10 months later...

So on June 4th of 2008, Doctor Stone told my Dad he had about 10 months to live. That was a whole year ago.

Dad is okay some days and some days he's really quite sick. It all depends on what his platelet and red blood cell count is. He has platelet transfusions pretty much every week and gets blood transfusions about once every 2 weeks. That depends on what his CBC (blood panel) says. He has his blood panel done every Monday and Wednesday. Now my parents lives are about going to the hospital, then waiting for the phone call. Of course they also focus on eating right and making sure to get out into the garden or play with their pets.

One month ago, Mom was diagnosed with Merkel Cell Carcinoma. It was a small bump on her arm that turned out to be skin cancer. She got the call about the biopsy on a Tuesday, met with the plastic surgeon on Thursday and had surgery scheduled within 2 weeks.

Pre-surgery, they injected her with a dye. The dye was intended to move into her sentinel lymph glands, so the surgeon could remove those, in addition to removing the cancerous bump and surrounding tissue, so that the glands could be tested to see if the cancer had spread.

Mom handled the surgery like a pro. It was outpatient, so we got there at 9:00, she was injected with the dye at 10:30 and the surgery started at 1:30. We took her home at 4:30. The waiting was the hardest part, oh and she tossed her cookies about 1 block from home. After a 4 hour car ride, I guess the bumpy streets stirred up the ickiness in her belly.

Mom was fine the next day, aside from the incision under her arm pit and the 24 stitches of divot on her bicep, she was fine. 3 days later the surgeon called. Ok, full disclosure, he was supposed to call 3 days later. Mom called him during the day, left a message and his assistant should have called back. When nobody heard from him, my sister somehow found his personal e-mail and emailed him that we were all waiting on pins and needles for the results. He called my parents at 9:30 at night to let them know there was no sign the cancer had spread. Mom was going to be okay. Thank you Dr. Tsoi!!

So today is a little over a year since my Dad was given 10 months to live. Dad went into the hospital this morning. His balance troubles have been steadily getting worse over the last few months. His physical therapist says it is probably time for him to start using a wheelchair. This morning he woke up and could not sit up without tipping over. (I've had vertigo this bad before, it ain't good.) Mom called the ambulance and they took him over to the Haxtun Hospital. After the CAT scan, they determined he has 2 hematomas on his brain. Basically, he's been bleeding into his brain.

I'm not terribly surprised by that. 2 weeks ago, he didn't get his platelets, but he got 2 units of red blood. When Dad gets blood with out platelets, his blood doesn't clot and he "leaks" as he calls it. The irritating thing is, he was supposed to get platelets, but the courier service "forgot" the platelets and the doctor in Haxtun, Dr. Lyla, who is the same doctor who prescribed him the Levaquin, the same doctor who didn't catch his anemia when it started, 10 months before he was diagnosed with MDS, that Dr. Lyla told the courier "oh he'll just get platelets tomorrow." When she should have told them to get their butts back up to Greeley and get him platelets for the same day as the blood.

I would honestly feel much better if that doctor would go jump off a cliff, or the very least, stop practicing bad medicine. (not the Bon Jovi song)

So that brings us to now. Dad is in the hospital, waiting for Dr. Stone and another specialist to tell him what is going on, how to fix it or how to stem it. I'm out here in CA waiting for news. These are the days I wish I lived closer. For all the "living in the moment" bullshit I spout all the time, it's scary on days when the crap stuff happens. It's very hard to live in the now, when all you want to know is what's going on.

Since I can't be there to fetch sandwiches or feed the animals or mow the lawn, my best effort was to call and leave a horrible joke on their answering machine. It was poorly delivered, but I hope my Mom at least gets a chuckle out of it.