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5:52:00 AM EDT
Feeling Mischievous
Hearing No body knows the trouble my body's seen
if the cancer doesn't kill me, the chemo will
Cancer can kill you. Chemo is worse.
It's been five weeks since Dr. Oh stuck a teeny, tiny TV camera down my nose in his search for a swallow. I hadn't swallowed anything in a year. I haven't mastigated in a year. Can you say that on the internet? My doctors are mystified. They put a small tube in my stomach, into which I pour the contents of nine cans of Nutren Probalance made by the sweet people at Nestle's. Three cans for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I can't taste it, it bypasses my tongue and esophogus and goes right to my tummy.
Anyway, Dr. Oh was looking at the TV monitor. It showied wet, red, fleshy, ugly tunnel that was my throat. Suddenly he stopped the camera! "What is THAT?" he said aloud, referring to a lesion on my throat atop my voice box. "It wasn't there a month ago??"
A rhetorical question, to be sure. I had no answer for him. The lesion in question just looked like the other ugly fleshy stuff on the screen.
"Oh, that's not good," says Dr. Oh. "It looks cancerous to me. We'll have to do some tests right away." Dr. Oh is very shy, doesn't talk much, is a hellova surgeon and Yo and I trust him a lot. He is without a bedside manner. He doesn't know what a b.m. is.
They did the MRI and the CAT Scan. Then they did a biopsy on the lesion. Then they did a Pet Scan. They turned all the xrays over to some radiologists who said, "Yup, he has cancer of the throat."
Yup is a medical term meaning "we're covered for malpractice."
Then they had to decide how to get rid of the malignant cancer. My HMO is also in the doctoring and hospital business. They have a Tumor Board made up of an oncologist, neurologist, radiologist, dentist, surgeon and a few other ists. They come to a consensus about how to attack this particular cancer in this particular body. It sounds like a good idea until you realize they're just playing CYA again. "Our judgement is based on a concensus of experts" means that no one person is responsible. And who can argue with a consensi?
It was their concensus that we should begin with three strong dozes of chemo-therapy. What they do is poison the cancer cells and try to kill them. Problem is, they kill all the other cells in your body at the same time. I had heard many horror stories about chemo. It makes you bald. You get constipated, you vomit, you're always nauseus, you lose your hair - not there - on your head and you want to die a lot.
All true. But the good doctors erred when it came to choosing the right dose for this otherwise healthy 77-year-old. They over-dosed me. And my wish to die nearly came true. After two moderate poisons, they gave me a large egg-shaped container holding a supply of poison fed to a tube in my arm automatically for five days.
That was the chemo killer.
After five days of chemo, I became violently ill. I couldn't sleep. I hurt all over my body. I remember almost nothing about my eight days of hell. It was also hell for Yo. I was almost uncontrollable. One afternoon, about 3, I was standing by the door of the bathroom. Suddenly, without warning, I fainted. Passed out. Yo is a strong woman. That speaks for her character. She tried to catch me and held me up for a few minutes. Just then, son Mark arrived, ran to Yo's side, caught me and let me down gently on the bathroom floor.
"You're going to the hospital, husband." There was no discussion. Mark loaded me in his car and away we went. I was there four days. The nurses were able to clean me out after they put me under. I have no recollection of the hospital. Or the week after I came home.
I do remember deciding if I was going to die, I would do it after eating a chocolate cream pie, and a quart of French Vanilla ice cream. And drinking ginger ale and apple sauce. And swallowing them all, just like a real person. And so I did;. And so I continue to do. I still take my tummy feeds every day. But I'm trying other things, too. I've finished three chocolate cream pies already and working on a fourth. It's been three weeks since my last poison potion.
I feel great. I've gained five pounds. I have agreed to two more doses of chemo, followed by an intense week of radiation at my HM0's main hospital on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood. They say all that should kill the cancer in my thoat for good. If it doesn't, they operate. Which means I lose my voice. But I've talked much too much over the last 77 years. It's time I gave somebody else a chance.
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OH Rob, I have been so worried about you. Not hearing from you. I just knew something had happened and so my prayers for you doubled up. Glad to hear you got through this latest disaster and that you are enjoying chocolate cream pies. I care about you my friend. Please, please if anything bad happens to you again would your son or someone let me know. I know that you don't have a helluva lot of faith in prayers but I do, and hey, what the hell can it hurt!!!!!! Every little helps as they say!
{{{{HUGS}}}}}
Marie
http://journals.aol.co.uk/mariealicejoan/MariesMuses/
8/18/07 12:18 AM
http://journals.aol.com/bgilm