Crazy Time.....

Taking a nap
Up to no good
Snip Snip LOL LOL
Proud of their work
HOLY CRAP!!!














Well well well...a lot happened these past few weeks.

1st, Stacy came up from Texas to stay with me for the week of the 6th because Hubby couldn't make it home this time. Thank you Stacy!!! You'll never know how much that meant to me and how much you were needed. Thank you Thank you! We went to PF Changs, our favorite Chinese place and then did some silly things with finger puppets (as you can see from above pictures).

Then I had the port-a-cath inserted the 8th...xrays were taken before leaving the surgery room and again before discharge from Same Day Surgery. Later that day I suddenly got bad chest pains and shortness of breath....Stacy called the Same Day Surgery people and they said "ice the site and double the pain pills...it's the trauma of the surgery". So I did that, but could not lie down, so slept in the recliner. The next day was somewhat better, so went to chemo, the 9th, and then went home and dealt with the after effects of all this and still had to sleep sitting up. No pain but tired...oh so tired....The following day, the 10th, went back for the Neulasta shot and mentioned to the nurse there, the symptoms I was having and she said that it was probably due to the surgery and the build up of the chemo. OK... went home and slept propped up on many pillows. No one seemed concerned or thought to get an xray. I didn't know or think of it either.

My friend Stacy left Saturday morning. She took such good care of me. I missed her as soon as she left, but was looking forward to Hubby's return that afternoon so that he and I could fly to California together on Sunday. His work is there and he had been coming home before every treatment and staying until I was feeling better. Too hard on him....his work was very gracious to let him do this but his mind was here and there...it needs to only be there...after all, he has to make the donuts.

Saturday evening we decided to postpone the trip a few days so Hubby got online to the Airlines to push out the ticket dates but the site said it wanted $1200.00 per persoon to push out the dates 2 days! Normally that amount was only $100.00 so he called the airlines office and Yup, they said the same thing...$1200.00 per person. Forget that! We started packing my clothes....not much, just a few things.
We left Sunday morning at 6 am....went to the airport checked in and went to the gate. Took it slow...not to bad...just tired fast and unable to take deep breaths. Was glad the gate was close to the security area. Phew! Flew into San Jose and then drove to Bakersfield to our hotel. We went to bed and I had to sleep sitting up leaning over into 5 pillows....by this time I knew something was wrong...

So we decided to go to the Cancer Center first thing in the morning.... @ 8 am we did and they xrayed me....I had a collapsed right lung all probablity started the evening of the 8th after the insertion of the port-a-cath (one of the things that can happen), with the chest pain and shortness of breath....a pneumothorax. They told us to go to Hospital (11:00a.m.) and was finally admitted to the floor (rm 5258B) by midnite with a chest tube in place. I was breathing easier but it hurt like heck with spasms. The next morning they sent me down to xray for a "pic-line" (like an IV inserted semi-permanently into the upper arm because no one knew how to access the port) so that my IV's wouldn't keep infiltrating. It was a good thing. They inserted my pain meds and drew my blood specimens all at one site. Very good.

I was in isolation from Tuesday to Friday in room 5216 because my blood counts were down. They came up Friday evening so on Saturday I finally got to walk the hallway and eventually the chest tube and pic-line were taken out and they discharged me around 7:30pm. FREEDOM! I practically ran out of there.... I was going nuts in there...they call it "hospitalitis"....people go through a mulititude of emotions during that time. I never want to experience that again.

Anyway, I am much better now...in fact I went to the hotel gym and walked for 20 minutes on the treadmill and 10 minutes on the bike....slowly, yes, but I did it. I feel so good. Breathing... I won't take that for granted again. Boy oh boy...each breath is a gift. It's amazing how much of our own "life" we take for granted. Being able to walk, talk, think, and breathe. Thank you LORD.