- These are three posts I did earlier this year, (wow where did this year go?)
- Happy New Year
This is a new year.
That may be an over-simplified stating of an obvious fact but, it is just that, a new year.
We saw the Dr. this past week to get the results of Pat’s CT-scan. His news was this; the mass in her lung is “stable” and although the treatment had not shank the mass, it had not spread. Most importantly, there were no signs of it returning to her brain. Also the pleural effusion, (fluid around her heart) was gone. While that may not seem to be the best news, it could have been much, much worse. So, our options were; 1.) Take a break from chemo or; 2.) Continue the current treatment. Yes, Pat immediately chose #2. She doesn’t want to give it a chance to start growing again as it did the last time she took a break. The Dr. said Pat was doing better than he ever expected, that her numbers were still good (her hemoglobin count did go up this week) and as he put it “You look really good, you eyes are clear and you seem stronger, I didn’t expect you to do this well”. The Dr. did offer a third option, he said that he could add an additional medication to the regimen but was afraid that it might do more damage than good so we are keeping that in mind as another possible course of action. As for right now, we will be continuing the treatment until March when again they will do a CT-scan and probably an MRI to see if any progress has been made.
Although the Dr. says he sees the treatment as stabilizing more than eradicating, he was willing to admit that he didn’t expect Pat’s “progress” to be at this level. I think he is starting to see Pat is not the typical patient. We believe all your (and our) prayers have a lot to do with the continued progress. Please continue to pray for us, we cannot win this fight without prayer. We are so thankful to God for bringing us this far and will continue to thank Him for all our future blessings. Pat is in great spirits and other than worrying about me getting tired of driving (which I am not), she is doing pretty well. She is doing well mentally, and seems to be getting stronger each day. Her main problems are numbness and pain in her feet which makes it difficult for her to walk, and pain in her back which flares up several times a day and sometimes wakes her up at night. Neither we nor the Dr. are sure if the pain is post-hepatic neuropathy from the shingles or pain from the cancer. It lasts from several seconds to minutes and sometimes it is an itch and sometimes it seems to be like a muscle spasm. Anyway massaging it seems to help until the pain subsides.
We came home after spending Christmas dinner with my family to find the street in front of our home washed out. About 1/3 of the street had sank 2-3 feet and there is a sinkhole about 20 feet wide and 50 feet long that envelopes the street and the easement and part of my front landscaping! It was caused by the rain not being able to drain through the culvert under our driveway fast enough. The road department says they can’t fix it until it dries up and this Sunday night we got seven, yes 7 inches of SNOW! (When it rains it snows!) OK bad pun. Anyway it will probably be 3-4 weeks at best before they can start working on it. Meanwhile there is another crack developing right down the center of the street that started as a single hairline fracture and is now 3-4 separate cracks that are in some places wide enough to stick a nickel in. That has happened over the span of 9 days. I talked to the guys from the road department on Monday and they said they will make sure I can get in and out of my driveway when I need to. Let’s hope they’re right.
So as I look out my window this morning the mountains and hills north of us look like a scene from the movie “High Plains Drifter”, just beautiful. I say Thank you Lord for allowing us another day, another start to “a new year”. Calling it “just that, a new year” doesn’t do it the true justice it deserves, for it is really a miracle to be here.
Happy New Year!
Floyd
Sandra commented
Hello Floyd I will continue to keep Pat in my prayers. God is taking care of this now keep the faith.
Sandra (Banks) Rose
Yard Dog commented
As the saying goes; The greatest wealth is health. You two have hit the jackpot. Happy NEW Year!
Pat is Sleeping
I haven’t written for a while, I guess you could call it a version of writer’s block, not that I profess to being anything close to a writer.
We want to thank Doug and Sandra for their hospitality on such short notice this week. Reggie and Yvonne’s and Damon, Velma’s and Martha’s homes each had some level of sickness, so we needed a germ-free environment and they, Doug and Sandra, were gracious enough to put us up for the night. Thanks again guys, and the meal was great! Also we offer our prayers to Damon’s Brother Ricky, Doug’s nephew Willie and our friend Pat, (that we used to work with) as they are going through some serious health issues of their own. I would ask that all of you who read this, ask God for His healing Grace for them as well. All of you friends and family have been so supportive to us through your prayers and thoughts, we want you to know that it means so much to us and we thank you for all you have done. Thanks also to Precious for the Vitamin Water and to Mom for the juice!
Pat is sleeping right now. It’s almost two in the afternoon. She woke up with a little nausea and so after half a cup of tea she decided to go back to bed. I am sitting here with Marley (yes he’s napping too), trying not to be too concerned about her little episode. That is most of my battle, trying not to fret over every little hiccup, cough, and hesitation and misspeak that she makes. Yes I realize my job is to be observant but hyper-vigilance is stressful beyond measure. I don’t want to miss something that could cause a big problem later. I have found over the course of the last 19, yes 19 months, watching and waiting is harder than all the other things I do physically. I would rather be doing nothing else though.
Pat’s last treatment went well, although she was a little dizzy when she stood up to leave. She is really glad she got the port implanted as it makes the treatment easier. No more 4-6 sticks trying to find the veins, both for the blood test the day before and for the infusion itself. She has made it through 3 treatments since the end of the year, with only a couple of minor problems. She developed a pain in her right leg near the hip joint similar to the one she had 6-8 months ago, but not nearly as severe and it seemed to get better after the infusion, so I attribute it to her not hydrating enough (since they pump her with saline while they give her the chemo, it seems to support my theory, but what do I know?). The other problem of course, was the nausea this morning; we’ll wait and see if that is anything. We decided to come straight back after treatment as Pat has wanted to do, and she slept most of the way. I was a little tired but through God’s help we made it home safely.
I sent out a new blog for New Year’s but I didn’t say that in the Email so most of you might have missed it. It included a picture of the mountains outside our front door. We had just had 4-6 inches of snow the night before and it stayed on the ground in the shade for more than two weeks. They finally worked on the street that washed out in front of our home, but I am not convinced that we aren’t going to have more problems the next time we get heavy rain. Oh well, the joys of rural living huh?
I don’t have much to say so …I guess I’ll end!
We love you all.
AC commented
Tell Marley to quit hamming up the photos. We know he can roll over. If he wants to impress us, have him drive you two to Pat’s treatments!
Nadirah Maát commented
You go Girl!!! I love you both!!!!
“B” “B” commented
Thanks for reading. Why not leave a comment or sign the guest book to the left of the blog? Pat would love to read to hear from you!!
Pat has started listening to our old music from before we moved to Nevada on our trips down to California. We had been listening to music loaded on the iPod but she now brings our CD cases and plays music she used to listen to when she worked at the park. I’ve noticed it has seemed to bring back “the old Pat”, so to speak. It’s kind of hard to explain but it seems that hearing the old music takes her back to before she started going through all this. I see her dancing in her seat as we roll down the road like she used to do whenever we were in the car. It is beautiful! I believe her spirit feels the way it did before all the surgery, the treatments, the medication and she just feels like her old self again. So thank you Paul Taylor, Kem, Sting, Euge Grove, Richard Elliot, George Benson, Pieces of a Dream, Maxwell and especially The Isleys. There are some special songs that she just lights up when she hears and my heart just soars to see that.
As far as her treatment goes, we had some challenges this trip. The blood draw nurse could not get the port to allow her to draw blood. It would flush but would not draw blood. They tried adjusting the depth of the needle, having Pat lay down, raise her arm and none of those things helped. Though it was painful for Pat, and disconcerting for the nurses, they decided to take the needle out and try inserting a new needle. Unfortunately, that did not solve the problem. So after much consternation Pat made the decision to go to the Lab to try to draw blood from her arm. Pat decided she would rather do that than to wait and get it done an hour before her treatment the next day. Luckily, (Thanks to God) they had a good lab tech downstairs, a 25 gauge needle, and a cooperative vein in Pat’s arm and they got it in one try. The lab tech was glad to see Pat and told her how good she looked and that she was happy that everything was going well. She was one of the few that worked with Pat before she got the port, so she knew all about Pat’s “adventures” at blood draw time.
Infusion Day: We were hoping that there wouldn’t be the same problem with the port the next day, but knowing the chemo treatment was “putting the chemical in” and not trying to take it out, we figured it would be OK. Still, we needed to let the infusion nurse know there had been a problem so if the port was malfunctioning it could be checked. The nurse said it could be that something had grown over the tip of the port tube so that when you forced liquid in, it would open but when you tried to draw out it would close over the tube like a one-way valve. She checked around the port and said everything looked fine and when she inserted the needle it flushed fine and then she drew back on it and success, the blood came out. She and Pat came to the conclusion that the blood draw nurse was using the WRONG size needle for the port. It’s a butterfly style needle but they come in two different lengths. The infusion room always uses the shorter length; the blood draw nurse had been using the longer style. The shorter one allows the base of the butterfly to come in contact with the surface of the port, which I believe leaves just enough space to allow the blood to flow into the needle, instead of the point of the needle being jammed against the inside of the tube. Anyway, everything seemed to go well, she finished her treatment without a hitch. When they completed her infusion, they gave her a proper sized needle to take with us to the blood draw next time, one less hurdle to jump. Hopefully they can order some of those if they don’t have them, for the future.
Some of you know that I raise koi. For those of you who don’t, they are those large, colorful carp-like fish you see in Japanese garden ponds. I have had them for almost 15 years now and I usually get them, (when I buy new ones) from a guy in Riverside. We have developed a friendship of sorts, so last year when I was there and I asked how his sons were, I found it strange when he said simply “Don’t ask”. I stopped by this trip to get some koi food and I found out he had lost his youngest son to a motorcycle accident at that time last year. The two of them had restored an old Harley the dad used to ride and the son had taken a corner too fast and crashed. This is the second son of a friend we have had this happen to in the last year. The father said “I designed the bike to go 50, but he was always coming home telling me how fast he had gotten it to go, he was just hell-bent on destruction”. My wife and I are just devastated as he was a really good kid, we will miss him. 
Floyd, Terry, Robert
Shiloh commented; Always thinking of you! Hugs and lots of kisses and prayers!
Owner replies; Thank you so much, and I hope all is going well with your new endeavor.
AC commented; Try to “visualize” a world without music. I can’t!
Owner replies; Simply…Absolutely not!
patandfloyd 