I almost died again and it was my last chemo today!!!

Guess what, I almost died again!  This is twice now I almost died since last August, first with cancer at stage 3b and now this.  On March 29^th I had some chest pains in my right side that felt like my ribs were broken or bruised but only when I breathed or twisted never when I actually touched them.  It turned out being a pulmonary embolism.

For those of you who have not heard of a pulmonary embolism, it is a blood clot that breaks loose from somewhere in the body and makes its way to your heart, brain or lungs.  If it stops in your heart it is a heart attack, your brain a stroke, your lungs a pulmonary embolism.  All three are deadly and on the same playing field.



Me in the ER demonstrating

how to use the bed side urinal.

It hurt most of the day and I still went shopping with Renée.  By the time we got home and put Liliana down for a nap I called my brother-in-law and asked him to take me to urgent care.  He has two kids and was able to throw them in his van and get to our house with a quicker response time then an ambulance.  We instead just had him stay and listen for Liliana if she woke up.  If he were to have come with me to the doctors they would ask our relation, and “partner” is just so much easier to say the “brother-in-law.”  Anyways we made it to urgent care and while in the waiting room I scared a teenage girl telling her that I was in there because I am fat and it was clogging my artery and was going to die on the spot.  I was checked out, got to keep an image of my chest x-ray and was sent to the ER.  We decided to go to the ER down were my Oncologist works so all my info would be in one internal network, easy for all doctors.

They hadn’t quit figured out what I had yet by this point but they had an idea.  Apparently when you go to a crowded ER and a doctor had already sent over your lab work ahead of you, and they think you my have an embolus in your lung, you get bumped right to the front of the line… yep I felt “SPECIAL.”  After more and more blood tests and a ct-scan it was confirmed, yep it is a pulmonary embolism in my lower right lung.  So I got to stay in the hospital for 4 an half days. 

While I was there all the staff was so awesome.  They even had all the rainbow sorbet I could eat, (side note) rainbow sorbet is my favorite sorbet.  But at one point my fever got to high for their liking at 99°F.  So I was put on a cold blanket.  I seriously think this was item was devised in some horrible dungeon with the purpose of torture.  It’s really a small mat that you lay on and is filled with water.  It is hooked up by a hose to a machine that almost freezes it.  How do I know it almost frizzes you ask?  Because I served my mission in a country that uses the metric system, just like this hospital.  I lay down on this cold mat and noticed that the temp was dropping fast and the numbers were in Celsius.  At the most miserable point, I saw that the machine said 3°C then dropped to 2°C.  It is 0°C that is equal to 32°F, which is where water turns into ice…  to my relief it went back to 3°C then 4°C after it 5°C I was hopeful it would finally end but the machine kicked on and dropped it back down to 4°C then 3°C.  I stopped watching after that.  Did I mention this was 2:30am? 

There were other times that I felt really scared and alone because I really have cancer and I really have a blood clot in my lung that can kill me.  I was scared at one point I wanted Renée and Liliana to be in the hospital with me before the doctor showed up so I would have their comfort just in case the doc said “well I checked everything out and your lymph nodes are still cancerous… sucks to be you.”  They came quickly and when the doctor showed up he said nothing of the sort.  I still missed my daughter so much I asked Renée to take some video of her at home and bring it to me the next day.  I even was able to pull up YOUTUBE on my room's TV and show my nurses my daughter.   Speaking of TV, I was on the Oncology floor because I am being treated for cancer, so the TV one they had in my room was hooked up.  Those rooms are meant for people who receive chemo for days on end every few weeks.  The TV had internet access and even a program with old style Atari games and serine video of mountains with native music behind it.  I took full advantage of it all and watched HULU.  I don’t want to state what shows I was introduced to because it would be very embracing… GCB.

getting chemo... and it sucks.

The great thing was that I got to get out of chemo that Friday.  It was suppose to be my second to last chemo but my Oncologist told me that they were just going to push everything back two weeks.  So that meant a whole month of recovery from chemo!  Two weeks prior to my hospital stay I had chemo, now two weeks after was the next one.  I tell you, it was great by the third and fourth week I started to feel a whole lot better.  It finally hit me how the chemo just keeps me down long enough to get a gulp of air the right when I think I’m about to break surface it pulls me down again.  But 4 weeks off not only did I get my head above water but I was able to swim a bit too.  I had that second to last chemo and it was like starting all over again.  Meaning it was like in the beginning, not as bad, but I did get the chemo hiccups again. 

On a side note, today I had my last chemo treatment and it went off without a hitch.  I only threw up twice in the bathroom at the infusion center.  This is a good thing because I usually can’t make it that far and end up using a trash can or a bucket that they provide.  They put me under so I would stay calm and not have wave after wave of nausea.  I’m obviously feeling excited that is my last one today because I normally would be a sleep all day but I was awake enough to write up this blog… and I was to go join my DND group that just started an hour ago… but I don’t think that would be a good idea.  The next step is to get another PET-scan and that will be in two weeks, this will tell if the chemo treatment has worked or not.  Two weeks after that my Oncologist will see how I’m doing and better have an idea of a day I can return to work.