Hindsight is 20-20, huh? Exactly three Monday’s ago I had come home from work curled into a ball on our bed in pain and silently repeated in my head over and over “please don’t let me have a bowel obstruction.”  In my heart of hearts I knew that I did but I also knew the severity of certain symptoms to look and genuinely thought I could resolve it at home. Unfortunately this problem was and continues to be much bigger than me.

Whether I chose to go to the hospital five days sooner it wouldn’t have changed anything. The fact of the matter is that the time we wasted not being able to use Carbo gave time for disease to grow and put strain on my intestines. Imagine a little piece of straw covered in bubbles. The straw being intestine and the bubbles begin little tiny tumors. As the bubbles grow the create tighter and tighter regions in the intestines. This will not resolve until we find the rigth chemo to help attack it.

We truly hope that Doxil is that answer we’re looking for.

SO I know you’re just dying to know about my bowels…because? who doesn’t?

I was going to make a cheeky joke about the hot sauce joke from Dumb and Dumber when it dawned on me that this gif is the actual personification of my small intestine gearing up to ruin my life.

Bowel Obstruction:

far as the obstruction goes, right now I still have the NG tube in my nose. The last day I wrote I was excited about the prospect of trying out clear liquids. Although I did a great job with the tube being clamped off, it was just too soon. I tested out a few sips of broth, tea, and Ensure Clear. Ultimately I became nauseous and couldn’t keep it down.

I was pretty disappointed and down over not overcoming this obstacle but  I had to just be at peace with the fact that my body isn’t ready. I’ll get all the nutrition I need from TPN and as much as it pains me to have to say this, I have plenty of time because I will have to go home on TPN until I can take in enough nutrition by mouth. I hope relearning to eat is a quicker process than it was over this past summer otherwise I can guarantee you that will be sobbing over every tray of christmas cookies you offer. Feel free awkwardly console my overreaction to your snicker-doodle.

And yes, the tube will stay in my nose until discharge. 😦

Breathing: 

Again, wish I had better news but things haven’t gone as straight here as I had though. The other day I was scheduled for another lung tap because my best is basically more liquid than actual lung leading to compressed lungs and shortness of breath. I’ve been finding that I’ve needed to wear the oxygen mask overnight each night now.

I sat through another lung tap that was not as successful as we had hoped. It released a little fluid but due to pneumothorax (air where there shouldn’t be) we had to stop. The next day Dr. Robson told us it was time Denver Drain:

Not to  be confused from that Goddamn John Denver.

SO what’s a Denver Dam?

There is a small catheter that is surgically placed on my right side rib-cage that can be attached to a collapsable bottle or bag. When I feel as if the fluid in my chest is accumulating too much and I become short of breath (as I had a few weeks ago). I can bypass the lung taps and drain the fluid myself. It’s not cute but it’s healing well and they’re managing the pain. One upside to the Denver Drain is that it’s reversible so maybe, just, maybe this doesn’t have to be forever. There are some downsides so I’m not

Since the surgery they have moved my room to an AMS room to monitor my heart rate and vitals at all. Ao should you feel like visiting over the next few days just ask the front desk for the room number. I am still very tired throught the day so  I do still ask that you check with myself, Cory or my Family if you want to come by,

Lastly,

I’ve been so touched by kindness that I need to especially recognize today Sheila Enderby who went out and got a secret friendship tattoo. This week alone I’ve been down, cranky, unpleasant, uncertain, needly, afraid. I just think that despite all she just let me be human and that was all  Ineeded then,