Goodness Gracious

My last real entry here was back in June 2009 after our anniversary. Shame on me. Y’all must have thought I didn’t love ya, or was in the grave.

Nope.

In fact, just two days ago my oncologist informed me my MRI was perfect. No changes since the end of my radiation and oral chemo in November of 2007. None. Zip. Nada. After two and a half years of MRIs every two months I have graduated to every three months. This really is huge to me. I had asked him if I could decrease the frequency last year, and he gave me reasons to stay on schedule which I agreed to. Finally he is feels he can loosen the reins a bit and my head won’t explode.

::fireworks::


In other news, remember the pink brace? It just wasn’t working out. I kept falling, and I couldn’t get up because the toe of the thing would not bend at all. I finally went to a different style of brace and could get up- no problem. But I kept falling.

In August I had a really bad fall.

The stupid nurse in me screamed for 45 minutes then calmed down, crawled to the couch and got up to call Bobby. Then I talked him into going to an urgent care center. They mis-diagnosed me, even though I vomited. We drove straight to our local hospital. The urgent care guy didn’t believe me when I told him my insurance company nurse said to do that.

Sheesh.

Cat Scan showed hematomas, I injured my right kidney and liver. The ER doctor calmly says “We don’t have the constant monitoring in case you need emergency surgery, so we’re sending you to Shock Trauma at University of Maryland by Ambulance. You can imagine our faces. I asked to go to Hopkins instead and they arranged that. After four days, and a brief stay in step down, I went home on good drugs. I told Bobby to never listen to me when I’m irrational again. As long as I didn’t move, I was pretty good on the drugs. Then I realized an amazing thing. My arms didn’t hurt. My arms and my sides and my face and my skin didn’t hurt. For nearly twenty years I knew I was dealing with chronic pain, and massages gave me some relief. I always said it was the absence of pain. But I never knew how much I had until I had the narcotics for the fall. After several weeks, I began to wean off the pain meds. It was a hard decision. No wonder there are addicts. The anticipation of the return of my pain was so depressing I cried. It hurt less, then only really bad when lying down, from pressure on my liver and kidney I guess. But the other pain came back as predicted. Then finally . . . back to yoga for pain control. And so I’m walking with two sticks now. It was hard to swallow, but the physical therapist was right. I’m much more stable and I haven’t fallen since.


Enough of that. We haven’t traveled much since the two big trips last year. We went to Rhinebeck New York for the fiber festival in the fall and recently to Philadelphia for the Flower show. Both trips were short but sweet. Bobby has a long weekend starting Friday and we may head to a NASCAR race in Virginia for another short getaway if the weather is good and the tickets suit us. Oh! Nah, never mind. I’m not going into the snowicane, I’m looking at the crocus and daffodils in my garden.
That’s the highlights. Sorry for the long absence here.

I’ll try to keep it alive better :-p