Thursday, July 26, 2012

Thursday from the RV

The pictures from the CT scan I'll have done in the third week of August are starting to take on the noteriety of the Zapruder film!   No less than three doctors now want to see those images and two of them want hard copies!

I went to see Dr. Sansone last week and she got it in her head that the pain I have been feeling in the area of my lower right lung could be a pulmonary embolism!   I knew that couldn't be right, but she went ahead and called Kathleen, my nurse practitioner at Dr. Galan's office and Kathleen was obliged to call me and tell me to go to the ER immediately. 

Carol was with me and we really wanted to go to a Polish Deli in New Britain...any Polish deli.  So, we made a command decision about the ER visit...and went to the Polish deli.  We got pierogis and homemade grilling kielbasa (both of which were DELICIOUS, by the way) and then I dropped her off at her car back in Norwich and made my way to the ER.

It was an exercise in futility.   They did the preliminary test for pulmonary embolism (blood work) and chest x-ray and I was sure that they would see that I did NOT have a PE and maybe, just maybe, they would figure out what I did have.  NOPE!  The bloodwork came back a bit elevated and they were obligated to do a CT SCAN!   OMG!  

Now I have had a CT scan in April, May, June, July and will have another in August.  OVERKILL MUCH?!!!

So Dr. Sansone thinks that my guts are in an uproar because of the Avastin.  She also thinks I have "bacterial overgrowth" again and put me on medication for two weeks...that RX cost my insurance company $1,000!   I am soooooooo lucky I have good insurance! 

She wants to see the pics of the CT scan that I will have done in August.  Oh...by the way...after all the promises I got from my oncologist's office, they NEVER sent the info to Dr. Sansone that they said they would!   I guess I just have to do this stuff myself.

Yesterday I went for my annual follow-up visit for my gastric by-pass.  When I told the tech that I thought I had a hernia, they immediately switched me from seeing the Nurse to seeing Dr. McMillian.  Now I LOVE Dr. McMillian...she is a UConn grad and she is WONDERFUL!   She agreed that I probably have a hernia...but a definitive diagnosis can only be made by a CT scan of the area....now SHE wants a hard copy of the pictures! 

She also agrees with Dr. Sansone (and Sandy too) that my abdominal woes are from the Avastin...a case of the cure being a problem...I won't say the cure is worse than the disease, because that is definitely NOT true!   The cure is a problem. 

As the Avastin gets out of my system...and as the Gas-Ex does the job that Gas-Ex does, I feel better and better.  I still have the mystery pain in my lung area, but I have an appt to see my allergy doctor at the end of August, and maybe he can shed some light on that! 

We went to Stowe last weekend in the RV with two teenagers, Ryan and his girlfriend.  Ryan was in a lacrosse tournament up there and we were his transportation, food and lodging for the weekend.  It was fun, but very tiring as we did NOT bring the car.  That meant that we had to drive the RV to the event area.  It called for a lot of setting-up and tearing down during the weekend.   We did have a nice air conditioned place in which to eat, potty, rest and relax between games though.  Ryan didn't play in the last game so we were able to hit the road to home early, avoiding the Sunday night traffic.

Vermont is so beautiful.  The air up there was so good, so easy to breathe.  The scenery was spectacular.  I love it there.  It's another one of those states that, if it had an ocean, it would be the perfect place to live!

The bathroom work is really progressing.  The tile is going in the shower and on the floor.  They should be finished by tomorrow I would think.  Some modifications that I requested have resulted in some delay...like I increased the amount of floor heating....but that's a good thing. 

It is looking so beautiful...can't wait to see what it looks like painted and with the vanity top and new light installed!

Hopefully those jobs will get done next week and I'll be able to enjoy my new space for my birthday! 

Storms coming in tonight...hope we don't lose power....we don't have enough gas in the RV tank to run the generator for long...we were so tired Sunday we didn't "top off" before we put it in the driveway, as we usually do.  I have "battened down the hatches" and we will hope for the best!

Be careful out there folks, the weather this summer is crazy scary!

Later....