Ron,
After reading your post I am truly moved. It helps me to hear from people like
you so I know what my mom is really going through. She doesn't always level with
us when she feels bad and won't call the doctor for fear she is being a bother!
I appreciate hearing about cancer from another point of view, although I wish
this disease didn't exist. I always wonder, does is say in the bible anywhere
anything about cancer? I know there are lots of other diseases in
there....anyone know? Just wondering. Joanne
HewRon@aol.com wrote:
> Right off I want to thank those who have expressed concern because I have
> been away longer than expected. I'm the one with acute erythroleukemia
> (that's what the doctor told me to put on the insurance claim forms). On
> November 6 I was admitted to hospital for my second "consolidation" period,
> which lasted five days. On my second day a bacterium was found in my blood,
> resulting in two weeks of two different antibiotics administered through my
> broviac tubes. (A broviac allows you to get chemo and other stuff without
> injections; the stuff flows directly into you via these tubes that enter
> through your chest. Sounds ghastly, but the reduction in injections -- save
> subcutaneous ones, and blood tests away from the hospital -- is a blessing.)
>
> I missed my daily visits to MOL. If computers were available to patients,
> that would certainly be welcomed by yours truly. I really appreciate the
> kindness expressed here on MOL, and wish I were an expert who could offer
> advice in response to the calls for help you see here. Of course sometimes
> people will take advantage of a group like this to push their products, but
> one can usually detect the commercialism and just zap those notes, though it
> may well be that some of these offerings have merit. We who are climbing the
> mountain have to detect the wheat from the chaff. We have to do this even
> when dealing with professional medical folk. For instance, in my hospital
> stays I have declined certain procedures on several occasions -- mainly
> because I thought they didn't accord with my doctor's wishes. It is not wrong
> to doubt even highly qualified medicine men and women. We are dealing with
> the very lives of ourselves and our loved ones. It is a fundamental right to
> doubt and question. (Buddha said "Believe nothing, including what I say, if
> it doesn't make sense to you.")
>
> I have arrived home totally exhausted. And since "consolidations" must be
> regular, I am due back in hospital for my third one within the next two
> weeks. When I asked my doctor if we could leave the next consolidation until
> after Christmas he said that would be "silly", since I am doing well. My
> white-cell count before leaving hospital was 9,800 -- it had been 90 just a
> couple of days earlier. Thus the magic of neupogen. By the way in a previous
> note I mentioned aches and pains. When I mentioned these to a nurse, she
> pointed out that the vigorous action of neupogen takes place inside the
> bones, and that's what causes the discomfort (which is not extreme). A
> hospital doctor said the pain was an indication that the medication was
> working.
>
> And here we go again. On my re-entry into hospital the chemo will knock my
> count right back down to near zero, en route knocking out villains still
> lurking in my immune system. Then back home after five days for 10 days of
> self-injection with neupogen. And then, God and my body allowing, higher
> counts, followed by a couple of weeks at home and then my last period of
> consolidation. And then? Hair would be nice! I have now lost even that hair
> that is one of the markers of adulthood. In the mirror, now that I have no
> head hair whatever and just a smattering of super-white pale beard hair, and
> almost none under my arms and points south, I look like a cross between a
> prepubescent boy and an old man. I'm not complaining. I am in the best of
> hands, I think.
>
> I hope this is true of you, fellow traveller. But do not feel shy about
> challenging anything your oncologist or anybody else says. The doctor
> probably knows a great deal more than you, but doesn't know everything, and
> ought to welcome knowing how you really feel. You may come to love your
> doctor (I think I am headed in that direction). It is important to have faith
> in your physician. I have faith in mine, but I am ready to question anything.
> Of course, if you ask hard questions, you must expect some hard answers. I
> have received a few. But the bottom line is, his magic seems to be working.
> And here it must be said that I am supplementing his magic with Chinese
> herbs, vitamins and soy milk.
>
> Meantime it is good -- no, gorgeous -- to be back in my humble home. On being
> brought home by my friend yesterday I astonished myself by bursting into
> tears after unlocking the front door and being surrounded by total
> familiarity.
>
> That's enough self-revelation for now.
>
> Before I went back into the white house, we went to a favorite Chinese
> restaurant. My fortune cookie said "Nature, time and patience are the great
> physicians."
>
> God bless.
>
> -- Ron
>
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