I HAVE A WHAT?!...

There is a lot to catch you all up on for the last two weeks. We have made another trip to SA, and are now back at home. Today was a most unusual day for us, particularly in light of the fact that it is day 15 of a treatment cycle, which normally is an easy and uneventful day for us at CTRC. But today's visit was far from that.

A "series of unfortunate events" occurred in the past few days that made today's visit more interesting. As I wrote about earlier, we found during our last visit that there was some kind of problem with my port, which would have to be looked into today. We were scheduled for an x-ray dye test first thing this morning to get a good look at the port and catheter in an attempt to assess the cause of the failure.

This past Wednesday while at work, I had an awkward fall while walking along a creek bed, twisting my body, but in particular my knees. My right arm and side hit a small dirt ledge along the side of the creek. I was afraid that I might have sustained a pretty good injury to my knees, but decided to give it a day or two to see how it went before seeing a doctor about it. My right knee was swollen by Wednesday night, and for the next two days I had a tough time walking. But by today, they were both much better.

On Sunday morning at 4:00, I was awakened by severe pain in my side. For at least 30 minutes, I didn't know if it was going to get better or not. The pain was unrelenting, spreading throughout my torso, but centered in the middle of my right side. As I read from the Psalms and prayed, the pain began to slowly subside, and by 6:15 I thought I would try to sleep a little in the recliner before trying to get up to go to church. During the most intense part of the pain, I wondered if it were possible that the cancer in my right lung might have turned aggressive, or if I may have had a collapsed lung. However, when I awakened at about 7:30, it felt much better, so I decided that I would not need to go to the emergency room.

Fast-forward to today: the dye test revealed a slight leak somewhere in the catheter line of the port, meaning that the port cannot be used any more for anything and should be removed. The question was whether or not to put another one in. Dr. Mita's recommendation was to have a new one placed after taking out the deficient one. We plan on having all that done during our next visit in two weeks. It is a minor surgical out-patient procedure.

When I told the PA about the pains I had Sunday morning, after checking me over, she conferred with Dr. Mita. They gave orders for CT scans, which we all hoped would rule out two scary possibilities: cancer in the liver and pulmonary embolism (blood clot in the lung). Neither would be very good news. Within the hour, the CT scans were done, and we were awaiting the results. After a surprisingly brief wait, the PA returned, and we went back to a room to discuss the results. On the way back, she told Helen, "You won't believe what it is." She began by asking me what I thought it was. After I said that I didn't have a clue, she said that I had a BROKEN RIB!!!!!!!! After picking my jaw up off the floor, I asked her repeatedly if she was kidding. Rib #6 on the right side was broken, and there was nothing that needed to be done about it but to let it heal. There were no signs of cancers in the liver nor around the rib area, and no sign of embolism. I just said, "Praise the Lord!" My whole body has been hurting since my fall, but I have been focused on my knees, and did not even consider the possibility of injury to my ribs. The PA said that she just had to laugh because they never diagnose broken bones...this is a cancer treatment center. As you can imagine, we were very excited about the broken rib! Is that not CRAZY?!

We are just so thankful to be home again and so grateful for God's grace in our situation. We are reminded how quickly things can change in life and we need to be ready for whatever might lie ahead. God's grace is sufficient and His love endures forever!