Victory Tour CelebrationVictory Tour Celebration is my current working title for my next few months. Doug and I have talked about the Tour when he visited me in the hospital. He thought it was a good idea.
I began the Tour when I arrived at the City of Hope National Cancer Institute on September 2nd for the liver resection. The operation was scheduled to start around 2:00 PM and last four to five hours.
We had a minor complication from the start. My operation required the use of the largest of the six operating rooms. It may seem odd to some that the City of Hope only has six operating rooms. It is a small hospital that is primarily a world class cancer research facility.
By way of comparison, Harbor UCLA Medical Center where I go for my once every three weeks visit is a major regional trauma center. It is in the process of adding a new surgical wing that will have twenty operating rooms.
Doug and I are used to operating room delays. It happened before in January, 2010 when my colon was reconnected.
Around 3:00 PM, the nurses in the pre-operation area started telling us the delay would only last another thirty minutes or so. By 5:30, Dr Joseph Kim, my surgeon, was looking very glum and unhappy.
I tried to make some jokes out of the delays. I told the nurses the delay wasn’t bothering me; I didn’t have anything else to do that day. Besides, I needed the experience so I would have something to tell my students when they asked me what I did over the quarter break.
Finally, the operation went off. It was shorter than originally planned. I can’t say for certain if that was true or not since I was asleep at the time.
Dr. Kim pronounced the operation a complete success. I have a very manly twelve inch long scar to prove I had an operation.
I’m not certain when I was moved from the recovery room to ICU. I just woke up in ICU on Saturday morning. I was beginning to feel like a gypsy when I was moved to a regular room that afternoon.
Dr. Kim came by to check in on me. We talked about the procedure and the results. He removed a portion of my liver that had the famous, two unchanging sized lesions. He found a third lesion.
Nice.
Dr. Kim described the operation as being similar to taking a divot when making a chip shot in golf.
Personally, I’ve always favored the hand mashie or the always reliable foot niblack.
The operation, in terms of the cancerous lesions was a complete success. Dr. Kim went on to say that I now have an early Stage A form of cirrhosis of the liver. The disease was in the early stages so we caught it early. Since it appeared to be a new growth, he believes the chemotherapy was the primary cause.
I would tend to agree with him. Chemotherapy is, by its very nature, a very toxic drug; it is designed to destroy cells. I have been in chemotherapy for almost four years. Since I am going off chemotherapy now, the cirrhosis should develop at a slower rate since the primary cause has been removed.
This also means that my fraternity brothers are not responsible for the cirrhosis. We did tend to drink heavily when I was an undergraduate at the University of Utah.
My life quickly settled into a routine. Every four hours, it was time for vital signs testing and blood sugar tests.
My routine reminded me of serving on the good ships
USS Perkins,
USS Leonard F. Mason, and
USS Lucid. It was like being woken every four hours for the midwatch but with no “mid rats” to help you along.
I never realized how important passing gas is until my stay in the hospital.
Passing gas would mean my intestines and colon were functioning normally. A functioning digestive system was a prerequisite to solid food.
Finally, on Monday morning, I achieved a modest gas passage. That meant I could graduate from IV food to hot flavored water [broth]. Some milestones in life are seemingly inconsequential when viewed out of their proper context.
I’ve never thought of broth as being a proper breakfast food. It isn’t; I tried to give the broth a fair chance. I couldn’t take more than a few swallows and turned to chilled apple juice.
Dr. Kim came by when Doug was visiting me on Tuesday. The big discussion was when to release me. Dr. Kim would have released me on Wednesday. I asked for one more day in the hospital and a Thursday morning release.
No problems; it was Thursday for a release.
The big event for Tuesday was an ultrasound examination of my liver. The purpose was to check on the liver and make certain there were no problems. Fine with me.
Regrettably, no one bothered to share the play book with the ultrasound technician. It was the worst experience ever in a hospital for me. The technician was an Asian American young woman who frankly seemed put off at me showing up late in the day for the test. I almost felt if I should have apologized for being there at 4:30 PM.
I could have come in earlier; it wasn’t like I busy or anything or stuck in traffic.
She had reviewed a CT scan from August. That was nice of her. The scan very clearly showed lesions in my liver. She was obsessed with finding them with her ultrasound transducer. She pressed much harder and deeper than I thought was reasonable or necessary while she tried in vain to find the now nonexistent lesions.
The technician called one of the other technicians to help her find the phantom lesions. This was the only smart act of the session for her.
The second technician saw a large scar over my liver complete with staples. This clearly indicated a recent operation. The second technician thoughtfully asked what I was in the hospital for.
“Liver resection; Dr. Kim removed part of my liver that contained three lesions a day or so ago.”
“Oh.” The two technicians spoke out of my hearing.
The first technician was upset, perhaps even more upset, because she looked like an idiot in my eyes and always will be. She then proceeded to poke and prod me as if she was trying to find some mistake that Dr. Kim might have made.
There were no mistakes.
She had me roll on to my right side, putting my weight on my operated on liver and increasing my pain and discomfort significantly as she searched across my body. This was a lost exercise since the ultrasound wasn’t powerful enough to take a clear image.
Had the technician invested a brief moment of her time and even tried acting like she was pleased to see me, she could have avoided putting me through so much pain. It is true that I am not a medical professional. I am still intelligent and I was aware of what had happened in the operating room.
I could have told her there were no more lesions to find.
I learned a bit about sonar systems during my misspent youth in the United States Navy. I was responsible for the sonar system on the good ship
Lucid. I know how much power you need for a clear image.
Anyway, the torture over; I returned to my room for dinner.
Dinner was an upgrade to unclear liquids. I had a bowl of cream of potato soup, iced tea, and a scoop of chocolate ice cream.
My friend Sharon came by to see me after her left her job. It was nice of Sharon to stop by. We talked for about half an hour, maybe a bit more. It was one of our usual pattern conversations. Sharon is a breast cancer survivor. A good part of our talk was about questions to problems at her job.
I don’t think too much of Sharon’s boss.
I doubt her boss could lead a pack of hungry wolves to a side of beef.
Wednesday was a quiet day aside from the once every four hours for tests. I was up and walking around on the floor.
I decided to splurge on food. I was upgrade to regular food. I had a cheeseburger and fries with iced tea and chocolate ice cream. It tasted very good.
Thursday I left the hospital. Doug picked me up and drove me home. I sort of blobbed around on Thursday. I didn’t do much of anything except check my email; I had over 190 emails, and rest, nap, and sleep.
Friday Doug and I ran some errands. I drove the MINI and logged two and a half hours of top down driving spread over several hours. I was great to get out and sit behind the wheel of the MINI.
We had lunch at my local The Counter Grill. I had a buy one – get one free coupon. Perfect. I did exercise restraint and skipped dessert. I am eating a bit healthier now. One of the stops was the Wal-Mart pharmacy to drop my Vicodin prescription that Dr. Oxner wrote out for me. I got around to picking it up on Tuesday.
I mostly rested over the weekend and got ready for school on Monday. I watched Utah play USC in football. It was depressing because I thought the Utah coaches’ play calling had all of the inspiration of a bowl of three day old mashed potatos.
Skipping ahead to this Wednesday, I went back to the City of Hope for a checkup and staple removal. Staple removal, I’ve been told, is painful. I never experienced that aspect.
I asked Dr. Kim if he could give me a simple easy to understand explanation of my medical condition. He thought for a moment and said that I could say that I’m free of cancer.
“I’ve free of cancer.”
Life is very good for me.
Be well and stay happy.
