Week 6: From Basketball to Basketcase

The day after all of my consults at the Huntsman, we took off for Las Vegas to watch the Mountain West Basketball tournament for the third year in a row. We didn't know if the cancer diagnosis would ruin it for us this year, but the timing worked out to squeeze it between the consults and next week's surgery. We're big BYU fans, and they've had pretty good teams the last few years so they're fun to watch.

Making this year's trip even funner, Tasha and Jake and the 2 kids came along so Tasha could check out the Radiation Therapy school in Vegas. It was fun having them around. Tasha is one of my best friends in the world. I love my 4 boys to pieces, but boy, am I ever glad I got my one girl!

After the basketball tourney, we drove back to Salt Lake where I checked into the Huntsman Cancer Hospital very early Monday morning. The place was a total zoo! They couldn't even give me a normal pre-op room to get dressed and get my IV's etc. They put a few of us in little curtained off sections of the big chemo room by the nurses station. That's where I changed into my hospital gown and did all the check in. Then the nurse finally came in and tried to put an IV into me. I have always been a really "tough stick"-- they just can't find good veins, so they poke me multiple times. This time the nurse gave up and said she'd go to plan B: just get a little IV in my hand and get enough drug in me to knock me out and let the anesthe- siologist put in an IV. Well, he did, and in my foot of all places!

My surgery got pushed back so late I didn't go in til 3pm, and it took almost 4 hours, and I wasn't back in my room til 8:30 pm. Lucky Rich got to sit around the hospital all day long! I've included pictures of some of the bruises from IV attempts in my arm, and my swollen up foot with the IV, and worse yet, me looking like a corpse in my hospital bed. My dear oldest brother Tim and his sweet wife Kay came to visit me that evening, and Tim took this picture. He was asking if I was sure I wanted a picture taken like that, and I thought, "What the heck - you don't get many chances to look like death!"

ONE OF MY LONGEST NIGHTS EVER
I have discovered that Morphine is as effective on me as a sugar pill. I have learned that as a patient you really need to be a squeaky wheel and let the nurses know you are in terrible pain - and boy, I was! I lay flat on my back trying not to move a muscle. If I so much as moved my right index finger, I thought I was going to drop through the floor. Breathing, and moving my chest up and down was so painful I had to concentrate all night at only taking shallow breaths. I would lay there with my eyes closed, hoping I could fall asleep and sleep away this horrible night. There was this red digital clock hanging on the wall in front of me, and occasionally I would peek my eyes open at the clock and see that only 5 or 10 minutes had gone by. I just wanted to cry.

The nurses would come in every few hours to inject more morphine into my foot - but no relief! Rich spent that night sleeping on the couch there in my room, but had to get up at 4:00 am and drive back home to Montana cause he is working on a job in Bozeman that is on crunch time. By morning I had a migraine headache and was really miserable. When the doctors came by for rounds, Dr. Agarwal said they had something more potent than Morphine, and without a beat I said, "Bring it on!" Dr. Nuemayer said they would look the other way and let me take two of my Excedrin for my headache. I took some Excedrin, and they put me on Dilaudid - the mega-narcotic - into my IV and then started giving me Loritabs orally between the injections.

Oh my goodness - what a big difference good dope makes! Dr. Agarwal explained to me why the pain was so intense. He told me this surgery is pretty brutal because they cut the pectoral muscle, and essentially fillet it away from the rib bone, much like de-boning a chicken. He said my pec and ribs get pretty beat up. Then they insert the expander under the muscle, fill it with some saline, and sew the muscle back together. They use dissolving sutures on the under layers, and glue on top. Funny, I don't remember such vivid details explained initially. I probably would have "chickened out" on being the filleted chicken if I'd gotten so much detail at the consult!

I eventually got up and went to the bathroom, which I couldn't imagine myself doing for at least week a few hours before. I tried to get up and go for a walk a little later, but got faint and almost passed out, so the walk had to be put on hold for a few hours. Then they brought me some applesauce and graham crackers since I hadn't eaten for almost 2 days, which gave me bit of a boost. Eventually, I got up and took a walk, and then actually went and took a shower. The shower just had a bench to sit on, and a hand-held spray. So I showered off, washed my hair, and now look at me: I'M ALIVE!

Good thing I started to look alive, cause I started to get lots of visitors, and it was fun to see them. Tim came by again and sat and visited for quite a while. My other brother, James, came by, then both sisters, Cynth & Barb, my sister-in-law and niece, LeAnn & Vanessa, then Aunt Fern & her daughter, Juli. To end the night, Collin, Tiffany, baby Landon and Chase stopped in. It was nice to have visitors when I was feeling a bit better.

I spent one more night in the hospital and got to leave the next day. The doctors wanted me to stay around the Salt Lake area for several days before going home. I have a number of family members who live down there, but since my daughter-in-law, Jamie, was going to be taking me home, we decided I would stay with her wonderful family, Rick & Cathy Smith. It was a crazy time for them, as they were planning a big 50th birthday party for Cathy, but they were still gracious enough to let me stay with them as a partial invalid. Chase came and picked me up from the hospital and took me to the Smith's beautiful temporary home (while they do some work on the new one they just bought). I did end up going to Cathy's big birthday bash for a while, and my sister Cynth and her husband Ray came and crashed it so they could visit me awhile. Thank you so much, Smith Family, for putting me up for a few nights! I'm truly grateful for your kindness.