Late at night...

You know, I've done a fair amount of complaining about lying awake at night and I haven't been really fair to somebody.
When things get tough at night I call up my friend Abby and we talk.
Much like my talks with the Carpenter Man and His Dad at night, these conversations with Abby are not monologues on my part, they're a dialog between two who have endured similar "issues" and who have endured those issues with dignity and a compassion for others as they suffered through what they had to go through in order to make sure that what they needed to go through didn't go to waste.
You know, as it is daytime at the moment and I ponder all this, I'm pretty durn sure that it was Abby who very quietly put the idea on my heart and in my mind that I, too, shouldn't let this go to waste
Thanks Abby!
I have some very special people who have been put in my life and they have been put in my life for a reason.
You are one of those folks and I soooooooo appreciate that you are.
Just cuz I might not take time out to blog about you or e-mail you, or call you, or drop by or walk down the hall to acknowledge you doesn't mean that you are any less important to me or don't put things in/on my heart or my mind like Abby, cuz I'm sure you do!
But just like it took me a while to discover Abby's message, it sometimes/oft times will take me a while to realize your message.

I'M P***ed!!

I always thought that people who had cancer got skinny!
Dang it, anyway,,,cuz since I've had this I've gained 15 pounds!
I belong to this Fellowship that has taught me that I can figure out things that used to baffle me, and I've got this gaining weight thing figured out and it's all your fault!
I'm eating better than perhaps I ever have. You folks have sooooooo graciously dropped off food, whether I was home or not, at the office, at church and taken me out for lunch and/or breakfast and/or dinner and I adore you for it!
I asked my Doc about it and he said it had something to do with the steroids I take before each chemo treatment, but I told him he was wrong just as he is going to be wrong about my probable diagnosis.
He tells me, and the research I've done backs him up, that the type of cancer I have is incurable and statistics say that with successful treatment and therapy I'll have 5 years...but heck, he doesn't know who he's dealing with.
I conquered alcoholism, which is generally considered fatal and I know that more people die of alcoholism than they do Multiple Myeloma, the cancer that I have.
Ain't I special? I gots Multiple Myeloma, not just Singular Myeloma!
I was talking to my boss lady the other day and something came up about my general attitude towards this whole "thing" and I told her that it came from that outfit that has given me a new life for 23 years and has indeed changed my whole attitude about life and the world around me.
I'm not supposed to, in print, radio, films or the internet tell you what outfit I belong to,,,so I won't. But if you ever want to get a hold of it for any reason, it's alphabetically way up front in the phone book!
Yesterday I had my first chemo after my layoff and it leveled me. It zapped my energy, gave me a raging headache that wouldn't go away even with the pain pills they've given me (which I hadn't taken any yet...they're for bone pain which hasn't afflicted me yet, and with my smart ass attitude, won't) and made me really goofy in a way that is really hard to explain.
But today I woke up after a good nights sleep and have and am experiencing a euphoria that they told me would only come after my 3rd chemo treatments...followed by a mental crash which I did experience in my first cycle.
I still have a cycle caused from my drinking. I took large "doses" of Midol for my hangovers, which were frequent and even though I ain't touched a drop for over 23 years every 28 days I get a little irritable and my ankles swell...try 'splainin' that to the docs!

Thanks for listenin' and being a part of my therapy and this recovery.

Busy, Busy, Busy...Buzz, Buzz, Buzz

My favorite ice cream comes from Ben & Jerry's...Coffee, Coffee, Coffee Buzz, Buzz, Buzz.

I tell you and I tell you truly, this break from chemo has not been what I thought it would be. I thought I could catch up on some sleep, some business, some personal type contacts and virtually none of that has happened.
So even though I didn't get to come see you or talk to you, please know that I had/have intentions, realllyyyyyy I did/do!
The road to h*** is paved with what(?), damnit!

Sleep has still been an issue, though. I thought that without the chemo I wouldn't be so exhausted all the time and that because I try not to nap much I'd have an abundance of energy.
Not.
Betwixt waking up between 2-3 am and sleeping fitfully after that, and whatever, I'm still tired most of the time.
I'm of off Diet Code Red Mountain Dew and am now into drinking partially watered down fruit juice drinks, so I can't blame the caffeine for my lack of sleep and/or my fatiguedeness during the day and trough this whole thing It is the exhaustion that frustrates me, as it does.
It isn't every night though...seems 'bout once a week or so, be it from exhaustion or whatever I do get a blessed night's sound, sound sleep.
And although it's been over 23 years since I had a hangover, I wake up with the hangover symptom of, "Where the heck am I?". That only lasts briefly though.
I've said, and I believe that I'm gonna beat this cancer thing.
I mean, it doesn't know who it's dealing with, right?
And I believe that with everything about me.........yet I'm scared.
It's like I'm experiencing that fear and faith can both live within me at the same time, and they do, and that's okay.

You know, in the pas couple of days I've had the chance to butcher this quote so maybe it's a good time to go bring it out and refresh my memory...I think it deals with something similar, if not right on...

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life.

"A fight is going on inside me"; he said to the boy. "It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil - this one is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resent-ment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

The other is good - this one is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth compassion, and faith. This same fight is going on inside you and every other person, too."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf will win?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed."

Do you feed "it" Coffee, Coffee Buzz, Buzz, Buzz?

I wake up at 2:13, or whatever and the evil wolf is just hanging around making his presence known.
And it takes me to where I don't want to go.
For a while it would wake me up out of a nightmare of my mother dying of cancer,and a lot of that process was really ugly and I remember her saying that she wasn't afraid of dying but she hated the fact that she had to die in pain.
Thankfully, those episodes are over.
But I still wake up in a state of terror (I skip right over fear...fear is for sissies.). And I don't know what I'm terrified of, I really don't. Honest to chemo, I can't grasp a hold of it...
it's just there and it pervades the inside of my bedroom and the inside of my mind and I can't make it go away. Crying doesn't help, flinging bad words and curses doesn't help, prayer doesn't help, or at least as fas as I want.
I typically will go back to sleep but wake up again in a half hour or so and the process repeats itself until I get up for the day.

Anywho, life is good (Yes, I said that!) Business is good....thank you, Cindy!

Andyou are wonderful x 12.

BTW, some of you who apparently this link got forwarded to have asked for my e-dress as you don't feel comfortable posting a comment...I understand, believe me and I'd love to hear from you!
It's Pete@LivingIndoors.com .

It's Party Time!!!!!

NO CHEMO FOR 10 DAYS!!!!!!!

This whole chemo scheduling schtick sucks because it changes and "they" work on "cycles" yet try to explain it in weeks and so I get all confused but other than one Twilight Zone episode where I was just late I haven't missed a session.

But I begin a 10 day chemo free period now...hey, my own Spring break!!!

This having cancer thing is becoming easier to talk about. Maybe not easier to explain, but easier and at times, strangely, almost fun to talk about.

Having cancer has changed my whole outlook and attitude on some things, and maybe on all things.

Like life and death.

Books have been written, movies and documentaries filmed and archived about life and death but as with dang near everything a person has to experience something in order to gain experience and understanding in and about "it."

And you know, I ain't dying...I don't think so and nobody has come out and told me I am, although there have been hints that cancer is a little more lethal than the common cold.
But even though I'm not "officially" dying, there is an element of awareness that hangs on and around, sort of like the cloud on that Peanuts character, Linus is it?

OK, I'm "sick" and perhaps this will be a terminal situation, although I truly doubt it, but what is dying going to be like and what will death be like?

Oh, and BTW, please spare me the well meaning but clichetic and hurtful, "Well, nobody get's out alive you know, Pete ", and "We just don't know when our time is up. Might get run over by a bus on the way home tonight, you know."
Well meaning as the thoughts may be, they rip me to the core.

Anywho, what will dying be like?
I have had the privilege of being in the company of a few people when they went home, and at the moment of "passing" there was a peace about them but maybe more noticeable was a peace about the presence of them. It was as if the air in the room was changing from stale to fresh. If I may borrow words from a Friend of mine, "It was as if a wind of spirit, not of air that filled the room."

What will "death" be like?
Dunno.
Ain't experienced it yet and at present ain't takin' reservations.
But I have my beliefs,as sophomoric as they may be.
And as I believe our "lives" are powered by spirit, and one cannot secularly see, touch, smell, taste or otherwise tactfully sense spirit...although one can feel spirit, my spirit will adios to someplace called Heaven and I can look up my mom & dad and say things to them that I never got to express when they were still alive.
Dang that drinkin' thing.

But dyin' isn't all that occupies my mind these days.
Livin' actually holds first bill.
And righ now I'm on such a high, call it maybe euphoria over not having to have chemo for the next ten days and therefore not having to deal with, I hope, the exhaustion thing I can enjoy the nice weather...or the not nice weather if it turns.
Maytbe I can put the tv remote away the books on the nightstand and get back to the office some more and experience the aura there (which is now and always has been wonderful), check in with some folks that have sent me good wishes (If'n I don't get to you, please don't think that i'm ignoring you....pleeeeeeze!), and enjoy life!
Anybody wanna go get a Ben & Jerry's Coffee, Coffee Buzzz, Buzz, Buzz in a chocolate waffle cone?
Life is magnificent and thank you for making it that way for me!

The Twilight Zone...

Just figured out that I put the wrong date on my voice mail message this morning!!
Maybe(?) it's got something to do with my "Twilight Zone" episode yesterday. I had a ride lined up to take me to Chemo @ 9:00am, but it didn't happen so I decided I'd drive my self which in and of itself is okay, but it sometimes is not the wisest thing for me to drive my self home. Anywho, prior to finding out that I'd be driving myself I had gotten up early, and by 7:30 had made and consumed my protein shake (It still seems strange to be putting anything in my stomach that early in the day.) along with my 10, yes count them, and I do, ten steroid pills and I was ready to kill, kill, kill!
So i did my morning routine shower, teeth, make bed and headed out the door and triumphantly drove myself to chemo.
I walked in, head held high and chest out and something was different...there were way more people in the waiting room than usual, and their clock said 10:00am. My first thought was I was putting my life in th hands of people who didn't even know how to obey Daylight Savings Laws! The receptionist was not at her desk so I sat ready to unleash the most polite verbal assault I could
when I looked at my watch which also said 10:00!?!?!
So, somehow I skipped an hour and I had no clue how that happened.
As it turned out I, some time later, remembered that in the middle of the night, a restless night as may are these adays, I had opted to change the alarm time an hour to snag a few more zzzz's. Wellst, what I did on my super technologically advanced alarm clock was mysteriously in the dead of night switched time zones...
So, going by it being accurate I was off an hour.
Had more to write about a different subject but will get around to that nextsoon.
Thanks to all of you for your thoughts, prayers, e-mails, blog responses and caring...it might not show but I love you, too.

Whew...

Thank God for my Angels, and I hope you know who you are...
I owe you Cindy, big time and the Anderson's do to...although in a different fashion because I know you and your business ethic and you've done them an outstanding job in my stead.

I need for you(s) to know that even though I am seeming to whine a lot, this tough stuff is just part of the journey which makes the adventure and thanks to yous guys and your love and support I'm gonna make it though this.

For a Christmas past my friends and almost vicarious family the Freedle's gave me the CD set of Randy Pausch, that professor guy who had some sort of incurable cancer and had but a short time to live and indeed went home not that long ago. Although Myeloma is generally considered an incurable form of cancer (Myeloma), there is something called "induced remission" that they are going to put me in...heavy on the "are".
I have watched a Randy Pausch video and listened to the CD's, although I'm having trouble installing them on my computer so that I can listen to them here at the office. His attitude is something that I aspire to...he was going home for sure and sorta knew when.
I'm going home, but I sorta don't know when but it's damn well not going to because of Myeloma.
I remember when I was first told of my diagnosis that, "More people are dying with myeloma than of it."
So, I'm gonna be one of those folks...I am!

Just had one of those wierd thoughts...It's too bad Dr. Suess couldn't have written a book about a character having myeloma but being an I am and I therefore an "am not"...or some such.

I had a magnificent night's sleep last night. It takes me a while to fall asleep, and recently it has been a fitful night's rest, but last night and into the late morning I had a grand sleep.
Was awoke by another angel coming to check on me because I has unintentionally MIA as my phone took an unceremonious vacation so I was unreachable.
I sooo appreciate the time you took to come over Carolyn, it means a lot to me that people like you care.

Which brings me to another point that I don't know how to make.

When you come up to me and ask me. "How are you?" and I start to cry it's not because I hurt or because I have cancer, it's because I find it hard to believe that you care. Thank you for caring and pleeeeeeeze accept my apologies for not knowing how to graciously accept your care.
I'll think on all this and maybe talk about it later.

PetScan Aftermath...

... Well, nobody told me there would be after-effects of the Pet
Scan and nobody apparently knew of the one I would have!
Seems I got the PetScan on Wednesday and then got my Port put in on Thursday and then had my first Chemo treatment on Friday and the second one today...
But this here'n blog shall deal with the PetScan aftershocks...
I can't "blame" what was to happen as the result of the Port Placement because it just doesn't make any sense...
Now it's Thursday and b=my brother Kevin is in town. My sister can't make it cuz she's got the Iowa form of the crud and doesn't want to make the trip for both our sakes, but she will soon, probably and hopefully with youngest son (29?) in tow.
It's funny how the Universe works because Stacey had planned a sojourn through Ft. Collins with Andy on the way to Albuquerque to check out where he'd be working next and planned that trip before we knew of my Myeloma...in 1985, the year I had my wreck which was a horrible year for
Stacey in that Andy Was diagnosed with leukemia...but he beat it!

I just got a phone call from the PetScan people and they want to do another one and I ai't real pleased about that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The reaction that I had to the PetScan...and I know it was to the PetScan they are saying has/had never happened before.
They are calling my Oncologist to schedule another one.

AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

What happened was, that Friday morning when I awoke after a totaly ruined sleep, ruined by an inability to move around or roll over because my ankles and knees were rusting up and becoming intolerable to move, at all.
Kevin woke me up to get me to my 1st Chemo app and I was 2 hours late because I could no get dressed.
Finally I was able to get myself into a pair of those new fangled combination sweat pants/pajama bottoms and hemo Treatment. Twas funny that when we go there the only wheelchair he could find, cuz there was no way I could walk was a toy wheelchair I'm sure left outside by somebody whose 3-ear old had outgrown it.

We got me in and settled up in the chair and the 1st go round of chemo was 6 hrs or something but that was okay because I could sleep,,,my joints only hurt when I moved them so sitting still was okay to doze off.

The chemo must have actually acted as a retardent to the pain because as the day went on the pain diminished.

Saturday.......ah, a day of relaxation. No Dr's, no chemo, no pain!

And what a relief and pleasure in that Kevin and I got to go have dinner with Doug who had arranged for us, including my Sister to have a "reunion" dinner while she was out, but although that didn't happen a wonderful sharing of victuals was had nonetheless.

Doug's one of my Bud's what has appeared an angel in my life over the past 15 years or so and continues to show up at the right time at the right place.
He and I have had lunch on Thursdays for the pas 15 or 16 years and I bet haven't missed 15 of those engagements over the years.
And ya oughta see the tote bag that his wife Pam made for me!!!
3-07-87 embroidered on the handle, eagle feathers on the body next to some very important prose!
Wowsers, Pam! Thanks!

OK, I need to run with Sarah Bennet, Prez of the Board of Realtors over to see Clint, CEO or some such of the Board of Realtors o talk about S.H.O.P. (Sensible Housing Opportunity Project).
We ain't giving' up on this Real Estate stuff!!!

Later.
May we make three blogs in one day?
Maybe.

My how time flies when your'e having Cancer!!!

Whelst, holy kow, it's Monday April 5th and I, who promised to myself at least to blog nearly every day through this "Adventure" have already slipped up! It's Monday the 5th, I think, not Thursday the 1st (or thereabouts)!
I think I left off with the PetScan looming...
Holy RadioActive Kow what a trip and after trip that was...
I had gleaned that a PetScan was just really a CatScan on sterioids so wasn't really tooooo concerned.
So, thanks to Cindy, one of my angels in this trek, I made it to the PetScan place on time.
Not gonna be too different than any of the other appointments or pending procedures I'm having...I thought.
Now, understand that when I say, "I thought" that is encompassing thoughts, conceptions and ideas present, past and future...some of which are coloured from old acid trips and going through too many windshields head first.
First of all I was lead away from Cindy and the ambiance of the waiting room into a "pre-procedure" room.
There this nubile young phlebotomist/IV trained gal came in and using "it's gonna all be okay" language soon had me hooked up to a pigtail IV and sort of glided out of the room with this sparkling radiant smile announcing that Jordache would soon be in.
Well, I didn't pay too much attention, nor was there or us there any particular reason to query who or wht "Jordache" was, I just assumed that he would s\administer the rest of the PetScan, which he did and admirably so.
Just mere moments expired between the lil' phlebotomist debarking and the door openning and in walked Jordache...I think/thought.
Jordache made a grand entrance wearing a complete Haz-Mat outfit...
It was only then tht I realized het there had been a Radio-active Placard on the door when I had entered this room!!!
Without lifting up his Haz-Mat mask he effectuated a peasant and professional greeting and went directly to he box sitting next to me that I had not noticed before, even with with it having a large yellow Radio-Active decal plastered on all sides including the lid.
He carefully lifted the lid all the while making appropriate guy-type small talk and then, with his gloves on...yes, those big anti-aircraft gloves managed to unscrew the tops to the IV tubes, also placarded Radio-Active, and screw them into the IV pigtail and push the fluid it. He did this with three or four "loads" in each arm (actually I think there was just one arm and one, maybe two loads).
He also very carefully, almost daintily unscrewed them when done and then turned to leave walking out the door with a salute,if you will, rising of the mask.
I was impressed and felt honored.
Moments later the lil' IV chick came in and told me I needed to sit for 45 minutes while the radioactive junque (which was/is to settle down in any other tumorous places in my body) settled in.
So I sat for the 45 minutes and then she came back int the Radio-Active room and led me out,without benefit of Haz-Mat protection for either of us and then, ever so professionally, lay me down in the Cat-Scan Wannabe machine and with all then professional ado at her muster covered up my torso and then for the next 45 minuted the CatScan Wannabee machine did it's thing a hummed it's way up and down the lower part of my body. The hum put me to sleep.
Afore I knew it I was gently awakened and my body lower part was covered and the procedure was reversed and again, I slept.
Woke up, Cindy was there, went and got a Vitamin Water and that was the end of the day, I think.

Next post dealing with the after effects of PetScan coming soon!