2018 can officially suck a bag of dicks.
Okay it hasn't been all bad but the past few months have been horrible. Early morning on the 21st, I stayed up late in order to flip back to nights with Shaun. I didn't have long until I had to get up and go to chemo so instead of taking a sleeping pill, I took a benzo. Those put me out for 4 hours, almost to the minute. Perfect. Then Shaun asks me which cat(s) are in the room with me. Just Noodle. He says River is meowing and he can't find her. I got up to help him look and we found her way back in the office inside a wooden crate originally intended for a place for the kitties to hang out in while we were in there but they never used it, so it was odd to see her in there. As I approached her she didn't move but just started meowing like crazy. Not like "Oh hi Mom!" but "Something is wrong. I'm scared. Help me!" I was actually a little nervous to pet her because I've seen her when she's in pain and scared at the same time and she kind of loses her mind. She didn't bite or hiss though. She just kept meowing while I petted her and talked to her. It dawned on me that perhaps the problem was that she couldn't actually get up and walk.
I pulled her from the crate and her back legs were totally flaccid. The second she got near the rug she started trying to drag herself using her front paws alone, to hide. I couldn't find any indication that anything was wrong with her spine. I had no clue what was happening or how she even got in that crate since it has a good 5" clearing to crawl inside. That's a question I doubt I'll ever get an answer to.
Shaun was freaking out and I had to ask him to try to remain calm since kitties are so sensitive to our emotions. I knew she was scared and didn't want to make things worse. I calmly talked to her, petted her and kissed her while Shaun started making phone calls. We found a 24 hour vet to take her to. She cried the entire time.
After telling the vet her history of her cough, he agreed with our suspected diagnosis of CHF and had a hunch about what was wrong with her. If it was what he thought it was, they would need only to take a blood sugar reading from a front leg and back leg. His hunch was right. Her front leg blood sugar was in the 500's. The back leg was in the 100's. He explained why that was but what it boiled down to was she had a blood clot that had formed in her aorta, blocking the flow to the lower half of her body. He explained that there were some things they could try that may work but they would be temporary solutions and most likely would not work. He said it would take daily meds to maintain, assuming it did work and that the problem would keep occurring.
This is the problem with a kitty like River. When I first spotted her at the rescue, she hated humans. Big red letters on her paper said "NEEDS SOCIALIZATION' or something to that effect. She was like a feral kitty. She loved other kitties but did not like humans. I wanted her anyway and was perfectly fine with just making sure she had every need met. They had to chase her all around the room, her hissing and growling and screeching the whole time. Her trust was hard won and it didn't take much to lose it, so things like vet trips and meds required us to chase her around the house until she was exhausted and terrified of us. It would set her back a lot in regards to trusting us and feeling safe. So instead, we would only take her to the vet when something was wrong and we'd opt for longer acting meds that cost more. It was better for everyone.
We asked the doc if she was in pain or just scared. He said she was definitely in pain. We opted to have her euthanized. I was so hoping the answer was some type of deficiency that could be fixed with an IV. Shaun feared the worst and he was right. We just wanted her to stop hurting.
Shaun cradled her head while I talked to her softly and pet and kissed her. She never stopped meowing until it was over. We talked to them about cremation and such but I remembered handing my dead son over to the coroner and not wanting to let go of him. I decided I didn't want to let go of River and wanted to take her home with us. We had to drive to another 24 hour place further into Austin to get the clay paw print thing that some places do. They didn't charge us for it. We were both a mess, bawling non stop. I just wanted to hold her as long as I could.
When we got her home I called Noodle over so he would understand that River was dead so he wouldn't just be wondering what happened to her. They got along pretty well when she was alive. I opened the bag a little and exposed some of her fur. He walked around the bag sniffing it and finally got to her fur. He buried his nose in her fur and really smelled her. I think he understood. Shaun insisted on digging the hole right away and didn't want any help with it. I picked the spot, under the tree with the hanging bird feeders, in front of the catio. He dug the hole and Noodle sat by her body the whole time and we all said our goodbyes to that sweet wild girl.
Last week she wanted so many pets and loves from us, she'd lay right between us on the bed and gently paw each of us to pet her. She went back and forth pawing each of us for more pets. She loved my kisses and would roll around and purr. She wasn't particularly outgoing. She did love her lovins but anytime she sensed she might be in a tight spot, she'd bolt. She hated being held or picked up and she got overwhelmed easily with too much stimulation, but we always loved her unconditionally and on her own terms. I do feel that she had a good life, even though it was only 7 years long. She was deeply embedded in both our hearts.
Shaun has taken this especially hard. Not only had he never had to have a pet euthanized but he felt a pretty deep soul connection with her. There's been some crying off and on, lots of talking about memories of her and general feelings of blah and sadness. He didn't want any holiday decor out anymore so we took it all down last night. I honestly didn't think that would help but he said it did so it was worth it. He said he never understood how people would be so depressed after their pet died but he gets it now. I guess he just never had that strong bond before. We have a digital picture frame that changes pics every few seconds and it's turned off. I don't know when it will be turned on again but right now he can't see pics of her without losing it.
I know things like this take time. We will get through it together.
Monday, December 24, 2018
Wednesday, December 19, 2018
Mastectomy and radiation
I'm here! I got really busy and then out of the habit of updating my blogger so I'm dong it now.
So I had my double mastectomy on November 12th. My mom flew down the day before. My surgery went really well and I was really surprised at how much of my tats were still there. Instead of cutting right through the middle of them, the doc went from the bottom. Now they just look like they could be partially submerged in water... if you visualize water under them. I might do something like that some day but at this time, I just don't feel like showing them anymore. I mean, she did a great job but mastectomies like this don't look good. It's not something that makes me feel better about my body so it's more like I just have to get used to my new body and let it go. For a few years of my life I loved my body. It was nice while it lasted and now it's gone. Moving on.
I had a drain tube in each side and the left side, the side that has never had cancer, hurt like hell. It felt like someone held a spatula to the stove and then pressed it to my chest. HORRIBLE. It was right up there with the level of pain I experienced with frozen shoulder. Nothing really helped with it much except getting the fucking thing out. I went to the doc's assistant several days later and it wasn't draining much so I asked her to take it out. She said she was worried about a seroma (fluid build up under the skin). Bitch, this is not my first rodeo. If I get a seroma then suck it out with a syringe later. Get this fucking thing out of me NOW. She took it out and gave a tsk tsk seeing a blood clot in the tubing. Don't care! That burning pain stopped immediately. Did I get a seroma? Yes... BUT, it didn't hurt. It looked like a tiny water bed. I press one spot, it makes waves over the another spot. It's pretty amusing to me to be honest. I didn't get the right side out that day but that side didn't hurt so whatevs. I wore a tight binder around my chest for another couple of weeks and it went away. Good bye fun little water bed!
While my mom was in town, I wanted to do some fun things so that was fun, trying to find ways to hide a drain bulb that had delicous red lymph juice. With pulp! Yum! We went to Fredricksburg because I've always wanted to see it during Xmas season. It's a cute little German town that is popular during the Xmas season. I didn't realize just HOW popular it was. There was absolutely nowhere to park. Shaun ended up dropping us off at an intersection and met up with us later. He ended up parking at the visitor's center. I've never seen a town's visitor center that busy before. There were some pretty neat things there from Germany though. They were all super expensive but it was still neat to see them. Maybe some day, when I'm rolling in dough, I'll invest in one of the cool German things. It was mostly useless nick nacks, ie clutter, so it's all good. We are kind of in poverty mode right now because of all the copays and me being off work for a few months.
Speaking of which, it took a month for my short term disability people to even give me an answer about if or when my disability would kick in. It was stressing me out. I mean if it's a no, then TELL ME already so I can get my ass back to work. I just barely found out a few days ago that they approved me until January 10th. That will probably be when I'm at my worst but I can always change it if I need to.
I have to say, my mastectomy surgery was WAY easier this time than when I got the DIEP Flap. I mean duh, it was way less cutting and moving things around but more than that, just driving home after surgery last time was absolute agony because boobs bounce and those little bounces hurt. Now I have the chest of a 12 year old boy and nothing bounces so it's way less painful. Also I did not miss having to sleep on my back without moving. It really sucks when you can't roll around. It hurts to stay in the same position all the time.
I'm also super thankful to my awesome cuz who sent me some edibles. While they didn't do a lot for the sharp pains, they do help with achiness, sleep and anxiety while my mother was here. That woman... Seriously, I thought about slipping her an edible just to get her to re-fucking-lax but I know that's not cool to do to someone and also I really didn't want to share them with her. She is such a busy body and cannot sit still. Also when she's up constantly running around, she's always had the expectation that every other able bodied person around should be busy at the same time. It's always been that way. Shaun was going through a pretty bad depression and was sleeping a lot. When he wasn't sleeping he spent a lot of time on his tablet. I personally did not like that he was doing this but I concentrated more on trying to find what could help him feel better and my mom was more focused on being judgy of him being lazy and disconnected. It was like seeing a slow train wreck happening so I did my best to intervene to make things go more smoothly because she still had a long time before she was leaving. I didn't want things to blow up like last time. She doesn't understand depression in people. She doesn't process things that way. When she's down it comes out as anxiety and keeping busy. That's how she copes. That's all she understands. Shaun did go to the doc and got some meds changed around that helped and all it took was that and me picking on him a bit. When I do that she always rushes to his defense, so things got better. Me taking the edibles and keeping her plied with wine helped get through those days. I did have to stop talking about news stories out loud, which was hard. It's just something I do when Shaun's home but doing it with my mom was only causing more tension. Her husband is a dump lover and she thinks my step-dad is just the most intelligent man in the world so he must be on to something. UGH. It just makes me want to puke. She did spend a large portion of her time obsessing over what was going on in her house over the Thanksgiving weekend. She spent hours looking through the security cams all over the house. It was making Shaun mad because she was giving off the vibe like she'd so much rather be there than with me but I wasn't butt hurt about it. I kinda wanted her to be there too. LOL! I saw a side of her that was pretty ugly but I think to her it was just normal behavior. I don't want to get into it really but let's just say it was rather interesting to see the other side when I'm used to being the recipient of that behavior. Yuck.
There was one funny part though. Well she didn't think it was funny but we were discussing my cuz and her mom who stayed with her until there was about to be bloodshed and she was moved into an apartment. My cuz has a dark sense of humor, which is partly what I love about her. She put up a tree for the holidays where her mom's pretty doves were hung but she also hung her own ornaments which consisted of bloody eyeballs and fake body parts. My mom was going off about this and how horrible it was and I could not stop laughing about it. I may have had an edible on board but that's beside the point. No matter how my mom phrased it to try to win me over to her side, I had to finally beg her to stop because I could not stop laughing! I still want to laugh about it. Then after she decorated my entire tree for me, I helped her hang my eyeball ornaments last of all. Ha!
We got through it in one piece and it ended on a good note with a hug and a huge sigh of relief when we pulled away from the airport.
The tube on my right side took longer to stop draining so I had to postpone my appointment with the radiologist. They wanted me to come in and get some initial things done to get me ready for radiation but they couldn't do it as long as I had a drain tube in. Finally I went and that was interesting. They put stickers on me with little X's drawn with markers. There were red laser lines showing on my chest and a regular light where they marked out the targeted areas. They put coordinates in the machine so it beams the precise strength in the precise areas. They had me lay on a type of bean bag. They positioned me in just the right way and then sucked the air out of the bag, making a mold of my body. Then every time I went in they would take the body mold out and I'd lay on it. I cannot feel when the radiation is going in. I just lay on a table and the machine moves around me and sometimes there's a long beep, which I think is when the actual radiation is going in. There's a really thick, heavy door to the room. It's like a vault door but without the wheels. Seriously, it's maybe 10" thick or something. Crazy. There are cameras all over the room... maybe around 10. They leave the room when the treatment begins so it's just in there with the robot machine. I happen to turn my head a certain way where I can see several computer screens. One section says "mid" a bunch of times and then the rest seems to be coordinates. Those numbers change as the arms of the machine move around me. Every Wednesday I have a quick check in with the doc and every other day they lay a big square slab of what seems like some type of sticky gelatin/rubbery thing. They said the radiation will normally go deeper than the skin and treat inside the body but because of where my tumor was, they also want to treat my skin so the square thing is laid on my chest and tricks the machine into thinking it's going past my skin when really it's just going past the "slab". That's what I call it. It goes past the slab and gets my skin.
I'm a week and a half into it so far, and I've had tiny glimpses of burning sensations but it goes away. My skin is just a little pink. The main area where the tumor was is totally numb to touch and pressure. It's also getting tougher there... like if you pressed on your skin and then moved your finger around, your skin is able to slide around a bit over your bones and muscles right? Mine doesn't there. It feels like a warm corpse in that spot. Very weird. Since I can't feel it, it's like feeling someone else's body. But hey, it doesn't hurt so yay!
I also saw that they had a bunch of cool body molds but for brain cancer. The people had to lay on their stomachs and put their face in a mold. The face molds were SO COOL! They said if someone doesn't want theirs when it's done, they will let me have their face mold. Fuck yes! I could do something cool with one of those! It's mesh like on a cast but just one layer so it has lots of breathability to it. I wish I could do those on my own but I'm sure it's some kind of pricey medical grade stuff. We'll see if I can get my hands on one.
So I have 5 more weeks of radiation, 5 days a week and each time it only takes maybe 10 minutes. It's real quick. Shaun went back to work a few days ago. He's on days this week and then he will assume his new position as captain on the night shift. I will probably at least partially flip with him when he does so we can spend some time together. It was really great getting to spend so much time with him. It was also nice to be on day shift hours during that time so we could get out and do things that normally we couldn't before, because most of it was right in the middle of our sleeping time.
We've gone to several Xmas type festivals. I did get some dill pickle popcorn which tore up my mouth from the acidity but totally worth it! Shaun got a hand-knitted Slytherin scarf he will cherish forever.
One last thing I'll briefly mention. My "bff" is no longer my friend. At this point in time, I'm not going to waste more precious energy on her talking much about it since I've pretty much wasted way too much on her already the past few years. Shaun and I hit our limit and I promised myself that I would never again spend a bunch of energy trying to make someone like/love me when they don't. No more excuses for her. Some relationships have an expiration date and this was one of those. I wish her all the best in her endeavors.
So I had my double mastectomy on November 12th. My mom flew down the day before. My surgery went really well and I was really surprised at how much of my tats were still there. Instead of cutting right through the middle of them, the doc went from the bottom. Now they just look like they could be partially submerged in water... if you visualize water under them. I might do something like that some day but at this time, I just don't feel like showing them anymore. I mean, she did a great job but mastectomies like this don't look good. It's not something that makes me feel better about my body so it's more like I just have to get used to my new body and let it go. For a few years of my life I loved my body. It was nice while it lasted and now it's gone. Moving on.
I had a drain tube in each side and the left side, the side that has never had cancer, hurt like hell. It felt like someone held a spatula to the stove and then pressed it to my chest. HORRIBLE. It was right up there with the level of pain I experienced with frozen shoulder. Nothing really helped with it much except getting the fucking thing out. I went to the doc's assistant several days later and it wasn't draining much so I asked her to take it out. She said she was worried about a seroma (fluid build up under the skin). Bitch, this is not my first rodeo. If I get a seroma then suck it out with a syringe later. Get this fucking thing out of me NOW. She took it out and gave a tsk tsk seeing a blood clot in the tubing. Don't care! That burning pain stopped immediately. Did I get a seroma? Yes... BUT, it didn't hurt. It looked like a tiny water bed. I press one spot, it makes waves over the another spot. It's pretty amusing to me to be honest. I didn't get the right side out that day but that side didn't hurt so whatevs. I wore a tight binder around my chest for another couple of weeks and it went away. Good bye fun little water bed!
While my mom was in town, I wanted to do some fun things so that was fun, trying to find ways to hide a drain bulb that had delicous red lymph juice. With pulp! Yum! We went to Fredricksburg because I've always wanted to see it during Xmas season. It's a cute little German town that is popular during the Xmas season. I didn't realize just HOW popular it was. There was absolutely nowhere to park. Shaun ended up dropping us off at an intersection and met up with us later. He ended up parking at the visitor's center. I've never seen a town's visitor center that busy before. There were some pretty neat things there from Germany though. They were all super expensive but it was still neat to see them. Maybe some day, when I'm rolling in dough, I'll invest in one of the cool German things. It was mostly useless nick nacks, ie clutter, so it's all good. We are kind of in poverty mode right now because of all the copays and me being off work for a few months.
Speaking of which, it took a month for my short term disability people to even give me an answer about if or when my disability would kick in. It was stressing me out. I mean if it's a no, then TELL ME already so I can get my ass back to work. I just barely found out a few days ago that they approved me until January 10th. That will probably be when I'm at my worst but I can always change it if I need to.
I have to say, my mastectomy surgery was WAY easier this time than when I got the DIEP Flap. I mean duh, it was way less cutting and moving things around but more than that, just driving home after surgery last time was absolute agony because boobs bounce and those little bounces hurt. Now I have the chest of a 12 year old boy and nothing bounces so it's way less painful. Also I did not miss having to sleep on my back without moving. It really sucks when you can't roll around. It hurts to stay in the same position all the time.
I'm also super thankful to my awesome cuz who sent me some edibles. While they didn't do a lot for the sharp pains, they do help with achiness, sleep and anxiety while my mother was here. That woman... Seriously, I thought about slipping her an edible just to get her to re-fucking-lax but I know that's not cool to do to someone and also I really didn't want to share them with her. She is such a busy body and cannot sit still. Also when she's up constantly running around, she's always had the expectation that every other able bodied person around should be busy at the same time. It's always been that way. Shaun was going through a pretty bad depression and was sleeping a lot. When he wasn't sleeping he spent a lot of time on his tablet. I personally did not like that he was doing this but I concentrated more on trying to find what could help him feel better and my mom was more focused on being judgy of him being lazy and disconnected. It was like seeing a slow train wreck happening so I did my best to intervene to make things go more smoothly because she still had a long time before she was leaving. I didn't want things to blow up like last time. She doesn't understand depression in people. She doesn't process things that way. When she's down it comes out as anxiety and keeping busy. That's how she copes. That's all she understands. Shaun did go to the doc and got some meds changed around that helped and all it took was that and me picking on him a bit. When I do that she always rushes to his defense, so things got better. Me taking the edibles and keeping her plied with wine helped get through those days. I did have to stop talking about news stories out loud, which was hard. It's just something I do when Shaun's home but doing it with my mom was only causing more tension. Her husband is a dump lover and she thinks my step-dad is just the most intelligent man in the world so he must be on to something. UGH. It just makes me want to puke. She did spend a large portion of her time obsessing over what was going on in her house over the Thanksgiving weekend. She spent hours looking through the security cams all over the house. It was making Shaun mad because she was giving off the vibe like she'd so much rather be there than with me but I wasn't butt hurt about it. I kinda wanted her to be there too. LOL! I saw a side of her that was pretty ugly but I think to her it was just normal behavior. I don't want to get into it really but let's just say it was rather interesting to see the other side when I'm used to being the recipient of that behavior. Yuck.
There was one funny part though. Well she didn't think it was funny but we were discussing my cuz and her mom who stayed with her until there was about to be bloodshed and she was moved into an apartment. My cuz has a dark sense of humor, which is partly what I love about her. She put up a tree for the holidays where her mom's pretty doves were hung but she also hung her own ornaments which consisted of bloody eyeballs and fake body parts. My mom was going off about this and how horrible it was and I could not stop laughing about it. I may have had an edible on board but that's beside the point. No matter how my mom phrased it to try to win me over to her side, I had to finally beg her to stop because I could not stop laughing! I still want to laugh about it. Then after she decorated my entire tree for me, I helped her hang my eyeball ornaments last of all. Ha!
We got through it in one piece and it ended on a good note with a hug and a huge sigh of relief when we pulled away from the airport.
The tube on my right side took longer to stop draining so I had to postpone my appointment with the radiologist. They wanted me to come in and get some initial things done to get me ready for radiation but they couldn't do it as long as I had a drain tube in. Finally I went and that was interesting. They put stickers on me with little X's drawn with markers. There were red laser lines showing on my chest and a regular light where they marked out the targeted areas. They put coordinates in the machine so it beams the precise strength in the precise areas. They had me lay on a type of bean bag. They positioned me in just the right way and then sucked the air out of the bag, making a mold of my body. Then every time I went in they would take the body mold out and I'd lay on it. I cannot feel when the radiation is going in. I just lay on a table and the machine moves around me and sometimes there's a long beep, which I think is when the actual radiation is going in. There's a really thick, heavy door to the room. It's like a vault door but without the wheels. Seriously, it's maybe 10" thick or something. Crazy. There are cameras all over the room... maybe around 10. They leave the room when the treatment begins so it's just in there with the robot machine. I happen to turn my head a certain way where I can see several computer screens. One section says "mid" a bunch of times and then the rest seems to be coordinates. Those numbers change as the arms of the machine move around me. Every Wednesday I have a quick check in with the doc and every other day they lay a big square slab of what seems like some type of sticky gelatin/rubbery thing. They said the radiation will normally go deeper than the skin and treat inside the body but because of where my tumor was, they also want to treat my skin so the square thing is laid on my chest and tricks the machine into thinking it's going past my skin when really it's just going past the "slab". That's what I call it. It goes past the slab and gets my skin.
I'm a week and a half into it so far, and I've had tiny glimpses of burning sensations but it goes away. My skin is just a little pink. The main area where the tumor was is totally numb to touch and pressure. It's also getting tougher there... like if you pressed on your skin and then moved your finger around, your skin is able to slide around a bit over your bones and muscles right? Mine doesn't there. It feels like a warm corpse in that spot. Very weird. Since I can't feel it, it's like feeling someone else's body. But hey, it doesn't hurt so yay!
I also saw that they had a bunch of cool body molds but for brain cancer. The people had to lay on their stomachs and put their face in a mold. The face molds were SO COOL! They said if someone doesn't want theirs when it's done, they will let me have their face mold. Fuck yes! I could do something cool with one of those! It's mesh like on a cast but just one layer so it has lots of breathability to it. I wish I could do those on my own but I'm sure it's some kind of pricey medical grade stuff. We'll see if I can get my hands on one.
So I have 5 more weeks of radiation, 5 days a week and each time it only takes maybe 10 minutes. It's real quick. Shaun went back to work a few days ago. He's on days this week and then he will assume his new position as captain on the night shift. I will probably at least partially flip with him when he does so we can spend some time together. It was really great getting to spend so much time with him. It was also nice to be on day shift hours during that time so we could get out and do things that normally we couldn't before, because most of it was right in the middle of our sleeping time.
We've gone to several Xmas type festivals. I did get some dill pickle popcorn which tore up my mouth from the acidity but totally worth it! Shaun got a hand-knitted Slytherin scarf he will cherish forever.
One last thing I'll briefly mention. My "bff" is no longer my friend. At this point in time, I'm not going to waste more precious energy on her talking much about it since I've pretty much wasted way too much on her already the past few years. Shaun and I hit our limit and I promised myself that I would never again spend a bunch of energy trying to make someone like/love me when they don't. No more excuses for her. Some relationships have an expiration date and this was one of those. I wish her all the best in her endeavors.
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