Chapter11

Chapter 11

07/07/2008 Monday

It’s a new week and also another week done! I’m starting week 4! I get out of bed early as I need to be at the center by 9am. I ‘eat’ 2 cans of Boost, clean up look at my beard and decide I don’t need to shave yet another day! I shaved last Friday in preparation for the sendoff of PO1 David Cummings and I “should” have HAD to shave today but it’s getting a little thin to say the least of my actually good looking beard! That’s when I notice that my moustache is also looking a little thin, as I reach up and gently tug, a couple of the hairs break off in my hand! NO! NO! NO! But, yes, it’s starting. My eye brows do the same thing and now it’s official! I’ll let my ‘stache ride as long as I can as I’ve had one for most of my adult life and I think I look funny without one and it also helps to hide the fact I’m not wearing my teeth until I can wear them without being in pain. Oh well I’ll just look the part of a toothless ol coot!

Anyway I go down to get my blood test before I start chemo and after they pull the blood I go back and wait for Dr. Holden to get in to see me. I go through the usual poke and prod BP ect. and then he comes in and we talk for a few minutes and the nurse comes in and hands him the results of my blood tests. He decides that due to a low white blood count and the constipation I will not get my chemo today and he’s going to take me off of Cisplatin, and onto another one that won’t kill off the white blood cells as badly and should make the ringing in my ears stop. OH PLEASE! That has been making me nuts for the last 2 weeks! He also gives me 2 new scripts for constipation and to keep me going regularly. One of them is called Magnesium citrate and is found on the bottom shelf at Wal-Mart. This stuff is Lethal! Works in ½ to 6 hours! DO NOT LEAVE the house after taking, as both Dr Holden and the pharmacist told me! I’m done and head home after stopping at Wally world for my meds and sit around while waiting for my next treatment.
I go back to the center and I see Jennifer and we do our usual dance routine of BP weight and then Dr Kim comes in and we decide that I don’t get my shots and I did learn that if my cell count had gotten down to 1.0 instead of the 1.1 I had I wouldn’t even get my radiation treatment! Oh, well, and wait for my treatment and then head home to take my laxatives!

On another note the young couple who lives 2 doors down bought my Honda scooter so that is a house payment we don’t have to worry about! Now to find the money tree to pay everything else coming in!

Tuesday

That warning I was given by the Dr. Holden and the pharmacist was a good warning! In my case it took 6 hours and then I got NO sleep! But I’m clean inside! But, it won’t stop! I mean I don’t even want to walk outside as movement makes every thing go down hill and when it moves it doesn’t even want to stop at the end and wait for me! I think I’ll duct tape the trash can to my butt so I can do something! I wanted to go so badly and now I don’t! LOL But this makes me think of the movie Dumb and Dumber when Carey gives his buddy that “Turbo Lax”! That’s how I felt! But now that it’s worked it’s way through I feel so much better! This stuff comes in a glass bottle and it fizzes with a lemony taste! I bet if you wanted to play a joke on someone this stuff mixed with Rum just might be a goodie! I bet my Brother in law could come up with a use! LOL

I do get my treatment with out a shot today and my day is pretty much spent at home as I don’t want to chance a walk around the block just yet.

I will say that when I was done I walked back out to the lobby where we have a TV and listened to Homer Simpson for a minute waiting for the elevator to arrive and as I hear it coming I turn and Dr. Kim is standing there in the door way and I wave at him in goodbye and he doesn’t look to awfully happy and a lady I haven’t seen is standing there and she sees me wave and turns to look at who it was and as she sees Dr. Kim she harrumphs a little but would not return his wave. I let her enter the elevator before me and she pushes the 1st floor button and I tell her that’s what I need also so I can get out of here till tomorrow. She asked me if I was being treated for cancer and I reply “yes” and she tells me in a pissed off voice. “Well, my husband died eight months ago and Dr. Kim killed him with radiation poising and I needed to come in and talk to him about it and get it off my chest!” and the doors opened and she plowed her way off and out the back doors of the building she goes! I’m standing there flabbergasted with about a million things I wanted to say to her but I really don’t think she would have heard me and to tell the truth I know some of you have been around on old planet Earth and you know a “Bitch” when she’s being one. I know that if her husband was being treated he needed to be. I do know that Dr. Kim is a fantastic doctor. I do believe that if her husband died it was because he was like me and procrastinated like me about going to a doctor and he died from the effects of cancer and not radiation! Yes the radiation can kill you but the amounts we get would take a lot longer than a few weeks! I just hope she has a long talk with God first before she does anything else like a law suit! It costs enough in cancer treatments without having to worry about that cost being added!

Wednesday

I wake up to the incessant sound of Barbara’s razor! That is an irritating way to wake up! I go in and give her a hug and then do my wake up routine of no coffee but go out side to get the newspaper and a walk around the “castle” to see how my plants are doing and to get my blood flowing a little. I go in and “eat” 2 cans of Boost and take my meds and dress in my usual jeans and black T-shirt. I call Dr. Nelson about my problems with my feeding tube and the nurse has me come in at 1300 to see the Doc. I get there and I have the usual nurse deal of the BP and vitals and in walks Dr. Nelson the guy who put in my feeding tube. He looks and the first thing he does is loosens the holding peg up a tad which helped right off and then explains that this stuff coming out of my belly around the feeding tube is what is called Granuloma (and from the medical on line dictionary the following!{Histiocytic, inflammatory response to a foreign body. It consists of modified macrophages with multinucleated giant cells, in this case foreign-body giant cells (GIANT CELLS, FOREIGN-BODY), usually surrounded by lymphocytes.}) It looks like what it sounds like! Really it does as it has a small vein in it and actually looks like the stuff around the bone of a pork chop after you fry it in a pan! I’m sorry but that’s what it looks like! He tells me he can cauterize it and I ask if he’s going to deaden it and he kind of looks at me and says that he doesn’t have anything to deaden it with and I ask him if he has any Lidocaine and he says, no he doesn’t! OK then, lets get it over with and so what he uses is a long Q-tip with an acid on it and for some reason I didn’t think to ask what it was but I can tell you it BURNED! Like an SOB it burned! He managed to burn about half of the thing off before I told him that was enough and I’d come back when and if it started hurting again! He did tell the nurse to order a bottle of Lidocaine “for this poor man” when I came back! Yah, right I’ll be back! When hell freezes over and pigs fly! I think I can last a few more weeks of this! And to think there are morons out there who actually go in for branding instead of tattoos! Whoo Boy! Not this dummy!

Anyway, I head home and tell Barbara what happened and listened to her freak out about the no Lidocaine deal and laugh about it a bit and wait until it’s time to go for my radiation treatment!

It’s time and I head out in the pickup as it’s looked like rain all day! I get to the center and go on down and see Donna as she takes my vitals and calls Dr. Kim in. He looks in my mouth and tells me I have a yeast infection in there! WTF! I thought that was a woman thing and well guess what! It ain’t! Well it kind of is, but the same kind of environment so he writes me a scrip for an antibiotic and I will not be taking any more shots this week until my labs come in next Monday when I go for chemo. I wanted to ask him about yesterday but decided I really wasn’t any of my business and walked down to get dosed again and to kill off a few more blood cells!

All done I head over to Wal-Mart and I try to call my baby sister but she’s busy doing those things a baby sister does at work! I walk in and hand my script to the pharmacist and he tells me it’ll be about 45 minutes! Oh really and I go back and buy a birthday card for a friends daughter who just turned 1 today and an anniversary card for Barbara. I go back up to the front of the store and sit on the bench waiting for them to call me when the lady I’m sitting next to stands up and looks at the line waiting to pick up their meds and exclaims “what a line that is”! I lean forwards and WOW! The stupid thing had about 30 people in it and I look at her and tell her we’d better get in that thing before it takes on a life of it’s own! I ask the girl behind the counter how much longer it would be on my meds and she checks and they aren’t done yet! No problem they should be by the time I get back to this counter they could make them by hand! We take our places at the end of the line and the lady in front of me tells us she hasn’t moved in 5 minutes! OH REALLY! I pull out my trusty cell dial 411 and get Wal-Mart on the line and I ask the girl for the manager. Karen came on and I politely tell her” I’m standing in the line for the pharmacy, and I’m so far back that I’m looking out the front door of the store and that they really need some help there as I was told 45 minutes on my prescription getting filled and that was about 30 minutes ago” I also informed her “There is only 1 girl bagging the meds up and running the counter and would you kindly PLEASE get some help back there!” She tells me she’ll check it out and about 2 minutes later the lady behind me asked me if it was Karen who I talked to and as I turned I see her running back to the register! I was thanked by almost everyone in the line for making the call! Hell I thought it was POLICY to open another register when there were more than a certain number of people in line at a Wal-mart!
Anyway 1 hour and 10 minutes later I’m walking out of the store, on the phone with my baby sister who called me back and I tell her about my wonderful day! She’ll read it in here also and laugh again after a few “you have to be kidding me’s” on the phone!

I get home eat a few more cans of Equate or Equal or what ever and finish this days journal up.

Thursday

I wake to the sound of the phone ringing and it’s Kim from Dr. Kim’s office (I know it’s confusing!) and she tells me she has my letters I need for everyone in the world so I can try again for food stamps, SSN, disability, and anything else I can get my greedy little hands on from MY government like all these illegal’s can get just for not speaking English! I’m about ready to get some brown shoe polish and a Moe wig and go down with a silly employers SSN and look at the person on the other side of the counter and say “no abla engleeshit” and see how THAT will work! Maybe they’ll give me money that way! I’m about to get started on this triad again so I’ll divert my self!

After finishing with her, I start my routine and when I look in the mirror I can see I lost a lot more from my moustache! That just bakes my cake! I’m already in a bad mood due to thinking about all of those forms I have to fill out again and sitting in that stupid office on the square looking at all the people who CAN freakin work but are to lazy to! Me, sterilize every single one of them and then send them to the fields to pick fruit! At least they will be working! And these babies having babies and then applying for benefits? Here we go again! Make the Dads PARENTS help to pay for the little darling! Maybe they’ll try harder with the use a freakin condom you little moron! If you can’t afford a condom you damn sure can’t afford a baby! Want me to get started on those little sweeties in Boston who were in the news lately? No I didn’t think so!

Where was I? OH, my ‘stashe is looking poorly! I really don’t want to cut it off and Barb looks at me and says I really need to. I look again and it looks like an old Chinese guys, white, real wispy and with the handle bars all out like they are blowing in the wind! I bet I’m loosing some of them every time I get on the bike from being blown in the wind! At least those hairs are dying a good death! LOL. No I’ll leave it on till I look like a mangy dog and when I start scaring little kids or make convenience store clerks reach for the phone THEN I’ll cut it off!

I head in and get my treatment for today and later I head to a funeral home to stand on a flag line for an old Navy vet who passed away the other day. I’m going on the mission tomorrow to escort him to the new Missouri Veterans Cemetery.

I get home from the flag line and I fill up on some cans of something or other, play on the computer for a while and head to bed. Later, I head to the bathroom because of the acid reflux I’ve been experiencing at night when asleep. I hate waking up when asleep to run in and hug Johnny! But I think I might know what it is and why but I won’t know till tomorrow night to be certain.

Friday

I wake at 1030 and go check the weather and see that my son got home from his friends house. I ask him if he would like to go on the escort mission with me and he say’s he will. Great as I do enjoy spending time with him and these days for me every second is like a minute as I want to soak up as much of my “baby” as I can and give him all the time he wants!

The schedule says to assemble at the American Legion post 639 and then we will motorcade to the funeral home but that was changed about the time Jerry and I left the house as when we got there, there was not a single motorcycle to be seen! Jerry and I walk in and the lady behind the bar says they are all ready at the funeral home and would be coming back by here (the post) for a ‘drive by” where George was a member and then on the cemetery from there and we could join up then. Jerry and I walk around to the helicopters they had out front, a Cobra and a Huey and this is the first time my son has seen these up close. There was a “sail” from a sub there and as I’m looking at the number 661 I keep thinking I’ve seem this number some where before. It wasn’t until I walk up and look at the plaque that I KNEW I knew it from somewhere. My older brother Brad served on her back in the 70’s! It was the Sail from the USS Lapon. I had even gone on board her for a tour when I went to visit him at Norfolk Naval Base just before he mustered out of the navy and I enlisted in the Army. I can tell you one thing. They ate well in the nukes! I went through the mess line and it was better than any church buffet! I swear it was fantastic! I kind of wished I had gone Navy! Better than eating “C” Rats any day of the week!

Anyway the motorcade showed up and Jerry and I join up and we had a memorable ride to the cemetery and Jerry got to see his first Military Veteran funeral. I still think when this cancer treatment is over and I get back on my feet I want to buy a bugle so I can learn the 5 notes to Taps and join “Buglers Across America” as the electronic type is so sad to listen to! I believe that every Member of every service should have a real bugle playing Taps at their funeral!

We finish and Jerry and I head on back home and I drink my lunch and head down for today’s radiation treatment but I’m really not feeling that well as I think the hour I spent in the heat was a little much for me. I get there and go in and talk with Dr. Kim about my pain meds as they really aren’t up to the task and he knew I’d be asking him for something different and now I’m on something a little stronger than Tylenol 3!

I head out of his office and I see my “girlfriend” Laura and she’s not looking to well. I ask her if her chemo went ok yesterday and she says yes and also introduces me to her father. I ask her why she’s still here and she goes into her “blonde” routine (which she does really well for a college professor!) Oh, well like I broke the machine, like wow!” Oh yeah as one of the techs come out and tells us it’s going to be about 15 minutes or so before we can get going so I head up stairs to get a signal on my cell and call home. 30 minutes later we’re still waiting and they come in and ask the 3 of us waiting if we want to stay until they figure out what’s going on or we can leave. Well Laura and I decide to leave and I haven’t introduced myself to the new guy who is a LOT younger than me so I don’t know his name yet says he’ll go to his cousins house and swim and they can call him at work when it’s up.

I go get my script filled and head home. I’m not home about 30 minutes and the phone rings. Dr. Kim wants to know if I wanted to come back in and get my treatment. No, I tell him, lets just add it to my last week and he’s ok with that.

My evening is pretty good until about 11:30 when my stomach tells me to get to the bathroom on the double and I barely make it and wind up sitting there until 4:15 when I can finally and safely get off the darn toilet and get a shower!

I finally drag myself to bed and sleep until 12:30!

Saturday

I get out of bed and start on my usual mourning routine. I do meds first then a can of whatever and another med and another can or whatever, this time a can of chocolate, a treat, if I could taste anything! I finish up with brushing my mouth with my baking soda wash. I can’t do salt for a while as it has been burning me to much but the baking soda will help to cut the film growing in my mouth and help kill this silly yeast infection! I’m done and then it all comes back up so fast that the sink is the closest thing there and what the heck it’s all liquid anyway and I’m the freaking Plummer of the house when home so use the stupid thing! I did and wished I hadn’t done the chocolate equate. To much caffeine and that’s it. There are a few cans and I’ll take the rest down to the center so someone else can use them.

I still have to wait for the next time I can do my pain meds as I’m not going to risk doing an overage on the dose and the laxative, well it CAN wait also after last night!

Barb, Jerry and I go down to Hobby Lobby and get a few things for me so I can work on an idea I have with this stupid feeding tube to get it out of the way. We also stop and get a card for a friend of Jerry’s birthday party and take him on over to his friends house. Wow we actually have the house to ourselves! I go out side to work on the gardens and she does a little house cleaning! Yeah, Cancer is such a PAIN IN THE ASS! Can’t do anything so why even try! ROFL!

I’m now working on this idea wishing I had a sewing machine but knowing I’d still screw up trying to use it but I can do this with a needle and thread!