Second Chest Surgery in Less than Two Weeks and other Musings

Well, here I am sitting wondering what to do with myself the next few hours.  Already balanced the checking account, I could pay the one bill, but I am not going to, it is a doctor’s bill.  They can wait a week.

To be honest, I am tired.  I find breathing a bit difficult.  Like there is something sitting on my chest.  I suppose it is filling back up with fluid, even the small ribs on the right side are starting to ache like they did before, a dull pressure related ache.

Yes, I am very tired.  Don’t want to take a nap, I am afraid it would interfere with sleeping tonight, although that wouldn’t be anything new, but I have to admit I slept last night, only woke up twice, but I was so exhausted I don’t think my body cared how contorted I was while sleeping.  Except I did care when I woke up, joints and muscles ached like I tried to do a marathon or something.

Speaking of marathons, June 11 is Run Amok here at Quantico.  It isn’t a marathon; it is a 3.5 mile run through an obstacle course and mud pits.  Something I could have walked.  I was hoping a group of us from BaseTel would do it, but since I can’t no one is, at least I don’t think anyone else decided to try to organize a group to do it.

God I can’t wait till I can walk without feeling short of breathe again.

My week started off rather interesting.  We all know that the doctor sent some of the fluid out to the lab on Friday to make sure where it was coming from.  First phone call on Monday morning. “This is Dr. Sherwood’s office; he wants to know if you can come in at 1 PM.  He is squeezing you in-between a surgery and another patient.”  Yeah, that is one hell of a call to get.

So I show up at 1 and his surgery took longer than expected, only an hour, and to be honest I was surprised, because what he does is some really delicate surgeries.  He is an amazing and very likeable doctor.

He looks at me and says you know how I didn’t like the color?  That milky color when I pulled those two liters of fluid out of you?  (He still sounded amazed at the fact there was two liters of fluid in my chest).  It is a Thoracic Duct that is leaking and we need to fix it.  It is a nutritional leak. (Something about leaking the fat into my chest.  No that isn’t why the right boob is a D cup rather than a B/C.)  I kind of didn’t listen to the what type of fat thing.  He said they have tried diet to help it heal in other patients but it didn’t work.  The diet would be NO fat.  You read that right NONE, zip nada, nothing, just what is natural and those choices are the lowest fat you can find.  Surgery would be the best and quickest way to solve the problem.

All I could think was “Doc, I am half Sicilian, I have already given up a hamstring, latisimus muscle, 2/3 of a lung, and yet to give up what is in  my abdomen to cancer, I am not giving up food that tastes good, especially now since food is FINALLY tasting good.  (Although I need to start being careful so I don’t balloon up, it is really easy to do when food goes from tasting and feeling like slime in your mouth to all the wonderful, complex flavors and textures.  It is very easy to fall into the “AH my body needs it and go overboard.  It all comes down to balance.)

Any way so in less than two weeks I will be going through another surgery, in fact it is tomorrow.  I will have a cut that starts on my back goes down along my right side and have my sore ribs spread so he can get in to find and seal the leak.  A two to three hour surgery followed by two to three days in the hospital.

The unnerving part is he will be near the diaphragm.  Don’t want that damaged.  He is a bit concerned because the tumor was so huge and involved it will be like going into a warzone for him.  So let’s all pray that his hands are guided so there is no collateral damage.

On the up note, he got excellent margins, so the cancer is out of my chest.

People keep telling me how strong I am.  Let me be honest, I am not.  I have no choice; I have to deal with it.  Besides, I draw strength from the two people in the world I would give anything for.  My kids.  My son Jim and my daughter Jasmine.  Both have been pillars of strength for me, both have given me encouragement when my morale was running low, both have continually let me know they love me and will always love me whether I have1 scar or a million.  They love me for me.

So tomorrow, just like the last time I had surgery before they knock me out I will remember how much my kids love me and how much I love them, and how I would go through hell and back for them.  And when I wake up I know that I will be greeted by Jasmine’s smiling face and know that Jim would be “concerned” and she would have filled him in.  I know he’d be there, but I say that PHD is more important.  (Very proud of my kids btw).

So to say I am a strong person isn’t exactly right, I draw my strength from my two wonderful children.  I will go under the anesthesia thinking of them and how much they love me and how much I love them, trusting in their love and the love of a greater being to guide the doctor’s hands, and I will wake up, trusting the love of my children.

It is like what Jasmine has been telling me all along, and to be honest I was doing it and not realizing it. 

Trust love.