is great at doing- but I am pretty sure blowdrying my hair is not going to be one of them. And I have to have my hair (or head) washed everyday, no matter what else is going on in my life! I did tell Cindy tonight that she had to change the tone on her cell phone during my hospital stay. While I am a huge Alabama Football Fan, I cannot tolerate the fight song as the cell phone ring, especially when it goes off every 5 minutes. At our family reunion on the 4th of July, we are going to pre-screen the phone rings and select a hospital appropriate tone- vibrate I think. I guess the funny thing about this is that most of you know I cannot go 5 minutes without my Blackberry. So only other peoples' phones drive me crazy.
I have had some painful memories in the last couple of days about my last thorochotamy, so I have been trying to remember the "good times" there! It is easy because there are so few! Emory Crawford Long (or Emory Mid-Town as it is called now) has a great fruit plate on the menu for patients. The staff figured out that was about all I would eat so I got one every meal. I got great care from the staff and doctors - even the chemo staff came to check on me.That may be it for the good times! But I know I am not there for a picnic, and I am sure I could not be in better hands than Dr. Miller. And if you ever need to get a chest tube taken out, his PA Jim is the one for the job. Everyone told me how painful that would be. They remove the epidural first so you do feel the pain of the tubes. Jim had me sort of in a fetal position and it was over before I knew it. That as been my biggest fear of the surgery, so I guess now knowing that will not hurt does help. One last good memory -well I heard about it anyway. While I was in surgery, most of my siblings-Cindy, Syd and Michael, Bob, brother in law Jim, Aunt Rhoda, Uncle Marvin, Cousin Cladys, and heaven knows who else were all in the waiting room. Doc O (who is the leg surgeon, not the lung surgeon) got so excited when he found out I did not have Sarcoma in my lungs he went running out in the waiting room to steal Dr. Miller's thunder and tell everyone it was not cancer. Being the over dramatic family that we are, everyone let out a big scream. The security guards came running up the stairs to the screams, and that just about all got kicked out the hospital. The story later told was hilarious. I think Doc O got hugs and cheers from all sorts of members from my crazy family and lots of other folks in the waiting room were coming over to hear the good news. Doc O made me promise to let him know the date as he wants to be there. Here's hoping he can be the hero and deliver the same good news again!
I
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
As expected
I felt pretty good when I left Dr. Miller's office today, but now I have had a little too much time to think, and I have scared myself a bit. Let me explain. Dr. Miller said the nodule had to come out, as expected. He said it is more defined than the ones I had before, which makes it really look like sarcoma. However, he did say that last time - but was even more emphatic this time. I think he did not want me to have any false expectations that this could just be an infection again. I asked him if there were just some people prone to having spots on their lungs in general (not sarcoma) or anyone who had spots on more than one occasion that were not sarcoma. He reminded me there is only one other sarcoma patient he has had in the last 20 years where the spot on the lung was not sarcoma, so there were not repeat customers like that. Maybe I can set a new trend? He really gave me no hope for that. I won't let that stop me from trying.
For the good news - it is small and slow growing. He encouraged me to go ahead and go to England and plan on surgery the first week in August. They will call me Monday to schedule.
He will do another CT scan before then to see what it looks like then and if there are any more. I am hoping it will have gotten smaller like last timem bit highly unlikely! I hate to be negative, but I really don't want to set myself up for dissapointment. I also have to have another drug induced stress test for my heart and lung capacity test before the surgery. It will be a thorchotomy again; no scope. When I told him that Doc O indicated he may be able to scope he looked at me like I was crazy. He said it was way to low in the lung for that, and he would show it to me to prove it if I wanted him to. I told him that I trusted him and that perhaps Doc O better stick to legs. As long as everything remains the same and no other nodules, the incision should be smaller than last time since, he does not have to go to two parts of my lung. Recovery about 3 weeks. Pretty much everything the same as before except I am healthier going in (no recent chemo, radiation, etc) and a smaller cut, only one chest tube. They will give me an epidural that will stay in for a few days. That keeps me from feeling the chest tube which I understand can be pretty miserable. Last time I mainly hurt from being propped up on my left shoulder during surgery. It was really miserable, because they could not give me other pain medicine. You get the epidural for the chest tube pain, but it is so localized it did not reach up and extend to the shoulder pain. And, you can't get pain meds on top of the epidural. While I am grateful for the epidural, I just remembered how jittery it made me. My hands were shaking so badly, I could not hold a glass without using both hands. Also I could not walk without a walker. But soon after they took it out, that all went away.
One thing that is almost funny now but it petrified me then - they gave me some Benedryl on top of sleeping pills to help me sleep. I had a main line into my neck where there was an IV and that is how I got meds. They gave me the Benedryl this way, and it took affect within 90 seconds or so. I was so shocked at how drowsey I felt so quickly, I thought I was having a stroke. My mouth got so dry, and I could not get words out. Cindy was there with me, and after we realized what was going on, we did laugh about my reaction. I slept really well, but I will never do that again. From that point on, all my Benedryl was oral!
I asked about after treatment and this is the most bothersome part. If the tumor is high grade, then I may have to have more chemo. We won't know that until surgery and they do the biopsy. But as my friend Karen says. "Don"t bleed till you get shot!" Also I keep telling myself that "chemo is my friend". And what a bitch she is! My leg tumor was more that 99% dead when they took it out. No one knows whether it was chemo or radiation that killed it, but something did. There are others where that treatment had no effect, so I should be glad to know my cancer can be killed off. Yet the idea of chemo again, does terrify me. But I am going to try not to bleed just yet.
In the meantime, I am going to enjoy my family reunion in Birminghams, mytrip to England, try to wrap up some big exciting things I have going on at work, play some tennis, and get some things done around the house. Poor Bob, and the rest of my family. They will be back to waiting on me hand and foot, and worrying about me all the time. I wish there was something I could do about that. I have not even made up for all everyone had to do for me the last time, and here I go again being all needy. That is really the worst part of it all. It is harder on everyone else than it is on me. So I am back to depending on all of you for support and prayers again. It worked last time!
I will keep you posted as soon as I have dates. I hope to see or talk to many of you before then. Thanks so much for keeping up with me, and keeping me in your thoughts.
Love,
Geri
For the good news - it is small and slow growing. He encouraged me to go ahead and go to England and plan on surgery the first week in August. They will call me Monday to schedule.
He will do another CT scan before then to see what it looks like then and if there are any more. I am hoping it will have gotten smaller like last timem bit highly unlikely! I hate to be negative, but I really don't want to set myself up for dissapointment. I also have to have another drug induced stress test for my heart and lung capacity test before the surgery. It will be a thorchotomy again; no scope. When I told him that Doc O indicated he may be able to scope he looked at me like I was crazy. He said it was way to low in the lung for that, and he would show it to me to prove it if I wanted him to. I told him that I trusted him and that perhaps Doc O better stick to legs. As long as everything remains the same and no other nodules, the incision should be smaller than last time since, he does not have to go to two parts of my lung. Recovery about 3 weeks. Pretty much everything the same as before except I am healthier going in (no recent chemo, radiation, etc) and a smaller cut, only one chest tube. They will give me an epidural that will stay in for a few days. That keeps me from feeling the chest tube which I understand can be pretty miserable. Last time I mainly hurt from being propped up on my left shoulder during surgery. It was really miserable, because they could not give me other pain medicine. You get the epidural for the chest tube pain, but it is so localized it did not reach up and extend to the shoulder pain. And, you can't get pain meds on top of the epidural. While I am grateful for the epidural, I just remembered how jittery it made me. My hands were shaking so badly, I could not hold a glass without using both hands. Also I could not walk without a walker. But soon after they took it out, that all went away.
One thing that is almost funny now but it petrified me then - they gave me some Benedryl on top of sleeping pills to help me sleep. I had a main line into my neck where there was an IV and that is how I got meds. They gave me the Benedryl this way, and it took affect within 90 seconds or so. I was so shocked at how drowsey I felt so quickly, I thought I was having a stroke. My mouth got so dry, and I could not get words out. Cindy was there with me, and after we realized what was going on, we did laugh about my reaction. I slept really well, but I will never do that again. From that point on, all my Benedryl was oral!
I asked about after treatment and this is the most bothersome part. If the tumor is high grade, then I may have to have more chemo. We won't know that until surgery and they do the biopsy. But as my friend Karen says. "Don"t bleed till you get shot!" Also I keep telling myself that "chemo is my friend". And what a bitch she is! My leg tumor was more that 99% dead when they took it out. No one knows whether it was chemo or radiation that killed it, but something did. There are others where that treatment had no effect, so I should be glad to know my cancer can be killed off. Yet the idea of chemo again, does terrify me. But I am going to try not to bleed just yet.
In the meantime, I am going to enjoy my family reunion in Birminghams, mytrip to England, try to wrap up some big exciting things I have going on at work, play some tennis, and get some things done around the house. Poor Bob, and the rest of my family. They will be back to waiting on me hand and foot, and worrying about me all the time. I wish there was something I could do about that. I have not even made up for all everyone had to do for me the last time, and here I go again being all needy. That is really the worst part of it all. It is harder on everyone else than it is on me. So I am back to depending on all of you for support and prayers again. It worked last time!
I will keep you posted as soon as I have dates. I hope to see or talk to many of you before then. Thanks so much for keeping up with me, and keeping me in your thoughts.
Love,
Geri
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Still waiting to hear
I am doing just fine and waiting for my appmt on Tuesday afternoon at 3:15pm with Dr. Miller to find out how he is going to get rid of this spot on my lung. My new motto is "Hope for the scope!", but I am not real optomistic that I will avoid a throchotomy.
I went to the Sacoma support group on Wednesday. It was great to see the folks I have been building a relationship with for about a year now. Most have been through much worse than I and they are truly an inspiration. In fact, before the meeting I contacted two members you have seen me write about before, Karen and Virginia. Karen has had 3 lung surgerys and 4 surgeries on her leg over the past 5 1/2 years. She is about my age, works from home and is a lot of fun. She is so positive and does a lot of research about our diease. She does not have the same cell type of Sarcoma as I do, so her treatment is a little different. She did have radiation but no chemo. She continues to have spots on her lungs, and when they get to be about 1 cm (as mine is now)Dr. Miller takes them out. She has accepted that every year or two she will need to have lung surgery and adjusts her schedule to fit. All of her spots have been sarcoma. I am still hoping this one is not, but the fact that it grew over the last 3 months is worrisome. However, I look at Karen, who is handling this all so well, and know that I can too. She has been very open about talking with me about all of this, and it is so nice to have someone who has been there before and knows what you are experiencing and help you anticipate what to expect next. For example, before my thorochotomy last time, I had to have a drug-induced stress test and a lung capacity test. I did not know if that was something that had to be done before every lung surgery or a one time thing. Karen never had the stress test (because she never had chemo, we guess) but did have the lung test -- but only before the first surgery. I was wondering about this because if Dr. Miller does let me go to England before surgery, I was not sure if I would need to have these test again before surgery and may need to build in some time for that. Of course, no two cases are exactly alike, but I am guessing there are some similar things.
I am still concerned about taking two weeks vacation, and then coming back and being off 4 to 6 weeks for surgery. It just does not seem right. My boss Kendra tells me not to worry about it, but I do. So if he allows me to go on to England and postpone surgery, I am going to have think about whether I should try to come back a few days ahead of Bob and get some work done first. I know I am the only one putting this pressure on me --but I cannot help it! I have a lot of work things we are doing that I am really excited about, and I do not want to miss any of it! But nor do I want to miss our time with family in England. A delimna for sure.
Virginia had sarcoma behind her knee 20+ year ago. It reoccured in 2007. The sarcoma was wrapped around so many vessels etc and the best option for her was to amputate her leg at the knee. Without doing that it would be a useless limb so now she can have a prothesis that helps her. At one point, I just thought that would be the worse thing in the world. It isn't. She is the most darling fun, positive woman who has a full life She drives a regular car with her left leg. She has an outside sales job like me and continues to thrive and be an inspiration for us all. She is always reaching out to new members and making every one feel at home, welcome, and comfortable talking about difficult subjects, as you might imagine. She is having to get a new joint, or something like that for her leg. Evidently your skin changes and from time to time you have to have an adjustment. Just as she was about the get this all done, and her prosthesis Dr was no longer on her insurance, so now she is having to change. She is on crutches now because they cannot reattach to the new joint right away. and I think the insurance company has to get the doctor thing straightened out. Her life continues on like normal and this is just a small challenge to her. She also has sarcoma in her lungs that they cannot remove. Fortunately, it is not growing and she is doing great. My little spot seems as insignificant as a broken finger nail (ok - those of you who really know me know that can be a little traumatic!). One other thing, the type leg she wanted costs $16,000 and is not covered by her insurance. She was going to get it anyway, hard as that would be. The company she works for had a big golf tournament, and unbeknowst to her raised the money to buy the leg. Another prosthesis company ask her to model a new great "foot" they had created and gave her a $5000 foot for free. These things are not cheap and most likely the ones that look the best may not always be covered by insurance. It is hard enough being sick -- and so many people have to deal with the financial end of it too. I am so lucky!
In the meantime, I am playing tennis, working and keeping busy till I get surgery schedule. I have a sinking spell every now and then but for the most part, I am doing pretty well.
One minor problem - we just got our house painted. We had to have the doors and windows open for a while, and on Thursday night (after we'd closed them all and gone to bed) we heard a noise in our room. Bob thought it was a bird. Being the chicken that I am (and very scared of birds), I ducked under the covers. Bob said it was a bat! It flew around and then, we think, it went into one of our guest bedrooms. We could not find it. Finally we shut the doors to all rooms and went to sleep. I was scared to leave our bedroom Friday morning, so Bob "manned up" and went on a bat hunt. He could not find it, but there is no way it has gotten out of the house. We called Animal Control looking for Batman to come and get this darn thing. They actually sent Batwoman instead. She was a little young thing, shorter than I am. All she had was a cage and a towel. She could not find it either. So "Robin" our code name for the bat is still here - somewhere. We mainly keep the doors shut. We had to open them when the carpet cleaner came today, and we did not tell him to be on the lookout for Robin either. I am not sure what our next move is. Batwoman told us to listen for Robin at night, and when we figure out what room he is in, to call animal control and they will come and get him. I thought we could leer him out with food. I think they are vegetarians and eat bugs too. So I am picking up some tofu at Publix. Just kidding I am kind of making light of this but frankly I am pretty scared! I am guessing Robin will either fly around at night and be heard banging against the windows trying to get out or will starve and die. It is really gross to think about. But it is another distraction none the less!
I will update on Tuesday!
I went to the Sacoma support group on Wednesday. It was great to see the folks I have been building a relationship with for about a year now. Most have been through much worse than I and they are truly an inspiration. In fact, before the meeting I contacted two members you have seen me write about before, Karen and Virginia. Karen has had 3 lung surgerys and 4 surgeries on her leg over the past 5 1/2 years. She is about my age, works from home and is a lot of fun. She is so positive and does a lot of research about our diease. She does not have the same cell type of Sarcoma as I do, so her treatment is a little different. She did have radiation but no chemo. She continues to have spots on her lungs, and when they get to be about 1 cm (as mine is now)Dr. Miller takes them out. She has accepted that every year or two she will need to have lung surgery and adjusts her schedule to fit. All of her spots have been sarcoma. I am still hoping this one is not, but the fact that it grew over the last 3 months is worrisome. However, I look at Karen, who is handling this all so well, and know that I can too. She has been very open about talking with me about all of this, and it is so nice to have someone who has been there before and knows what you are experiencing and help you anticipate what to expect next. For example, before my thorochotomy last time, I had to have a drug-induced stress test and a lung capacity test. I did not know if that was something that had to be done before every lung surgery or a one time thing. Karen never had the stress test (because she never had chemo, we guess) but did have the lung test -- but only before the first surgery. I was wondering about this because if Dr. Miller does let me go to England before surgery, I was not sure if I would need to have these test again before surgery and may need to build in some time for that. Of course, no two cases are exactly alike, but I am guessing there are some similar things.
I am still concerned about taking two weeks vacation, and then coming back and being off 4 to 6 weeks for surgery. It just does not seem right. My boss Kendra tells me not to worry about it, but I do. So if he allows me to go on to England and postpone surgery, I am going to have think about whether I should try to come back a few days ahead of Bob and get some work done first. I know I am the only one putting this pressure on me --but I cannot help it! I have a lot of work things we are doing that I am really excited about, and I do not want to miss any of it! But nor do I want to miss our time with family in England. A delimna for sure.
Virginia had sarcoma behind her knee 20+ year ago. It reoccured in 2007. The sarcoma was wrapped around so many vessels etc and the best option for her was to amputate her leg at the knee. Without doing that it would be a useless limb so now she can have a prothesis that helps her. At one point, I just thought that would be the worse thing in the world. It isn't. She is the most darling fun, positive woman who has a full life She drives a regular car with her left leg. She has an outside sales job like me and continues to thrive and be an inspiration for us all. She is always reaching out to new members and making every one feel at home, welcome, and comfortable talking about difficult subjects, as you might imagine. She is having to get a new joint, or something like that for her leg. Evidently your skin changes and from time to time you have to have an adjustment. Just as she was about the get this all done, and her prosthesis Dr was no longer on her insurance, so now she is having to change. She is on crutches now because they cannot reattach to the new joint right away. and I think the insurance company has to get the doctor thing straightened out. Her life continues on like normal and this is just a small challenge to her. She also has sarcoma in her lungs that they cannot remove. Fortunately, it is not growing and she is doing great. My little spot seems as insignificant as a broken finger nail (ok - those of you who really know me know that can be a little traumatic!). One other thing, the type leg she wanted costs $16,000 and is not covered by her insurance. She was going to get it anyway, hard as that would be. The company she works for had a big golf tournament, and unbeknowst to her raised the money to buy the leg. Another prosthesis company ask her to model a new great "foot" they had created and gave her a $5000 foot for free. These things are not cheap and most likely the ones that look the best may not always be covered by insurance. It is hard enough being sick -- and so many people have to deal with the financial end of it too. I am so lucky!
In the meantime, I am playing tennis, working and keeping busy till I get surgery schedule. I have a sinking spell every now and then but for the most part, I am doing pretty well.
One minor problem - we just got our house painted. We had to have the doors and windows open for a while, and on Thursday night (after we'd closed them all and gone to bed) we heard a noise in our room. Bob thought it was a bird. Being the chicken that I am (and very scared of birds), I ducked under the covers. Bob said it was a bat! It flew around and then, we think, it went into one of our guest bedrooms. We could not find it. Finally we shut the doors to all rooms and went to sleep. I was scared to leave our bedroom Friday morning, so Bob "manned up" and went on a bat hunt. He could not find it, but there is no way it has gotten out of the house. We called Animal Control looking for Batman to come and get this darn thing. They actually sent Batwoman instead. She was a little young thing, shorter than I am. All she had was a cage and a towel. She could not find it either. So "Robin" our code name for the bat is still here - somewhere. We mainly keep the doors shut. We had to open them when the carpet cleaner came today, and we did not tell him to be on the lookout for Robin either. I am not sure what our next move is. Batwoman told us to listen for Robin at night, and when we figure out what room he is in, to call animal control and they will come and get him. I thought we could leer him out with food. I think they are vegetarians and eat bugs too. So I am picking up some tofu at Publix. Just kidding I am kind of making light of this but frankly I am pretty scared! I am guessing Robin will either fly around at night and be heard banging against the windows trying to get out or will starve and die. It is really gross to think about. But it is another distraction none the less!
I will update on Tuesday!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Hanging In there
I am doing ok and keeping busy. Last night Rita and I went to the gym and got on the treadmill. I even baked a cake and got up early this morning to play tennis with my regular Saturday group- Susan, Paula and Loree, Going for a facial this afternoon, so life seems pretty normal.
I heard late yesterday that my appointment with Dr. Miller won't be until Tues, June 23. DocO is trying to get it moved up but I know Dr. Miller stays packed. Hopefully if it is the scope thing, maybe he can do it quickly and we can go to England as scheduled. Or, maybe he will even think it is ok to wait until we come back as planned on July 21. I keep hoping that, same as last time, it will just be an inflamation. I am not sure I am that lucky. And this time the spot got bigger- not smaller as it did before. Of course I did not even know the spot existed before. It is the uncertainty that gets you. In the meantime, we are getting the carpets cleaned, house painted, cooking stuff to freeze and trying to get some work projects taken care of so we can be better prepared. I am lucky that when I have surgery this time, it will not be after having months of chemo, radiation, the wound vac, and every other obstacle I had before. I am going to do every thing I can to go into surgery as healthy as possible so maybe recovery is not so hard.
More to come!
I heard late yesterday that my appointment with Dr. Miller won't be until Tues, June 23. DocO is trying to get it moved up but I know Dr. Miller stays packed. Hopefully if it is the scope thing, maybe he can do it quickly and we can go to England as scheduled. Or, maybe he will even think it is ok to wait until we come back as planned on July 21. I keep hoping that, same as last time, it will just be an inflamation. I am not sure I am that lucky. And this time the spot got bigger- not smaller as it did before. Of course I did not even know the spot existed before. It is the uncertainty that gets you. In the meantime, we are getting the carpets cleaned, house painted, cooking stuff to freeze and trying to get some work projects taken care of so we can be better prepared. I am lucky that when I have surgery this time, it will not be after having months of chemo, radiation, the wound vac, and every other obstacle I had before. I am going to do every thing I can to go into surgery as healthy as possible so maybe recovery is not so hard.
More to come!
Friday, June 12, 2009
Not what I hoped for but I got the tee shirt
All this time, I thought you got the 2 year tee shirt from DocO if you were clean after two years. Seems you just get it for just surviving two years. So I did get that and am thrilled to have made that. But the news was not so good. I have a spot on my left long (different side from last time). Evidently it was there 3 months ago but now it is bigger - from 5mm to now 1cm. And it has to come out. Last time I was very lucky that is was not cancer. Most every spot like this on lungs of sarcoma patients is cancer. But I was the exception before and maybe I can be again.
So now I am waiting to hear from my lung surgeon, Dr. Miller to see what happens next and when. This morning is when I had the CT on my chest and MRI on my lung and when DocO discovered the spot. I knew when Andre', the P.A. came in first and told me he had not looked at the scans that something was wrong. Ususally he or a resident come in before DocO and give me a thumbs up so I am not too anxious waiting to hear from Doc O. He started by saying "Your leg looks fine but......". And so it goes. He did say the spot was very close to my treachea (sp) and maybe Dr. Miller could pull it out by going in with a bronchoscope (sp) instead of a full blown thorochotomy. That would be great. The throrchotomy is not a fun surgery. DocO has a call into Dr. Miller about getting me in to see him. The great thing about being a patient with all Docs in the Emory system is that they can all see my scans and reports on the Emory network-so no waiting for files to be sent. I am guess Dr. Miller will just look at my scans on line and decide from there how he is going to proceed. I am hoping once he reviews he will just call me and tell me what is next. If it is a bronchoscope and the recovery is easier - then I hope we get moving on it right away. If I have to do the full throchotemy then I just don't know.
We are supposed to be going to England July 5 for two weeks for Bob's mothers 90th birthday. If it is safe to put off the procedure till after, I 'd like to do that, even if we have to cut the trip short. I have tons of things going on at work-- all good stuff that I am really excited about and I hate to miss any of that too. S0 waiting till after vacation would give me a chance to get some things wrapped up. But of course we will not do that if it puts me in more danger.
So my head is spinning right now and not knowing what is next is driving me crazy. I am not thinking about what this means long term -- and like before my gut tells me it is nothing again. But regardless, the journey is not fun for anyone. It is not nearly as hard on me as it is Bob, our family and friends, and I worry about all that. But all I can do is wait!
In the meantime, I am going to try to get some things done while I am able. Stupid stuff like getting the carpets cleaned, getting the house painted and getting work in good shape and caught up. But first, I am having a massage this afternoon and playing tennis in the morning!
Life goes on. I know you all have me in your prayers, and I am so grateful for the wonderful support you have all given me. I promise to blog when I know what is next. I know I will be okay- just may have some tough days coming. But we have been here before and were just fine. And I got the tee shirt!
So now I am waiting to hear from my lung surgeon, Dr. Miller to see what happens next and when. This morning is when I had the CT on my chest and MRI on my lung and when DocO discovered the spot. I knew when Andre', the P.A. came in first and told me he had not looked at the scans that something was wrong. Ususally he or a resident come in before DocO and give me a thumbs up so I am not too anxious waiting to hear from Doc O. He started by saying "Your leg looks fine but......". And so it goes. He did say the spot was very close to my treachea (sp) and maybe Dr. Miller could pull it out by going in with a bronchoscope (sp) instead of a full blown thorochotomy. That would be great. The throrchotomy is not a fun surgery. DocO has a call into Dr. Miller about getting me in to see him. The great thing about being a patient with all Docs in the Emory system is that they can all see my scans and reports on the Emory network-so no waiting for files to be sent. I am guess Dr. Miller will just look at my scans on line and decide from there how he is going to proceed. I am hoping once he reviews he will just call me and tell me what is next. If it is a bronchoscope and the recovery is easier - then I hope we get moving on it right away. If I have to do the full throchotemy then I just don't know.
We are supposed to be going to England July 5 for two weeks for Bob's mothers 90th birthday. If it is safe to put off the procedure till after, I 'd like to do that, even if we have to cut the trip short. I have tons of things going on at work-- all good stuff that I am really excited about and I hate to miss any of that too. S0 waiting till after vacation would give me a chance to get some things wrapped up. But of course we will not do that if it puts me in more danger.
So my head is spinning right now and not knowing what is next is driving me crazy. I am not thinking about what this means long term -- and like before my gut tells me it is nothing again. But regardless, the journey is not fun for anyone. It is not nearly as hard on me as it is Bob, our family and friends, and I worry about all that. But all I can do is wait!
In the meantime, I am going to try to get some things done while I am able. Stupid stuff like getting the carpets cleaned, getting the house painted and getting work in good shape and caught up. But first, I am having a massage this afternoon and playing tennis in the morning!
Life goes on. I know you all have me in your prayers, and I am so grateful for the wonderful support you have all given me. I promise to blog when I know what is next. I know I will be okay- just may have some tough days coming. But we have been here before and were just fine. And I got the tee shirt!
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