Hope all is well with you. Thanks for checking in on me.
WARNING - this post is long and ... different. I've had a roller coaster of a day and I guess it comes out in my writing. A lot of artistic license has been taken here. This entry runs the entire gamut, from farce to very serious. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK.
I should have called it Chemo II or something, maybe....
Anyway, 2nd round of chemo was today.
My sister Marta, who spent many years as a nurse at the University of Iowa, and now works at a state prison in Iowa as a nurse (this will be important later in this post), came along to chauffeur me to the appt. I love her dearly, and thanks to her for being there for me.
We stopped at the Dollar Tree en route as I've lost 3 pairs of reading glasses at home and the only pair I had, to take w/me, were my funky-ass construction reading glasses (no correction on top, +1.50 correction on the bottom, THEY ROCK, old people. Check Harbor Freight!) and Jules would rather not have me seen in public with those on. Or private, either for that matter. They make me look like I should be running a table saw or something. Nothing wrong with running a table saw, it's just that I never run a table saw, so why wear the glasses?
While we were at the Tree we also snagged what turned out to be some killer trail mix, which I highly recommend, for chemo or any other application you can think of.I went in for the draw. The nurse was an interesting, very blunt and matter of fact lady and we had a nice discussion. She did my draws last week and I was GRILLED about each blood component. "You do know what each one DOES, right?"....gulp! "Well, I know SOME of them." Then I got "Well you better know ALL of them, they're very important!" To which I reply, silently, YIKES! Nurse Square Nuts has reported for duty! Audibly, "I will make it a point to understand them."
Just kidding, she was a nice lady, but she expected me to be the informed cancer patient, and that's reasonable. I'll do my best to do my best.
Anyway levels were good, I'll try to get my chart started back up so we can watch for trends.
On to vitals (weight was 190) with another nurse, all good, then the doctor. I introduced him to Marta. Last week Dave, this week Marta... I still got 6 siblings I can throw at 'em! He did the exam and said the tumors (do I call them tumors? They're enlarged or cancerous lymph nodes, I guess they're tumors...) were definitely shrinking.
He asked how I was doing. I told him great, only problems were that I "crashed" a little the day after I went off the steroids, and I had some trouble sleeping on the steroids also. He asked if I was agitated also while on the steroids, I said only by my wife. That was to be expected. He gave me a scrip but told me it was ONLY for the days I was on the 'roids.
On to chemo.
It actually went better this time for some reason. I wonder if maybe one of the IVs didn't go as fast, or maybe since they had it on the chart that I went into hypothermia (the literary device of "exaggeration" has just been employed for comic effect only) last week that they adjusted something.
The new glasses. REORDER CODE is "Grandpa Bookworm". Dollar Tree, Devastating Fashion, FOR A DOLLAR!
All went well as I said, and I only needed one blanket. At this point, I celebrate all victories, big and small.
They have bookshelves with quilts and afghans for us chemo types. They are laundered after every visit, so there's nothing cheesy about them. Our mother has spent the better part of her life making afghans. It will be a large part of her legacy. I tell Marta that we'd best not tell Mom about the afghans or she'll begin a personal crusade to provide 500, by year's end.
Although she was not assigned to my case this week, Nurse Becky and I spoke. I apologized for not adding up 2 and 2 to get four, thereby missing the fact that SHE was Stacy's pal. It was kind of old home week for two Kids from Korn Kountry (Leland and Mendota). She's very friendly.
Marta caught up on all the latest dish as we had stolen some rags like "People, and Celebrity Underwear Drawers, Exclusive Pictures", etc. from the waiting room so that we could divert ourselves from the BO-RING wait. I don't think they'll care that we stole them as they were all circa 1992.
At one point the nurse asks if I'm warm enough, or do I need another blanket? I answer no, and think to myself that the word of my 3_blanket_day on my first round of chemo must have gotten around and that I'm branded forever as a complete wuss.... how sad. Now cancer has stripped me of my dignity, as well.
Now the nurse asks Marta if she's cold. Would she care for a blanket?... What's this, everyone in my family has a defective thermostat now, just because I needed 3 freakin' blankets? I might start to take this personally. Say anything you want about me, but don't drag my sister into it too, OK? But I say nothing. Maybe I am a wuss.
Marta replies, "No, I'm fine. I guess I'm used to it. It's always cold in the prison."
Pins drop in faraway corners of the clinic, and we hear them. All of them. Slowly I realize that the nurse is not breathing. I've got to say something... SAY SOMETHING!!
Finally I come up with "Oh, she WORKS in a prison. She's not an inmate!"
And silently, to myself, in my best Jimmy Cagney voice (think White Heat or Public Enemy), I'm saying "Don't worry about running me and my sister down by questioning our thermostat genes, see? She's not packing a home made shiv! She didn't stand up in the commissary in the Big House bangin' her tin cup on the table and say 'Hey you mother effers, my bro has the big C and I'm bustin' out of here, now, see? It's his second chemo and it's my turn to drive the Lymphoma Limo and haul his ass, and no-one here's gonna stop me, see, not even the warden, see?' "
But I never said that out loud
See?
The tension goes out of the room. Pins drop silently once more. They finish up poisoning me in order to restore my health. We thank everyone and leave.
Marta and I begin to make our way home. We go back to Dollar Tree so she can grab a couple more Trail Mixes and I buy some assorted junk. It's a character flaw I inherited from my mother... well no, I don't really NEED the ZOOM nail clippers with the 2x SUPER MAGNIFICATION, but THEY'RE ONLY A DOLLAR!
You thought I was kidding.
So you pick up a few little gadgets because everything's cheap, and get to the checkout - "Your total is two hundred eighty seven dollars and sixty five cents." What the...?
And then...
Still on our way home, I call my mom. No answer. Call my sister Deb and talk to her. Give her the 411 on my treatment. Ask if she's seen mom as she lives in the same town. No, and sister Sylvia just called Deb looking for her as well. That creepy feeling you get when a loved one turns up missing is present in my gut now. Deb offers that she's probably on her patio talking to the neighbors.
After I hang up, I mention to Marta that it's great to see her since I never do as she lives about 2 & 1/2 hours away. And I rarely talk to Deb, but I have now, 2 times in 2 days as she sent me some blueberry cobbler mix and I called to thank her. Gee, Marta, in case someone wants to talk to their family more, all they have to do is get cancer! Black humor, my specialty.
We pull in the driveway at home and Julie comes out and gives us the news: Deb just called. Mom fell in the parking lot at the grocery store and may have broken her arm. She's en route to the hospital via ambulance.
An update comes in: Her arm is broken, badly. High, near the shoulder socket.
My mother is 85 years old. She is "Granny" to all kids, and proud of it. Bore eleven children. Buried one as a weeks-old infant and lost another who was 47 years old. She never has fully recovered from either of those losses (and never will). Buried her husband of 61 years 7 years ago and has really been lost ever since. Both hips are artificial. A few years ago she fell coming in her back door and got an artificial shoulder as well. Which has failed, and as a result, she's in pretty much constant pain.
Although she needs surgery for the failed shoulder replacement, they are very concerned about anesthesia because she also has developed COPD, even though she never smoked. So she opted to live with the pain because she can still crochet pretty well without that arm. And so now, she falls and breaks the OTHER arm.
Tomorrow the orthopedic surgeon will examine her and lay out her options. I had thought that maybe they'd just go ahead and do BOTH arms but Marta says they would never do that as she'd have to be "under" for too long and they wouldn't risk it. Hope is that they can put pins in this break and it will work out. But she may need another shoulder replacement. So we will see what her choices are, and go from there.
There are a million other sweet little old ladies out there like my mom. On The Home Front, she fought the Second World War. She survived the Depression and is now living through what will probably be the Second Depression. She raised a HUGE family, and has had a good life, all things considered. And so it would be a mistake to categorize her entire life by reviewing only the sad chapters. She's certainly had her share of misery. But so has everyone else.
She's my mother, and she's very special to me and everyone who loves her, just as I'm sure yours is or was to you.
You are born, you live, you die. In between you try to make the world a better place. You make the best of what God gave you, and she definitely has done that. She's got a ton of good memories and is very proud of all her offspring. And in the final analysis, what else is there?
I hope we can get her patched up and going again.
I can't imagine life without her.
And then..
When I talked to my sister Mary about my mom, she told me that her ex-sister in law (whom I will refer to as "K" for privacy reasons) was just told that she has cancer. Her specific situation dictates intense and frequent chemotherapy sessions and she is expected to be very ill. Her long time partner died from cancer very recently.
Tonight I'm wearing my LIVESTRONG bracelet for "K" too.
It will probably never come off.
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