I thought it might be time to get caught up on what’s
happening on the health front at our house since I haven’t posted any health-related
news in six and a half months. There is plenty of news to report.
The day after my post of August 24 I had an appointment with
my colorectal surgeon who decided it was time to do surgery on the primary
tumor. I had one more chemotherapy treatment scheduled before surgery,
and surgery was scheduled for October 10.
The doctor had explained to me that if everything went as
planned he would be doing laparoscopic, robotic assisted surgery. Everything went well and I had an
abdominoperineal resection, which completely removes the distal
colon, rectum, and anal sphincter resulting in a permanent colostomy. So now I
have a stoma, which means that the end of my remaining intestine was brought
out through an incision in my abdomen, and now resides a few inches from my
navel and wears a pouch to catch anything spewed out. I have named the stoma
Stella. Even wrote a little rhyme to welcome her to the outside world:
I
have a little stoma
Her
name is Stella Sue
She
sits next to my navel
And spews out stinky poo.
All right, I didn’t say it was great poetry-
and it may be a little gross to some sensibilities, but that IS what she does,
and she does it well.
One of the interesting things about this
surgery is that even though certain body parts have been removed, there is
often the sensation that they are still there- sort of like the phantom limbs
people describe after an amputation. So I may also make Stella the heroine of a
book I might write one day: Stella
Stoma and the Mystery of the Phantom Rectum.
I was in the hospital for three days, where I
was shown how to handle the stoma and apply the colostomy pouch, etc. So far
everything has gone pretty well. There
is a learning curve involved as you try to find the pouching system that works
best for you. There are problems such
as ballooning, pancaking, and blowouts, none of which are pleasant, but after a
time, one learns how to prevent those problems for the most part, and how to
deal with them effectively when they can’t be prevented.
The surgeon said he got clear margins when he
removed the tumor, and the pathology report verifies clear margins, so that’s a
very good thing. My oncologist
recommended that I remain on maintenance chemo to prevent a relapse, so I resumed
chemo treatment with irinotecan and Erbitux on November 8. My last CT scan on
January 5 shows that everything is stable and there is no new metastatic
disease, so that’s a good thing.
I go in on Thursday this week for another
chemo treatment and will have another CT scan in April. I hope the next scan shows good results
More drama entered our lives in December,
when Mr. G. began to feel ill. He went to
our family doctor, on December 4. After listening to his symptoms and running
some tests the doctor thought he might have a kidney infection and started him
on Cipro. He got worse, with some back
pains and numbness in his legs. We thought he might be having a reaction to the
Cipro so back to the doctor on December 13, who scheduled him for an MRI.
I had
a chemo treatment on December 14, and when our son brought me home, Mr. G
couldn’t walk at all, so off they went
to the ER. He was admitted, and after
some tests, including a spinal tap, he was diagnosed with Guillaine-Barré
syndrome. He was in the
hospital for two weeks, and then was discharged to Lakeshore rehab facility for
therapy. After two weeks of rather
intense therapy he was transferred to a nursing home/rehab facility for less
intense therapy for three weeks, then back to Lakeshore for another three weeks before being discharged home
on February 28.
He was able to come home with a walker rather than a
wheelchair. Physical and occupational therapists come to the house several
times a week and he has been making slow but steady progress. He is now able to walk short distances
without the walker, and we’re hoping he’ll make a full recovery in time.
And that just about
catches us up. Today is the first day
of spring, and I’m looking forward to
some nice warm gardening weather!
