Share a Story

Mike’s birthday is tomorrow, and I’ve come up with an idea. (I hope this one turns out better than my Lizard’s Thicket debacle on Saturday night.) Since it’s obviously not feasible to have a big birthday bash—if we were in the Marriot part of the hospital, I might be able to pull it off, but there’s just not enough room on the Motel 6 end—I thought you all could send some virtual birthday wishes to Mike through the blog, and I will read them to him tomorrow. Those of you who know Mike could maybe share a favorite memory or something you’ve learned from him. (You ATO guys be careful in your stories—our children will read this one day!) This will also be a great way for those of you who don’t personally know Mike to learn a little more about him.

Just to get the ball rolling, I’ll share a little story myself. When Mike and I became engaged in July of 2000, he hid the ring and made me hunt for it. We had already talked about going to Jamaica on our honeymoon, so he decided that the tier of room we stayed in would be determined by how long it took me to find the ring. Every 15 minutes that passed would constitute a drop in quality. Mike was enjoying my suffering (and saving money as the minutes passed), but after 25 minutes I gave up because I knew with him that I would never find the prize. The depressing part is that I was darn close to finding it in the first five minutes. The problem was I thought he would at least have the ring in a box, but he didn’t. It was hidden in his suit pocket hanging in the closet. Believe or not, I did look there! On the bright side, Mike decided not to skimp on the honeymoon. Being one who does not like to accrue any debt, he actually delivered telephone books to finance our excursion.

Now it’s your turn! If you’re writing something that’s more than a sentence or two, here’s a helpful hint: type your writing in a Word document then copy and paste it to the Blogger comment box. That way if the comment disappears, you still have it in Word and can try again without having to type everything over.I’ve had a couple of experiences of typing in Blogger then had it vanish into cyberspace once I clicked “publish.” I’m telling ya, it’s a depressing feeling to have your composition evaporate. You don't have to share a story...you can just send birthday wishes if you want.

Lung Caper

I try to get a little more sleep on the weekends since the doctors don’t come in at the crack of dawn, Mike doesn’t have radiation, and I don’t have to fight the traffic going through Malfunction Junction. I guess since I came in a little later yesterday, Mike was going to make sure I stayed later as well. He ended up getting his chemotherapy late. He’s supposed to get it between 4:00 and 5:00, but he didn’t get it until 5:40. (At 5:00 I called the front desk to remind them he needs it by 5:15.) As I’ve mentioned before, this creates a problem with dinner because Mike can’t eat for two hours afterwards and the cafeteria closes at 7:00. Sure, there’s a microwave on the floor, but who wants reheated hospital food??? So I had the brilliant idea to get him some Lizard’s Thicket. After dinner Mike was coughing pretty badly and breathing hard. When the nurse came in to check him, she heard something a little odd in his lower right lung. Because he seemed to be breathing so hard, she went ahead and hooked him up to the oxygen. This seemed to help his breathing, but they went ahead and did an x-ray on his chest. There was some concern that perhaps he had swallowed something wrong and it had gotten into his lungs, which could cause pneumonia. To protect the innocent, I won’t mention the name of the person who fed Mike dinner since she was feeding him so that I could go downstairs and spend a little time with Ava. But in case it’s getting the best of you, her name rhymes with flair. My brilliant idea was beginning to not seem so brilliant at that point. I mean Lizard’s Thicket is good and all, but it’s not literally to die for. Luckily, the x-ray came back fine and showed nothing in his lungs. Whew! "Flair" and I ended up staying at the hospital until 12:30 last night waiting on the results and making sure everything was okay.

I did talk with the on-call doctor today about the CT scan. Not including the swelling, the tumor is pretty much the same as it was last weekend. She said that a CT scan is just a two-dimensional reading and isn’t necessarily accurate to the millimeter. Transverse dimension means from left to right, and AP dimension means from front to back. She also said that how we physically see Mike doing is a better indicator of his status than the scans.

Other than that, Mike’s pretty much been the same today. If he’s awake, he’ll sit up and talk with you. Just don’t anticipate any factual information from him. This evening he said we have been married a hundred years. Surely nearly seven years with me doesn’t feel like one hundred!

CT Scan

When I came in this morning, Mike’s eyes seemed okay, but he was still inaccurate with answers to questions. He initially said we have twelve children (Yikes!!! How could we ever afford that? Two cost enough as it is!) When I told him we had two, he couldn’t tell me the names of our girls, but when I held up pictures of them, he could say their names. The on-call doctor was present when I was giving Mike his quiz. Since he didn’t make an A+, she went ahead and ordered another CT scan as well as two doses of the Mannitol for today. Mike had his CT scan shortly after 11:00, and the doctor brought the report to me a couple of hours later. She said that the tumor was stable, so we were just going to keep on doing what we have been. After she left, I started looking at the report in more detail, and it doesn’t look so great to me. It does state that the tumor is “largely stable” and there is no additional hemorrhaging, but the mass—including the swelling—has a “maximal transverse dimension of approximately 6.8 cm and a maximal AP dimension of approximately 5.3 cm.” I don’t know what exactly “maximal transverse” and “AP” dimensions mean; when I went to ask the doctor for clarification, she had already left. The last report just used the term “diameter.” I’m not sure just what the difference is or if there is one; I’ll ask her about it in the morning. It’s been nearly four hours since the doctor put in the order for the Mannitol, and it has yet to make it up here from pharmacy. I realize the pharmacy has to serve the entire hospital, but I don’t think I’ll ever understand why it takes so long to get medication around here. It’s a hospital, for cryin’ out loud!