Patty's epic adventure

  7/31/22 Today is Sunday. My oncologist called me this past week and told me to take my medication at night instead of in the morning, so I tried it for a few days and it seems to help. I’m not nearly as loopy as I was and not so tired. The pulmonologist said my lungs would heal between 3 and 9 weeks. Everyone is different. He wants me to have a lung scan the middle of September. I’ve never heard of those. He said it’s a nuclear test.  I see the podiatrist on Thursday and I am SO hoping I can walk out of there. I’m so glad I have good medical insurance. You cannot believe the charges I’ve incurred. It’s staggering.  David bought a lottery ticket, but y’all know we don’t live in Illinois.  And so ends another week without me becoming unexpectedly rich.  I believe I have finally lost my mind. If anyone finds it, don’t bother returning it. It wasn’t functioning properly anyway. 

  7/26/22 Today is Monday. I haven’t written for a quite a while. My grandson and his mama were here for 10 days, so we were busy. I still cannot put any weight on my right foot, so I am still on a scooter or in my wheelchair. I’m getting really, really tired of this. I go back to the podiatrist on August 4, so I hope to walk out of that appointment, instead of rolling. I started the new cancer drug last Monday, and I did fine  for several days. The past few days, however have been a challenge. The medicine makes me loopy couple of hours after I take it, and my vision is blurry. It lasts for a good portion of the day. Driving is out of the question, once again.  I have an appointment tomorrow afternoon at 1:30 with the pulmonologist. Wednesday morning I have my labs and an infusion at the oncologist. David will have to take me. I had a blood draw on July 6 while I was in the hospital. It was on my right forearm and it left quite a bruise. It’s still huge and I don’t know ...

  7/14/22 It’s Thursday. David took me to the podiatrist this morning for an 8:40 AM appointment. It started to storm not long after we left home, so I had to unload with my scooter in the rain. I got soaked. I looked, but I have not shrunk yet. Dang it. We got some big winds with this front moving through, and trees were down everywhere. Businesses were closed, because there was no power. Police officers were directing traffic, because the street lights had no power. Our power at home was out for nine hours. Good thing it was cooler today!  I didn’t get the news today that I had hoped for. I have to be on my scooter or my wheelchair for another three weeks. I cannot put any weight on my right foot. He did say, however, but I could take a few steps to the bathroom. So, now I can actually go to my guest bathroom and not have to wheel all the way across the house to mine. Neither my scooter, or my wheelchair, fit through that door. I have arthritis, and degenerative bone disease...

  7/13/22 It’s Wednesday and this is a pretty good day. I saw my oncologist this morning and David went with me. She had the results of all of my tests including the MRI of my foot I had done yesterday at 5 o’clock. No cancer shows up anywhere. None. I have something screwy in my foot and I’ll find out about that tomorrow morning when I go to the podiatrist. I am still on my scooter or my wheelchair. I have not put any weight on my right foot since July 4. The oncologist took me off my cancer medicine because it’s making me feel like I am drugged. We’re going to try something new in a few days, when my head clears up. I will not see her again for a month, instead of going every two weeks for bloodwork. My white count went down to 2.6, so that’s not good. It’ll come back now that I’m not on this medicine anymore.  She could see the blood clots in my lungs and showed me a picture of my lungs where it’s damaged. That’s why it’s a little hard to breathe. David got to see it, also....

  7/10/22 Today is Sunday. I’m sure of that because I got the funny papers today.  It’s a good day. David is working overtime, trying to fix things that have broken around the house, and trying to help me at the same time. We need rain so very badly and everything is dry and dying here. Some sprinkler heads broke, so he’s trying to fix those.  I’ve been sleeping most of the day and my heart rate dips down into the 30s quite often. I am very lethargic. I come back from making a bathroom run just huffing and puffing.  I reckon it’ll get better as the days pass. I have tests at the hospital tomorrow. All morning. They will last from 8 AM till noon, I think. I will have David drop me off and then pick me up again. There is no reason for him to sit there for four or five hours. We will have to leave home by 7:30 AM, at the latest. Bone scan, CT scan of chest, abdomen, and pelvis, then another bone scan. It’ll be fun. I just can’t wait to have another IV. They are such fun...

  7/9/22  It’s Saturday. I spent most of the day in my recliner. I tried my knee scooter for a little bit, but it made my hips hurt too much, so I went back to the wheelchair. I cannot get into the half bath with either the wheelchair, or the scooter, so this is unfortunate. I need to go to the back of the house when the urge arises. So, I have to climb out of the recliner, into the wheelchair, wheel myself all the way across the house, and then I get on my knee scooter to get through the carpet in the bedroom and make it through the bathroom door. This is very time-consuming, as you can imagine. One time today, I got 1/3 of the way to the bathroom and I yelled for David to come push me the rest of the way. I told him to run. It was a Kodak moment, for sure. I made it, but there was absolutely not a second to spare. This is a lot of fun. I get out of breath very easily and my cough is becoming extremely annoying.  But, I’m home, so nothing else matters. I need to start so...

  It’s Friday and I’m home! I haven’t been home long. I was discharged at 5:30 pm. Long day. I had to come home with a wheelchair, tho. They wouldn’t let me go without it. I have to stay in it until my next podiatrist appointment next Thursday.  The cardiologist is setting me up with another heart monitor because he wants more info. Apparently, my heart beats in clusters and doesn’t get a good solid beat to move things along when it needs to.  It skips around too much and it’s also dropping way too low. It went down into the low 30’s again and I got dizzy. My blood pressure is too low for him to prescribe the medicine I need, so I’m kind of stuck in a hard place.  My boot dislodged a portion of the clot, so I cannot wear it any more.  The clot is still there and I’m on blood thinners now. Xeralto, 20 mg.  I will be on it for a long time. I have to take it easy for awhile and hopefully my oncologist will be able to answer my questions next week. I still have...

 It’s still Thursday, but it’s three in the afternoon instead of 3 AM. I can’t figure out why my font won’t get bigger, and I’m getting frustrated. I cannot read this tiny stuff. Oh well. A lot has happened today but I don’t think I can get it in any kind of order so it’s going to be a pretty random post. One doctor wanted to release me today, but the last one said no. I got dizzy and almost passed out while laying down in bed. I called the nurse, but by the time she got here, I felt better. She took my pulse and it was 30. I don’t know what it was when I was dizzy, but it could not have been good. They called the cardiologist in and he wants me to wear another monitor. This one for the next two weeks. I have worn one before and they’re a pain in the butt. My heart is beating too fast at times and screwing up the works. I don’t know why. My right foot is swollen and now I’m not allowed to put any weight on it. They have my bed in a position like a chaise lounge, sort of, And I’m no...

  7/7/22 It’s Thursday now. I’m still in the hospital. I’m still on 4 L of oxygen and I’m still wearing a heart monitor. At least I’ve spaced out my pain medicine times, because the pain is letting up some. I’m talking into my iPad to make this post, but I have my glasses now and can read what I have written. Unfortunately that was not the case for the last post. I don’t know when I’m getting out, and my oncologist is on vacation this week. I know the doctor on call, though, and she is from the same office, so that’s nice. I have more blood clots in my right leg, so I will find out in a few hours what they’re going to do about them. I know, because I had an ultrasound of my legs today. I also had an echocardiogram heart. When I got here, I had a CAT scan of my lungs, but they didn’t tell me much. I was told that I had one embolism in the left lung and two in the right. However, I heard the nurses talking in the hallway at shift change, and my nurse told the new nurse that I had a w...

  Today is Tuesday, July 5. I’m going to warn everyone right now that this blog is going to be packed full of errors. I’m not going to do anything about any of them, so I hope you understand stand it OK. I haven’t written for a while, but a lot has happened. I’ve been wearing a boot every day. Dang there all day. Been pretty sore.   I’ve been going to physical therapy twice a week, and doing pretty well. David canceled my appointments this week for me, because I won’t be able to make either one of them. Courtney, Ryan, and Warren, all came in this weekend for the fourth. We had a wonderful visit. We finished laying our floor just in the nick of time. Last night, around 10 PM, I was sitting in my recliner when my chest begin to hurt. I thought maybe I had cracked a rib, but just a short while later another pain hit. Then another. I told David to get the car keys and please take me to the ER because I thought I had some pulmonary embolism‘s. Long story, short, I do. David stayed...