Patty's epic adventure

  6/26/23 It's Monday, but I don't have much to report.  I do have some good news:  I got my night guard from the dentist and I haven't had an earache in the past 5 days.  Cross your fingers.... I've been a tad under par this week.  Very tired.  I can sleep most of the day if the phone allows.  We had a storm blow through a few nights ago and the next day I spent 2-1/2 hours picking up fallen limbs out of the yard.  And, it was very hot.  I didn't want to take a break and cool off because I knew I'd never go back out.   David has been in Houston and came home last night.  He missed the power outage we had a few days ago.  That wasn't much fun in this heat, either. My infection seems to be clearing up a bit, but I just can't seem to totally get rid of it.  I'm too impatient, I reckon.  The pool was a disaster after that last storm, but I got it cleaned up pretty good.  It was 94 degrees, but dropped a couple ...

  6/14/23 Today is Wednesday. Yesterday I went to the dentist and he made an impression of my upper jaw and he’s going to build me a night guard. It will be ready for me to try on for size tomorrow afternoon. My jaw is not closing correctly, so we’re hoping this will fix my ear ache.  Cross your fingers. I got a note from a retina specialist in Dallas. She is a lady and would like to see me on June 28. Her office is 120 miles from me, but if she can fix my eye, it will be the best road trip I ever went on. My oncologist called in a prescription for me today to see if we can clear up an infection I have. Oh, boy, more drugs. I can hardly wait. I learned why she requested DNA from my tumor from MD Anderson. It’s for signature testing. It’s called CT DNA and it will test for circulating tumor DNA in my bloodstream. It measures molecular residual diseases.  So, there. I am so much smarter now.  And, you are, too! Do you know why it’s hard to be happy? It’s because someti...

  6/12/23 Today is Monday. I left home at 9 AM and got back to the house at 3:30 PM. I went from one appointment to another, to another, etc. My first appointment was the dentist. I haven’t had my teeth cleaned for 2 1/2 years, but since I’ve been off blood thinners for a week now, my oncologist said it was safe. I was supposed to tell them to be very careful and try and not make me bleed. Well, I bled like a stuffed pig anyway, so, cross your fingers for no infections.  He said my teeth looked absolutely wonderful, so that was very good news. He took x-rays and there was a little problem with my right jaw. I told him the reason I came in, was to see if he could discover something that could be causing my earache. I told him I’ve had it for five months, and I had a brain MRI and the ENT guy was stumped.  My job isn’t closing evenly, so my old TMJ issues might be the cause. He’s going to try a night guard for me and see if that helps. I told him I do not have dental insura...

  6/7/23 My left eye is better, but my right eye is not. It is so discouraging. I go back to the ophthalmologist on Monday. Driving at night is now impossible. I canceled my back procedure today. I’m not going to do it anymore. It’s a long story but I’m not going through all of that again to have the same results I had10 years ago. I got the results of my sleep study yesterday. Apparently, I stopped breathing an average of 15 times every hour. Each of those sessions averaged 22 seconds. That’s not good for my heart issues, among other things. So, they have ordered me a CPAP machine. I will give it a try. I saw my oncologist on Monday, and she answered a lot of questions. First, and for most, she took me off my blood thinner. I am very grateful for that. She saw the bruises on my torso that were caused by my pressure suit for my lymphedema. I told her the suit was hurting me. She told me to stop wearing it. My red and white counts, both, are still low, but they have gone up a tiny b...