Halloween

Hi Folks,

Recuperation continues. Doing well. It's much easier to get in and out of bed now, no pain, just a little soreness. Haven't had any pain pills for 3 days. I do still enjoy my bed, that is for sure. I just can't get comfy sitting up for long periods. I think part of it is when I came out of surgery, from laying flat for all those hours, my lower back was very very sore. That is why I'm not a back sleeper, that lower back thing. It's coming out of it though. I'm pretty easily fatigued. My getting ready for and the actual outing to doc has tuckered me out! And I'm not just saying that so I can get waited on and have my mom's yummy cooking whenever I holler . . . I swear!  I make my Dad wait on me too, to keep things fair. I don't want to show favoritism. I am an equal opportunity whiner.  He is good at bringing me Starlight mints and cats!

Got all the staples out this a.m., all 48 of them, and now I'm all steri-stripped. Very Halloween-like to me when I look down. I feel very seasonal. I could cut a window in a t-shirt and have a peek-a-boo costume! Haha. Just kidding.

Knock on wood, having a good IJP stretch too. I'm referencing my previous post here folks. And I did it myself! Honestly I deserved a little success there,

Off to nap!

Thanks all for thinking of me.

Kay :)

It's Just Poop ----- Saturday, October 29

Hi Folks,

Warning . . . graphic medical stuff to follow . . . if you are queasy go back a post and look at the cute cat picture lol.

Doing well. Biggest thing for me now is dealing with this colostomy. Yes, a colostomy. A surprise.  I know John mentioned in his post-surgery pinch hit post that the mass was tangled with a lot of other stuff, so they took the mass, both ovaries, my appendix, and a bit of bowel. The bowel was badly adhered to the mass, and when the surgeons got it loose, there was a section of it that did not pink up well. It was felt that section of the bowel would probably die, and rather than possibly subject me to another major surgery so close on the heels of this mother, the bowel was removed and I have a colostomy now. Had a rough start with this thing, due to its location (and my own anatomy lol), but  thanks to a wonderful nurse at the hospital (thank you Anita!), and a terrific home health nurse courtesy of my insurance company (Bless you Nancy and thank God for good health insurance!), things are looking up. There is a learning curve and practice helps too. The colostomy is temporary, I can get my plumbing hooked back up proper in 3-6 months. In the hospital, when I was having a hard time getting things to stick (lol) and was a bit down and discouraged, Mar summed it up pretty good. She said "It's just poop. You'll deal." And so I shall.

Just a couple more things:

Morris Hospital is terrific. Everybody. I'm so glad I got to have my surgery there and recuperate on Two East after my one night in the Mid ICU thing. Not sure what that is called, but they were terrific there too. The cafeteria food is freakishly good.  The eggs and toast! Wow. If I was going out to breakfast right now, and had my druthers, I'd go to the hospital! It was that good. Crazy, but true! My Mom is a great cook too. Now instead of dialing 3663 and ordering my meals though, I just yell MOM! Though just for fun, later, I'm going to call her on my cell phone and, just like I did at the hospital, ask if I may please order my lunch now . . . lolol.  Shhhh, keep this to yourself, but I could cook my own eggs . . . mums the word on that one folks!

Looking forward to getting my staples out Monday. I guess if you are nervous about taking your bag out for the first time, there are worse places to go than a doctor's office. lol.

And finally, losing some belly weight sure feels good!

I'm going to go for a walk later and get some of this brisk fresh air.

Take care folks,

Kay :)

Finn the Legwarmer

Finnegan is keeping a close eye on me during my recuperation. We are doing well, pretty tired, and really glad to be in our own bed. More later.

Kay :)

Thursday October 27, Woo Hoo Home!

Home! Home! Home! Woo hoo! Got home a little bit ago and have to deal with those internet withdrawals right away.


What is wrong with this picture . . . 91 year old Bernie sitting here trying to decide if he wants to go to the VFW or Ebbey's for his Thursday beers, and Kay heading off to bed for a nap! lol

More later, but for now, everything was benign (woo hoo), and from my pre-surgery meeting with the anesthesiologist last Thursday, until my weigh-in this a.m., down 44 pounds! Holy cow!


More later, I'm doing very well, but I can't get comfy and I need to settle in. I suspect a nap will fix everything, and Finn is ready for me. Gotta love a warm, purring cat!

Thanks for all the prayers and good wishes folks. When you have family and friends, life is good!

Kay :)

Sunday night

Mother called tonight.  Kay has been moved out of what Kay termed "semi-intensive care."  Her friends Mar and Donna visited her today and at least one other of her friends will visit tomorrow.  Also, she can take phone calls now.  Phone info on www.morrishospital.org

Mother said she took our dad with her when she visited today.  Yesterday Kay was speculating whether Dad would visit her at all.  I told her he might not because he'd be afraid they were going to keep him. 

Visiting Hours

Hi, this is John, pinch-hitting for Kay.  I saw Kay at the hospital this afternoon.  She looked very tired out.  She said last night was the longest night of her life...she'd finally fall asleep then wake up to see the clock had only gone 15 minutes. 

The surgery was very long.  The cyst had tangled itself among a lot of things.  They took her appendix and an ovary while they were in there.  They'll have to wait for the biopsy, but the doctor said it didn't look like anything cancerous.  He showed her a picture of it, which she said was really gross.

They had her sit up today in a chair.  It was incredibly painful.  They're going to have her sit up again tonight.  They were talking about moving her to a regular room tomorrow.  However, that would mean they'd take the catheter out and she'd have to get up to go to the bathroom.  She's hoping they'll delay that.

She couldn't think of anything to say other than that she was on the ice cube diet, and that if a person walked past her with a 7up right now, she would kill them and take it.  She can't have 7up or any other food until they can hear enough sounds in her gut.  Not enough sounds in her gut, I said.  Guess there's a first time for everything.

She will be in the hospital for 5-7 days.  If you go to the Morris Hospital page, www.morrishospital.org, you'll see a link where you can send her a little message.  John

Just Thinking

 This is just a partial list, and not necessarily in order (though the first 2 are definitely right)  . . .

Good things . . . family, friends, vicodin, sick days, insurance, warm cats (preferably dry), my down alternative comforter (if I can sneak it away from Finn), Netflix, grilled cheese sandwiches and homemade soup.

Bad things . . . clear liquid diet and this weird cherry soda I have to drink. I'm a little suspicious . . .

Surgery

Friday, 11:15 a.m.

Glad to have it scheduled.

Kay :)

Camping Pic

Patty, Donna and Marilyn (Mar) at camping. I've known them for over 100 years (combined of course!). As you can see from their somber expressions, they didn't have any fun at camping at all!

October 15, 2011 - Best Case Scenario

OK Blood test is ok. No specialist, no leaving town. Whew. Probably end of next week. Will know more on Monday.

Woo hoo!

Kay

October 14, 2011

No news is . . . no news. It's going to be a long ass weekend.

Kay

Thursday

No blood test results yet. Hopefully tomorrow. I'll be relieved to have this thing scheduled. Now that I know there is something in there, I want it out BAD!

I'll post good news as it comes in!

Kay :)

Misc Stuff, Camping, and Wednesday, a Weird Weird Day

Monday:

Lots of action to report. All done with physical therapy for my shoulder, it's feeling much stronger, no more pain! Woo hoo.

Had a lovely hike and lunch and good laughs with my buddy Chris to start the week. Much pleasantness. And lots of stairs!

Tuesday:

Had a great camping trip. Terrific weather, lots of laughs, good eats. Nice ride on pontoon boat. Great long weekend. Waaay too much beer and food. My first night there, washing up the supper dishes, one of the guys said something funny and I looked up at him, laughing, and I sliced the hell out of my thumb. Mental note to self . . . be careful dumb ass! It bled for hours. Unfortunately my ER nurse friend wasn't coming til the following night, but three cheers for Mar! She fixed me up with a good bandage. Her excellent bandaging may possibly have been inspired by the fear of my bleeding all over her lovely new camper. If there had been a health care professional around, maybe there would have been stitches. Fortunately for me there was none, just my inebriated friends. So all weekend I kept that thumb bandaged. Couldn't wash any more of those damned dishes with a bandage on my hand. Pretty smart of me!

Then back to work on Tuesday. You know how you feel after a long weekend of eating and drinking too much, and not getting enough sleep, when you are pushing 50 years old? Well I do! And how! I was a little stiff, a little sore, not unusual after camping weekend and that long drive, but I had a pain on my right side, around my rib cage. It did not improve. I thought I was sore from camping, or bean bags maybe, but the most likely culprit . . . hacky sack!

Well the pain did not improve. In fact it was so painful I toyed with the idea of going to the emergency room. I tossed and turned and flopped around all night Tuesday, could not get comfortable, could not get to sleep. I could not help but think of my good friend, who, after a weekend of partying and fatty food, was stricken by pancreatitis, and was hospitalized and had to tell health care professional after health care professional about her beer consumption and fatty diet over the weekend. Oh the pain. Not just the pancreatitis, but the confessing. The friend who told ME that she drank 12 beers and ate a foot long Subway sandwich, but when the doctor asked her, she told him 6 . . . beers and inches of sandwich!!! Well I should never have teased her about that, because karma is a bitch man.

Wednesday (The Weird Weird day):

Well, come morning I realized I was going to suffer the same fate. The confessing, not the pancreatitis hopefully! The pain is not going to go away. Off to the ER. There is my friend Patty, who was also at the camping trip. Very handy to have ER nurses for friends. Except it's hard to lie to people about what you did to bring on your painful condition when your health care professional friend is standing there, and knows THE TRUTH. Oh and there is my boss's wife, also an ER nurse. So right off the bat I confess my sins (well, most of them lol) over the weekend --- tons and tons of beer and fatty junk food! Nobody seemed surprised or even shocked by my bad behavior.  ER business commences. All the pain is around my gallbladder, I have mistreated and abused my gallbladder all weekend, so all signs point to the gallbladder. So I get an IV, blood work, ultrasound. Then doc wants a CT-scan. Hmmm Ok. Weird and unexpected but OK.

Doc comes in and gallbladder is OK, liver is OK (quite shocking after the camping trip honestly; I think I forgot to mention that in addition to the beer there was booze in the coffee in the mornings too, topped with fatty whipped cream), but it turns out I have quite a large mass in my abdomen. Probably a benign cyst/mass/tumor from my ovary (I heard it referred to as all 3 things this weird weird day). Strangely my first thought was “Damn! None of these people needed to know I drank like a fish all weekend and ate tons of crap! I confessed for nothing!”

After the doctor assured me he was not joking (lol), I said ok, why is my side so sore? Turns out large masses in your abdomen can put pressure on nerves and generally just mess things up. OK. Refers me to my gyno for 3:30 this afternoon. Big fun! Definitely surgery. Doc is waiting for results of CA125 blood test (****!) before scheduling surgery, to see if I can have it here at local hospital or if I have to go to a specialist. Hopefully blood work results will come back tomorrow. And hopefully I will be able to have surgery here at local hospital.That is best case scenario.

Did I mention it is 31cm? WTF? If I told anyone it was 31 inches, oops, I meant centimeters. Sorry about that.

Is this really happening?

I'm glad the Weirdest Day of My Life is over! Very very very glad.

Kay :)

P.S. I'd like to share two funny typos that I corrected. In the paragraph about my cut thumb and Mar's camper, substitute "breeding" for "bleeding". In the paragraph about the ER doc referring me to my "gyno" substitute "gyro" in there! LOLOL

October 1, 2011

I know I'm a day late! My router went out and I am technologically challenged. My weight is the same as last week, which is surprising, considering that my diet turned into the "Corn Dog Diet" thanks to Corn Festival the last couple days!

I was in a soupy mood this a.m., so I cooked, sort of. Trying to utilize my pantry, so my cooking involved opening a lot of cans!

I read a bunch of recipes for Chicken Tortilla Soup and formulated a plan. I used a can of Progresso Hearty Tomato soup for the base, just because I have a ton of it that I got super cheap in my couponing adventures. I threw in some enchilada sauce, stewed tomatoes, black beans, green chiles, fresh corn, sauteed onions, garlic, and green, red and yellow pepper. Then off to market for some chicken, found a big pack of boneless, skinless chicken thighs, reduced for quick sale. Grabbed some sour cream and wanted an avocado, but they were too hard and too expensive for me. Seasoned up the chicken breasts with olive oil, chipotle powder, fajita seasoning, and chili powder from the Spice House in Chicago (yummers), and grilled it off and shredded it with two forks. Threw the whole shebang in crock pot and seasoned it up with some more of the spices. It smelled pretty good in the kitchen at that point. Served it up with a squiggle of sour cream and a squiggle of clearance Wholly Guacamole, and topped it with these little tortilla strips I have had in pantry from Aldi. They taste like little, lightly salted Fritos! Yum. Can't get those again . . .

Anyway the soup was delicious and satisfying and filling and a success! I think I prefer the tomato base over the chicken broth base I have had before. I'm going to start eating more beans and veggies. Look out world!

Camping coming up next weekend. Right now weather sounds delightful, and the menu is not too extravagant. Not that that will stop me from overeating! LOL  But I'm going to try to get some walks in. Shouldn't be too difficult with the fun dogs, Lily and Sophie, available.

Keep up the fight people! And stay away from the corn dogs!

Kay :)