(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Add Me To The #F*ckCancer Group [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-06-22 Well, after almost 20 years of belonging to our DKos community I never saw myself writing this kind of diary. Unfortunately, we have way to many in our community who have faced this recently and I wasn’t sure if we needed to hear one more. I’ve been writing and editing this for over a week and just haven’t gotten the nerve to hit “publish” so here goes... At the end of May I was going upstairs to bed at about 2 am (I’m a night owl) and found myself out of breathe. Age and being out of shape were my immediate thoughts. About 6 am I had to go to the bathroom. I didn’t even make it to the door before I passed out. After coming to, I still needed to go to the bathroom where I passed out again. That’s not a good sign but I figured that if I made it back to bed I’d call to get a Dr appointment in a few hours. I woke up about 11 am and when I went to get up I could hardly breathe. I called my daughter to tell her I was having trouble and she was there in about 30 seconds… She lives next door. My son-in-law was calling the ambulance already. She was pretty shook that I didn’t call her after the first time I passed out but later forgave me that I wasn’t thinking straight because of the hypoxia. The EMT’s got right to work and had me in the ER really quick. They rolled me into the big room with what seemed like a dozen doctors and nurses. They were drawing blood, hanging IV’s, putting on the oxygen and getting an Xray. I was in no pain and it seemed like a little overkill but at this point there was no fighting the fact that something was wrong. With the initial X-ray, they said it may be pneumonia but they wanted to get me to Imaging for a CT scan. When the doctor came to give the results he said I had a bunch of blood clots in my lungs. AND, they had found a mass on my right lung. I blew it off telling him that I had Valley Fever as a kid and there is a scar there. He told us that they would be admitting me as soon as a bed was available. So for the next week they pumped me full of oxygen, nebulizers and fluids to get me on my feet for the PE (pulmonary embolism). And kept running more tests to see where we were regarding the “mass”. I wasn’t about to say the “C” word until they absolutely had definitive proof of what it was. My daughter was very patient and let me go at my own pace to deal with what was coming. You see, my mother’s side of the family dies from cancer. Her dad and four of her siblings have died of colon, esophagus, prostate or lung cancer. She had survived uterine cancer only to die of pancreatic cancer. My last surviving aunt has stage 4 lung cancer. I had recently been a part of a medical genetics study that said that the markers for familial cancer had come back negative (things like Lynch Syndrome). I thought I was in the clear. So here I am with NSCLC Adenocarcinoma Stage 3b that has spread to the lymph nodes in the chest cavity. That’s a lot to wrap one’s head around. And my mind doesn’t seem to be wrapping very well. It’s the strangest thing (being bipolar all my life) that I haven’t really fallen apart. I’m detached and easily diverted. In fact, the whole 7 days in the hospital I didn’t want my computer and did very little on my phone. I just didn’t want to go down the rabbit hole of doing my own “research”. And even though Trump was convicted the day after things came undone, it just wasn’t in me to take more than a fleeting glance at DKos (which may have broken a years long habit on checking in daily). When my daughter told my 12 and 10 year old granddaughters that I was in the hospital, she said I was watching SpongeBob and eating jello. So, I watched SpongeBob and found I liked emptying my brain. Lego Garden overlooking Saint Marys Peace Garden, Mayo Clinic Another diversion… My daughter got me hooked on Legos. My nurses came by quite a bit just to check on my latest project. I had some great nurses! We sent them a Lego set of wildflowers so they could build their own bouquet. Back to the cancer… Before I left the hospital, the Oncology curbside doctors came by to say that I already had a “Tumor Board”, my very own set of doctors that would be meeting regularly to discuss and coordinate my care. They said it could take up to 3 weeks to get results of tests so I went home and marked my calendar for 3 weeks. Within days appointments and more tests started showing up in my Patient Portal. Last week I saw the Radiology/ Oncology doctor who told me that they would be deciding what the next step would be after first round of chemo. Monday I met my Oncologist who explained the first part of the “Plan” and I was sitting in a chair on Tuesday getting my first chemo treatment. There are a lot of moving pieces and everything can change as newer test results come in but I feel safe that they are going to know what is best to do. And I got the “Talk” from the Oncologist that I’m sure they tell everyone… Don’t think too far down the road and try not to look at statistics… Cancer treatment (especially lung cancer) has come a long way… Keep good thoughts about what’s important right now… There is some good news... I live in Rochester MN, about a mile from Mayo Clinic which is amazing. I have Medicare and good supplemental insurance. And most important, I have family next door. My granddaughters are coming by several times a day, they have taken on doing my laundry as one of their summer chores. They come over for lunch to make sure I’m eating and drinking enough. They have put up a bird feeder in my family room window and we spend time watching the wrens, finches, chickadees and cardinals. My backyard window AND tomorrow my son and 2 grandkids are flying in from AZ. I’ll get to see all my grandkids together for the first time in over 5 years. 12, 11, 10 and 8 year olds who can play next door and in our backyards so they don’t totally wear me out. I must admit that my daughter is going to have her hands full with trying to keep me from overdoing things. Another great diversion… Mayo Clinic has a Peregrine Falcon program. They have a nesting box on top of the Mayo Building that has a Falcon Cam. I got hooked on watching 3 chicks turn into fledglings and then flight. They return to the box at night. (The diary photo shows the FalcomCam in my hospital room.) I’ll end with the fact that a day doesn’t go by that I’m grateful for having such a fortunate life. Even now I realized how damn good I have it. And it hits hard sometimes when I read DKos that way too many of us have next to impossible odds to just survive. I get so angry that we have such a messed up healthcare system, that not everyone can get the same level of care that I will receive. And that not everyone has enough money to deal with life, especially when emergencies hit. And that some here struggle with lack of support for mental health issues. Soooo, even with all that’s coming at me, I still will be doing what I can to GOTV by donating to candidates and writing letters. I may not be as obsessed with the news as I have been but I will use my energy as best I can to do what I can to make a better future for my grandkids. My Grandkids… I think that they may be why I’m able to stay in the present and out of the dark corners of my mind. Anyway, that’s what I’m telling myself today. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/6/22/2248062/-Add-Me-To-The-F-ckCancer-Group?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/