The saga of the big bimp (re: Peter Sellers as Inspector Cluseau) and then...

This is a picture (thanks Gregg!),  of the bump on my head apppx. 45 minutes after I fell and before Gregg

transported me to the hospital.
That was I dunno how long ago...a month maybe?
Anywho I'm still Black and Blue, but that is improving...so maybe we should call the day after Thanksgiving Black and Blue Thursday?
The bump?
I went to the Facial Trauma doc. earlier this week and he tried to drain the bump, but it's now full of congealed blood...yuk... and short of making an incision and scraping out the "stuff"...yuk...which he can't do because that would be the equivalent of minor surgery which can''t happen because I can't have any kind of surgery because of low platelets and the risk of infection so I just have to wait for my body to take care of it and that'll probably take a few months!
So my "Quasimodo" look will be with me for a bit.

Just a brief note on why Thanksgiving Day and what I had/have to be thankful for...

Day before yesterday, Thanksgiving Day, marked 90 days since my transplant.
Wow, without that transplant I'd "be a goner".
But the transplant, although it certainly made a difference it didn't make the difference.
The Great Physician played the biggest role but it was the prayers and presence of the people that made the difference.
That is not a contradictory sentence at all...but you'd have to be me to truly understand it, I think.

To have the presence of people who made the sojourn to the University of Colorado Hospital sometimes several times a week, is what made the difference. Without them I know I would not have been able to survive the ordeal...and I do know that.
To those three of you who showed up soooooo often, I salute you and I thank you for your lives.
To those of you who made the trips from far away, i.e. my brother and sister, you have always been there for me when I've needed you, you'll never know how much I love you....it's true, you'll never know, just know that I do.
To those of you who came and stayed with me at Brent's Place (the transitional housing place that I stayed a for 3 weeks after leaving the hospital), I know it must have been boring but it was incredibly comforting for and to me.
To those of you who organized, participated in and got your vehicles cleaned at the car wash, bless your individual and collective hearts. For those of you who are members of, or are not (!) I am humbled by your benevolence, your prayers and your thoughts and those incredible Birthday Cards which Bonnie affixed to the wall in my hospital room.
To you guys stationed at RE/MAX Advanced who called me, came down to see me, sent me cards, the Car Wash, your benevolence, the "Welcome Home" Sales Meeting, it's you guys who help make and keep that place the magical place that it is.
To those of you who just heard of my "plight" somehow and just jumped on the prayer/thought/cart/phone call/e-mail Pete's bandwagon.
To those of you who followed this blog and made your comments which I so appreciated and made me cry and gave me hope.
And to anybody I've missed in the above clans, Thank you and know that you indeed have saved a life.
Again, I'm not taking anything away from the Big Guy, but I know that it was the presence of people, whether they were present or not that saw me through this.

There are no words...but Thank You and Bless you, each and every one of you.

Home Sweet Home?!?!?!?!?!?

Assuming everything goes right, a.k.a. labs, I'll be outa here and home by noon!
One wouldn't think that a bump on the head would land me in the hospital for durn near a week, would ya?
But it did, sorta.

Heckuva Mugshot, eh?

Check above the budding raccoon mask and you'll see some fuzz on top of the ol' noggin!

I still don't have it figured out how a fall could poke a hole in both my kidney and my spleen, but if'n anybody can accomplish that I can and did!
They'll heal themselves just like the broken bone above my left eye will, but the jury is still out as to whether or not I'll have to have the bone beneath my left eye "repaired"...I'll know that when the swelling and bruising goes down in a week or thereabouts.
I just found out it seems like there's some issue with my blood pressure that might keep me here!
If you'd been through what I've been through in the past 9 moinths, you'd have high blood pressure too!!!!!!!!

No body has come up with a definitive explanation for my "falling" but they seem to mention my blood pressure meds and dehydration working in combination that are culpable along with one of my chemo drugs.
So, it appears that I'm gonna get to play the "find a balance" between a high blood pressure med, proper hydration and the rest of my meds including the chemo drugs that get to accompany me for the next three years...

You know, this stayin' alive ain't as easy as it once was.
Wasn't there a song about "Stayin' Alive" back in the 80's?
I think it was a Disco thing and I didn't do Disco...I did Johnny Walker Red instead.
Maybe I woulda turned out better if I coulda danced Disco in a spandex three piece suit and drank wuss drinks with umbrellas in them.

Damn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What was, "Yeah, you can go home Sunday morning" just turned into, "We'll try and get you home later today or tomorrow."
I'm not a happy camper.
As a few folks can attest I get a little testy when I'm told I can go home and then either get home and rebounded back or just don't get to go home after I'm told I can.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!

My MIAness?

Hi there,

Wellst, I've done another MIA thing.
Didn't mean to, it just sorta happened.

You see, I was at the Front Range Cancer Specialists getting my last chemo of this cycle and looking forward to a week or ten days off before cycle two of how many cycles of... 22 days on, x-amount of days off,  there are in three years...

There had been some sort of emergency earlier in the day and as such I was the last person to leave and they had already shut down the front doors so I had the privilege of being escorted out by a nurse to the secret side door.

Well, knowing what to do as I had fallen three time prior to this and that my falling always was always preceded by an episode of dizziness and light headedness that happened when I stood up, I took inventory and ascertained my balance, equilibrium, dizziness and light headedness were baseline and took off after the nurse who was showing me the way out.
“Out”, is a hall and I got about a third of the way down the hall and ***damn*** the dizziness and the light headedness hit and I know I’m goin’ down. I quick look and there’s no chair or railing so I reeeeeeeealy know I’m goin’ down.
Some 25+ years ago (July 10, 1985) when I had the wreck and during OT (Occupational Therapy) in the months thereafter they taught me to “tuck and roll” on my right side so that if I fell I wouldn’t stick out my right arm to brace myself because if I did that I could/would break my right arm or wrist.
I remember my brain signaling that but the message never got to that part of my nerve system or anatomy and I said to myself…”This is probably gonna hurt.”

I was sorta right.

I didn’t loose consciousness and remember my head bouncing and hitting the floor (carpet over cement) twice and it stung some…which is past tense of sting, I know and there was no sting but I think there is a sensory difference between sting and stung… . It, my face, didn’t hurt for a few minutes.
That few minutes was occupied with getting to Urgent Care which was/is right next door.
Got there and they cleaned me up a bit cuz’ after all, you cant fall face down and not create a cut above/in your eyebrow, right?
I/they had me call Gregg because they didn’t think it a “well” idea that I drive myself home and as he only lives a short distance away he was there in a hurry. So much of a hurry that they weren’t really done assessing me.
They did some “look at my finger” things and decided I should go to the hospital.
As I agreed, Gregg said there was “that look” on my face indicating that I really didn’t wanna go, but I did.

He, that would be Gregg, called up a couple of the Book Study group that was, coincidentally meeting at my house that night, and they got my car and got it home.

So, we headed over the ER at the hospital and got there somewhere before 7:00 ~ the fall happened sometime after 6:00 ~ and they started the assessments all over again…and came up with the conclusion that I should stay overnight for observation. It is now Friday, the fall was Monday and the “overnight” for observation has now turned into, “We think you should stay at least through the weekend”, which certainly is longer that I expected…
Why that’s nearin’ a week!
And why so long you ask?
Well, seems that in their thoroughness of seeing if or not I had a concussion, they discovered that during the fall I had damage, slight, to my kidney and my spleen and had internal bleeding!
As a matter of fact, as I write this at 9:31am on 11/13/2010 I two units of blood yesterday and I had 2 the day before. I wonder if'n I'll get any more...time will tell, huh.

OK, we’ll get to the prognosis/bottom line.

The spleen and bladder will heal themselves.
I broke the bone above my eye and below. The bone above will heal itself, but the bone below which I also broke may require some fixin’ up, but that decision won’t be made officially for a day or two but it appears likely when the swelling and blood pools (a.k.a. blackeye(s)), go abate a wee bit, they will make their final recommendation.
Soooooooooo…

Seems I’m gonna be here for another day or two because my primary physician, as far as the hospital is concerned, is my local Oncologist, is off on Fridays and told me on Thursday that I should expect to see the weekend from here. There is disagreement, as well as Drs. can disagree, whether I should spend the weekend…or not! The Pulminary doc assigned to me sez, “As far as we (who ever “we” is) are concerned I can go home, the Renal docs seem to be stuck on Sat. or Sun., the facial trauma doc doesn’t care…he just wants to see me in a week, ad a doc who stumbled into my room by accident thinks after the first of the year.

All I know is I look like a raccoon.