Port installed, the procedure itself was not as bad as I thought it would be, but was still more involved that I expected.  Incision in my chest, right under my collar bone, and a “pocket” built for my cute little port.  Also an incision in my jugular – yikes! – to install the tubing that goes from the port to my jugular vein.  The connection allows the chemotherapy drugs to go through my heart, and be distributed throughout my system with each beat of my heart.  Pretty cool, huh?

The three heroes of today’s drama are as follows:

I LOVED my nurse, Kathy.  She watched over me like a mother hen, and seemed to know what I needed, before I needed it.  Not only as regards medication, but when I had an absolute meltdown right after the procedure, and in the hall to xray.  She says it’s just “what I do” but I say “Kathy, you are an angel.  I could not have gotten through today without you.”

My loving husband, who takes care of EVERYTHING, with barely a thank you from me, who benefits the most from all that hard, thankless work.  I don’t have to worry about a thing, and I don’t have to think about a thing.  He does it all, and still pulls a mean espresso shot.  I was so miserable after the procedure, and a whiny baby in recovery.  I complained ALL the way home about my headache, I was tired, I hurt, etc.  Home now, still sore, but feeling so much better.  A Dick’s Deluxe burger and a lovingly prepared espresso con panna from my wonderful and intuitive husband has kicked out my headache, and regulated my emotions, which were on a roller coaster today, as well as my blood sugar.

Making up the trifecta of heroes and heroines, my amazing and wonderful sister.  I was to have testified in a trial Tuesday morning, and had no way to know if I was still needed in the morning.  My sister took extra time and effort today, when she was good and tired herself, to clarify with the parties involved, and rescued me from a 4 hour  car ride,  5 short hours after minor surgery.  I don’t know how she does it – she just DOES.  She is our father’s daughter, 100%.  She’s got a plate load of drama, crapola, and shit she is dealing with, more than any single person should have to deal with in a lifetime, and she only thinks of what everyone else needs.  And that includes me.

I thank God for these people.  My courage is heavily borrowed from my husband, and my sister.

We all depend on the compassion and dedication of the professionals at Seattle Cancer Care.

This post feels a little all over the place, but it comes by it naturally, as that is what’s in my head and my heart today.

I am SO missing my dad today, and his appropriately corny jokes.

At 10am we meet with the nutritionist.  Hmm, we’re going to talk about food, when I haven’t eaten since 6am.  Who’s idea was that?  And I actually agreed to this?

11:30am is “sedation assessment” where I suppose they assess just how MUCH sedation I’m going to need.  Is this going to annoy me?

12:30pm they start the port placement.  Scheduled to last 90minutes, then I go into recovery/observation for 30 minutes.  I hope today’s observation will be like last Thursday’s.  They gave me a warm blanket, crackers, cheese, and apple juice.  I don’t think I could have been more pampered if I was getting a pedicure and massage.

Here we go…

Here we are 11 days post surgery, and I feel as if I am only now coming out of the anesthesia.  I seriously thought the hard part would be just getting through the surgery but no.  Getting all of that anesthesia out of your lungs takes a long time, and it is so far the worst.  You feel miserable, you can’t think straight, you’re nauseated, in pain, can’t articulate what your pain level actually is, you’re just in this horrible fog.  Before the surgery I was most worried about what the right side of my chest was going to look like, but the reality is I just didn’t care enough about that to worry about it.  I just wanted to wake up and feel normal, but maybe with a little manageable pain.  That is SO not how it went.  Mostly I was queasy and whiny, dizzy and feeling like I was in a big, too bright room with 7 or 10 other miserable folks in my situation.

Today we have a sizable return to normality.  I don’t feel like I’m in a narcotic fog, only aware of feeling afraid of the next episode of breath-taking pain.  I’ve spent the previous week so afraid of this pain that I will not risk moving from a reclining position, and worrying that I’m doing recovery “wrong” as my shoulder is now so stiff that I can barely lift my arm high enough for Ken to change my dressing or empty my drains.

But today, after we came home from the Women’s Center at SCCA, where I had my second and last drain removed, I managed to keep so well ahead of my pain, that most of the day I’m down to one pain pill every 4-5 hours, and was much more alert and functional throughout the day.  I seem to have greater range of movement, and have forgotten my pain enough to use my right arm to push off from the chair twice, without immediate consequences.

However, I notice I am becoming a little more sleepy and dizzy, and will need to shorten this post.  I think this is because I took two pain pills instead of one.  I’m hoping I can down to one pain pill  before bed tomorrow, and maybe switch to ibuprofen the day after that. Who knows?  Perhaps in the not-too-distant future, I may actually be able to wash my hair myself.

Type at you later,