A Funny Thing Happened…

Posted: December 5, 2010 | Author: | Filed under: breast cancer, drugs, infection | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

I was at Walgreens (again) to pick up (yet another) prescription, and had one of the best belly-laughs I’ve had in a while. Thank heavens Macy was with me, or I might have embarrassed myself, and the pharmacist, even more.

To set the scene: I go to Walgreens a lot. They know me there, kind of like how it was for Norm on Cheers, but without the drinks and witty repartee. I have lots of prescriptions, all of which are on a slightly different schedule, so that I can’t ever manage to go pick up a month’s worth of all my drugs but instead make multiple trips every month.

Usually, there’s either a grandfatherly pharmacist or a host of young female techs. This visit, though, I found a sweet young male tech behind the register, and another sweet young male pharmacist. While these two fellas were plenty easy on the eyes and seemed competent at their jobs, I do prefer the grandfatherly pharmacist because he always calls me “miss” instead of “ma’am.” I know, it’s a farce, and I know I’m way more “ma’am” than “miss” at this stage of the game, but I like it anyway.

The young whippersnappers both referred to me as ma’am, but I’m not going to hold that against them. The young tech went to get my order, and the young pharmacist butted in to ask if I had any questions about my meds. I thanked him but said no, I’m a frequent flyer here, quite the pro at taking these drugs. He couldn’t just leave it at that, he had to be extra thorough and read the warning labels on one of the drugs, either one of my antibiotics (yes, I’m STILL on them both) or my iron supplement, I’m not sure which.

So he looked at the label and asked me, in all seriousness, if I might be pregnant or am breastfeeding. I can’t decide which scenario is most amusing: pregnant me, in all my forced-menopause hot-flashing, hormonalness; or the idea of breastfeeding with no um, breasts. Those poor sweet young men behind the counter didn’t know and can’t be blamed. And I’m pretty sure both were quite horrified when I told them, in no uncertain terms, that both scenarios are quite impossible for me and that any baby relying on me for breastfeeding would be utterly starved to pieces.

We had a good hee-haw about it, and the tech said something about the fact that I look young for a cancer patient. Shows how much he knows: there’s no mean demographic for cancer. The pharmacist said, any age is too young to be a cancer patient. And how.

It’s just rice

Posted: November 6, 2010 | Author: | Filed under: breast cancer, drugs, infection | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Most people probably spend the extra hour we gain in Daylight Savings by sleeping. I usually use that extra hour to clean, as something around here always needs cleaning. This time, however, I’m going to spend the extra hour reflecting on my good health.

It’s a tenuous state. And after my little scare this week, I’m planning to savor it even more. In case you missed the update, I had some fluid on my right side that Dr S wanted to drain so he made yet another hole in my chest wall on Tuesday. All week the gunk that drained out of the latest hole was pretty nasty looking, and infection was on everyone’s mind.

Friday I saw the newest member of my infectious disease team, Dr Samo. I wanted him to see the gunk and tell me unequivocally that I had nothing to worry about. As much as I try to live by the “don’t borrow trouble” mantra (thank you very much, Amy Hoover), this gunk was worrisome.

As I drove into the Medical Center Friday morning, I was mentally reviewing the all-too-familiar list of things to pack for a hospital stay, just in case. I even wondered if I should pack a bag, since I had no idea what to expect from this doctor visit. Imagine my relief when Dr Samo was universally unimpressed with my gunk. I’m really glad. He said he agrees with Dr S, that we’re not looking at infection but simply some unhealthy tissue that’s not getting enough blood supply and dying a slow, gunky death. That kinda creeps me out, to think of decaying stuff on the inside, but compared to infection it’s positively lovely. Big sigh of relief.

There was some great comic relief in the waiting room of Dr Samo’s office. An elderly lady was waiting with her daughter, and both were pure country. They talked r-e-a-l slowly and with a heavy twang. No idea what they were there for, but they had a hilarious conversation that was too funny to not overhear. Mama said to daughter (very s-l-o-w-l-y), Next time you go to the store, I want you to bring home an orange. After a very long pause, daughter asked why, and mama said, to eat of course. Daughter chose to dredge up some ancient history by mentioning the apples she brought home from the store that mama never ate. Mama knew she was busted, and deftly changed the subject to someone named Timothy, who apparently isn’t much into fruits & vegetables, but according to mama, eats more than you think. She went on to say that when you think about it, Timothy eats salad (r-e-a-l g-o-o-d), and will eat peas, corn, potatoes, baked beans and rice. Daughter let the baked beans go, but pointed out that rice isn’t a fruit or vegetable. Mama said, well sure it is; if not a fruit or a veg, what is it? Daughter said, It’s just rice.

So there you have it folks, at the end of the day, it’s just rice.

supplies

Posted: November 3, 2010 | Author: | Filed under: breast cancer, cancer fatigue, drugs, infection | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

I was just wondering what I could blog about, since it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything. Now that my life is more or less back to normal, there’s just not as much fodder for posts. This is a good thing, because it means my health isn’t full of breaking-news updates, but a bad thing because I really like writing and many of you kind souls have said you really like reading my posts. So I was pondering this while doing something seemingly insignificant but actually quite momentous over the weekend. I put away all my medical supplies.

There’s been quite a collection on my bathroom counter since August. Way back in late July & early August, while I had home health care for the IV antibiotics, I amassed a huge pile of supplies. Everything from wound vac stuff (remember Sucky?) to heparin flushes to alcohol wipes to gauze pads. And a bunch of other stuff in between. I hated every piece of medical paraphernalia from the moment it entered my home. I know I should be grateful for it all, and for the comprehensive health insurance that paid for everything. And I am. I truly am grateful, and think a lot about how much more stressful this whole mess would be without insurance. But I still hated all the supplies.

I hated the supplies because they reminded me, in a very tangible way, of how perilous my health was. No one ever talked out loud about how dangerous this infection business really is, but you’d have to be be pretty dense to not get it. I certainly didn’t need a reminder to know that my situation was serious — I lived it every second of every day. Even now, 2-plus months after all that mess, it still scares me, just a little bit. I still look over my shoulder and don’t entirely trust the good health I’ve been enjoying lately.

So this weekend I got cocky and decided it was time to pack away the supplies. I no longer needed the saline and gauze to clean a wound, or the antimicrobial silver dressing to put inside the wound, or the antibiotic cream and tape. My skin can finally breathe now that it’s not encased in plastic dressing and tape. I’ve been lax in taking my temperature every day, and only do it every other day. I still have the syringes and teeny little vials of B12 liquid that gets injected in my arm once a month. And I still have a stash of pain pills, which I don’t need but I like knowing they’re around, just in case. But for the last several weeks, I haven’t needed to get into those supplies.

Once that nasty wound finally healed, there was little need for the plethora of stuff, but I was so used to having it on my bathroom counter, it all really seemed to belong there. It became a fixture, I suppose. Until this weekend. When I got cocky, again. Last time I got cocky, I decided I didn’t need the probiotic anymore, even though I’m still on two antibiotics twice a day. That lasted exactly 2 days. But several weeks had passed without incident, so I guess I got bold and decided it was time for the supplies to go.

Silly, silly girl. When will I ever learn? I’d been feeling not quite right for the last several days. Nothing I can really pinpoint, but something seemed off. So when I saw Dr S today he immediately noticed a reddish-purpleish spot on my right side that seemed pretty puffy. I think his exact words were, What the hell is that??? Never a good sign. So he poked around for several tense minutes and sure enough that spot felt different than the surrounding tissue. He squished it pretty good and said there’s fluid in there.

I won’t repeat the litany of curse words that went through my head at that exact moment, but suffice to say it would make a former Marine or tattoo artist or school lunch lady proud. That was some professional cussing going on in my head. The quality of the cussing almost distracted me from the inevitable: Dr S moved away from the exam table (which is like a second home to me) and headed for his supplies. He never says much but we’ve been down this road before, or as Payton’s speech teacher Ms. Pointer would say, this is not our first rodeo.

No, sadly, Dr S and I have been rodeoing together long enough that I know that when he heads for the supplies, he is going to come back with a sharp object in his hand and a very determined set to his jaw. He did not disappoint me.

He sliced me right open,  and sure enough the fluid came rushing out. Not as dramatic as the “black gold, Texas tea” segment on the opening scene of The Beverly Hillbillies but it did bring that little blast from the past to mind.

Long story short, we don’t know what’s going on. It’s probably nothing serious (repeat that phrase 1,000 times for good measure). He cultured it, so maybe we’ll know something by the end of this week. Or maybe not, because one thing I’ve learned in this long, rotten education is that you don’t always get an answer right away, and you don’t always get the answer you want. Fingers crossed that we’re not talking about an infection here. I shudder to think about the prospect of another infection, or a variation on the one I already had, especially since I’ve been on 2 oral antibiotics for something like 12 weeks. Yes, you read that right: 12 weeks. Nearly 100 days of twice-daily abx. If I’m not covered then I may just have to give up, tell the bacteria to come & get me. Have at it.

I’m not ready to start waving the white flag just yet. But I will get the supplies out of the bathroom closet and put them back on the counter, where they belong. At least for now.

Oh no, not again!

Posted: October 19, 2010 | Author: | Filed under: breast cancer, cancer fatigue, infection, tennis | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

So I have this little spot on the area formerly known as my right breast, which is now known as the right chest wall and was, over the summer, the site of a whole lot of activity. Things have been really calm lately, so I guess it was time for something to happen. This little spot popped up a week or so ago, about the time I started playing tennis again. Because I so enjoyed being back out on the court, and because I really needed to believe that I was finally out of the woods, I tried to ignore it. It wasn’t very big, it wasn’t all that red, and it only stuck out a little.

Well, if I’ve learned one thing from this whole mess, it’s that ignoring a spot in the hot zone doesn’t work. Never. No matter how hard you try. So once this little spot got a little bigger, a little redder, and stuck out a little more, I knew it was time to make the call.

I’ve gotten to know Dr S’s office manager, Marcie, and his nurse, Brenda, really well. Maybe too well. So when Marcie answered and I told her what was going on and I asked her if she wanted to ask him if he needed to see me, she said she wasn’t going to ask because we both know the answer. And yes, she does just lay it out there like that. Personally, I find it refreshing.

My  next check-up with the good doctor isn’t for another 3 weeks, and Marcie said there’s no way he’s going to wait that long to see you, so get yourself on in here. I tend to do what Marcie says. Dr S, not so much, but Marcie for sure.

When Brenda saw the little spot, she made that face. That “I skipped the poker face” lesson in nursing school. That face that makes me want to run screaming out of that building and never come back. So not only did she make the face, but she said he’s probably going to want to biopsy that. Commence running and screaming.

He wasn’t in that exam room five seconds before he hollered at Brenda to get him a syringe and a needle. I said, Wait — a syringe and a needle? Why both? What are you going to do? He looked me right in the eye and said, I don’t know, but I need a needle! A this point, it was too late to run screaming from the building, but I wanted to.

He poked the spot with the needle– more than once — and then used the syringe to try and collect something but nothing came out. The spot appears to be nice and harmless. Perfectly innocent. It’s probably scar tissue, so we’re just going to watch it. Keep an eye on it. See what happens.

Works for me. I’m thinking I’ll be out of there in time to get the cheap rate on the parking. Just wanted to ask him one question though, real quick as he’s out the door.

All I wanted to know was the name of the doctor in Miami who pioneered the technique that he’s thinking of using for my reconstruction. I’ve done a little research, but not much, and wanted to make sure I was headed in the right direction.

I have a lot of questions about this procedure, and it’s a big decision to make now that it’s not as simple as tissue expanders to implants. But I wasn’t going to ask the questions right then, because that’s a conversation for another time. I just wanted to know if I was on the right track in my fact-finding.

If you missed my post on Caring Bridge a while back about the “examine the fat” game I played with Dr S not once but twice, for two times the humiliation, you’re in luck because I’ll be dadgummed if he didn’t want to play it again. And as we all know, whatever Dr S wants, Dr S gets.

(If you want to read the original post, go to http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/nancyhicks/journal/2. I haven’t figured out how to add a link to this blog so if that doesn’t work, go to the old Caring Bridge blog and look at the journal entry for October 6th).

Why that man insists of tormenting me, I will never know. But I think he really enjoys it. Just as I’m wrapping my head around yet another change in the game plan, from TRAM-flap reconstruction to this new Brava technique of building new boobs out of fat that’s been relocated, he throws me another curve ball. Now he’s thinking that maybe the Brava technique isn’t the right option for me after all. Maybe we need to re-visit the TRAM-flap, which means he needs to pinch an inch and see how much building material I have.

I said uh-uh, no way, not again. We have done this twice and I’m still recovering from the humiliation. I’m not doing it again. He didn’t go so far as to say he doesn’t remember, but that’s my suspicion. I guess I should be flattered that my fat is so unremarkable as to render him striken with amnesia not once but twice, but I’m too wrapped up in being humiliated, again.

That man doesn’t take “no” for an answer. I said it repeatedly, and y’all know I’m no weenie when it comes to making myself heard. I told him politely then with some choice words that I wasn’t going to show him again. His response: Come on, it’s not like I’m a stranger.

THAT’S THE PROBLEM! Once you lose the “stranger” status with your doctor,  you move from clinical to personal, in a hurry. I know this man too well and have quite frankly been through enough already and really shouldn’t have to suffer yet another indignity.

However, knowing him as well as I do and having been through as much as I have with him, I know the fastest way to get through the unpleasantness is to just, well, get through the unpleasantness. And that’s how I found myself once again playing the “examine the fat” with Dr S.

And guess what? The result was exactly the same: He scrutinized my belly and said there’s probably enough to make a B-cup. But only on one side. I said, I know you think I’m really demanding, but I insist on having a matched set. We had previously discussed the idea of doing the TRAM-flap for one side, and using an implant on the other side, but I said then and said again that I don’t want to do that. Just seems like asking to be lopsided at some point down the road. He actually agreed with me, which scared me just a little.

So he seems to be leaning toward the TRAM-flap again, and away from the Brava technique. He gave me the website to research, I said, ok fine, we’ll talk about it later. And I thought I was out of there.

As I was checking out with Marcie, though, he called me into his office. It’s not quite like it was being called to the principal’s office as a kid, but a little disconcerting still. He’d pulled up the website and wanted to go over it right then & there. I didn’t even want to think about how many patients were waiting for him.

So we looked at a bunch of photos and I was quite underwhelmed with the results. Maybe it’s because I was perfectly satisfied with the set-up I had, pre-mastectomy. I’ve explained that to Dr S before: that while he does amazing work, and the majority of reconstruction patients whose photos I’ve seen look way better after than they did before, I was just fine where I was. So the “new boobs” as a prize for going through breast cancer, mastectomy and reconstruction isn’t a big draw for me. Excuse me for being underwhelmed.

As if I’m not confused enough at this point, he introduces yet another option: taking the muscle from my back, under the shoulder blades, and using that to build the new pair of goods. We looked at some photos of that, too, but I had one question: how would that affect my serve? Seems to me that slicing the muscle away from an area that is used to torque the body and generate force while serving the ball means bad things for one’s game.  I’m not going through life with a permanently wimpy serve. I’ve suffered enough.

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