Heavy Heart
I've been too sad and too busy to post these stories, until now.
About two weeks ago, Don decided that his cough and some shortness of breath needed to be taken to a doctor. At the hospital in Kanab UT, and X-ray showed a mass in his lung, and a CAT scan showed it more clearly.
So he went off to St. George to see a lung Dr, and had a biopsy done.
During the procedure, his lung collapsed. Not really a huge deal, happens fairly often when you poke at lungs, since they are a spongy collapsible sac that is pretty much held in place by air pressure, and sort of mildly stuck to the chest wall. A tube was put in to get the air rearranged, and the lung is back to position. After some monitoring, Don was sent home with oxygen to await the test results, for a week.
The oxygen system consists of a gray sort of R2D2 machine that purrs along, extracting pure oxygen from the air. He wears the standard double pronged nose tube ( canula) and has enough tubing to go anywhere in the RV. There is another concentrator in the Lodge office for work time, and cylinders on a trolley for in between.
Getting this all lined up was a little nerve wracking as someone dropped the ball and the second load wasn’t delivered on time, but the young man who delivered it reassured me that if we need anything just call and he will be on his way. It turns out he is related to the guy who brings the mail down from Fredonia Az every day, so although the physical distances out here are huge, it felt strangely like Wales. The small (2,000) town in MA where I raised my kids, where everyone knows everyone and most are related.
Don is, as you might imagine, both scared of what the future holds, and angry that his body has failed him, especially the very visible badge of infirmity, the oxygen. There are a lot of things we want to do and see, sort of imaginary pictures on the wall, and they have dimmed. It is always possible that this will be repaired and we can carry on, but the odds have shortened.
We got a phone call saying that the mass is indeed malignant. At first it made me want to run and hide, just sort of go in some closet until it is all over. But the fact is, that there are many types of cancers of the lung, and this is not the worst, because inoperable, small cell cancer. ( Yes, I did go on line and scare myself a bit)
So today is Sat, July 11, and we have to wait until next Friday to learn more. We will go into St. George that Thurs night, hit the Super 8, and be ready for the doctors and their machines in the morning.
Plan A would be to get whatever done and return to the North Rim, where I can still work while he recuperates. But since he will likely need ongoing procedures, and bad lungs at 8,800 feet is a bad idea, more likely there will be a move.
Plan B, thin at best, is Don taking the 5th wheel to civilization for treatment, leaving me to work.
Plan C, we both leave for somewhere near medical attention, preferably where I can work off our site fees at least.
So many people here have been so wonderful to us. The Front Desk team, having lost several desk clerks is still pulling together and doing a great job, as if to show Don that he trained them well, and that although they would like him back, he is not to fret. Don has pretty well chosen his crown prince and the assistants to be, so they should be OK if we have to leave.
A wonderful man who has been driving the employee shuttle van idly asked me a few weeks ago if he could train as my substitute just in case. It didn’t seem that urgent then, and it would require changing the way we handle funds, so I let it slide. He has now had three mornings of training, and since he is both better at numbers than I am, and worked at a Post Office in a former life, he is pretty well up to speed. This particular Post Office has a lot of idiosyncrasies, some due to lack of standard PO machines (like no postage meter or cash register) and some due to its role as banking office for the operation. It was a daunting learning curve for me, as you may recall, and still has very hectic days where it’s all I can do to get through it all. He “soloed” today in the Post Office, so he’s ready to fly it now.
An amazing number of people here have shared their cancer survival stories, and Don reminds himself that his aunt, who as a young woman lost a lung to TB and was given 6 months to live, lived a long life to age 80.
Me, I am of two minds. I like challenges and emergencies. But I also fear being a long term caretaker again, and am not happy about the idea of being planted in one place.
Today, Friday July 17, we learned that Don has stage IV lung cancer which has now spread to his liver. We stood at the oncologist’s office and looked at the PET scan files. Since cancer cells live at a high rate of metabolism, the isotope that was injected gets collected faster there, and the tumors light up like miniature supernovas. We could see the one in the lung, but also more and bigger blobs of light in the liver. Since the cancer is now on the road in there, operating is useless, and so is radiation. Chemo may well lengthen his life, and we haven’t ruled that out.
It seems best to head for VA where two of his daughters live. So, on Monday we will very sadly leave the North Rim, and head out on the last great road trip while he can still drive. We will revisit some favorite places, stop and see family and friends along the way, and end up somewhere in the Richmond area. There we will see another oncologist, and ponder treatments. We will continue to make short trips as long as it is still fun. The doctors remind us that there is no way to predict how this will go, nor how long it will take for sure. 6 months seems to be the average for what he has.
So gentle reader, the tone of this story has taken a sad turn, but an interesting one. Many questions, some never will be answered. Tears, regrets that he will never see these magnificent rock formations again, that we won’t go to Alaska together, that he won’t get to ride a mule down into the canyon. I will lose a darling companion.
About two weeks ago, Don decided that his cough and some shortness of breath needed to be taken to a doctor. At the hospital in Kanab UT, and X-ray showed a mass in his lung, and a CAT scan showed it more clearly.
So he went off to St. George to see a lung Dr, and had a biopsy done.
During the procedure, his lung collapsed. Not really a huge deal, happens fairly often when you poke at lungs, since they are a spongy collapsible sac that is pretty much held in place by air pressure, and sort of mildly stuck to the chest wall. A tube was put in to get the air rearranged, and the lung is back to position. After some monitoring, Don was sent home with oxygen to await the test results, for a week.
The oxygen system consists of a gray sort of R2D2 machine that purrs along, extracting pure oxygen from the air. He wears the standard double pronged nose tube ( canula) and has enough tubing to go anywhere in the RV. There is another concentrator in the Lodge office for work time, and cylinders on a trolley for in between.
Getting this all lined up was a little nerve wracking as someone dropped the ball and the second load wasn’t delivered on time, but the young man who delivered it reassured me that if we need anything just call and he will be on his way. It turns out he is related to the guy who brings the mail down from Fredonia Az every day, so although the physical distances out here are huge, it felt strangely like Wales. The small (2,000) town in MA where I raised my kids, where everyone knows everyone and most are related.
Don is, as you might imagine, both scared of what the future holds, and angry that his body has failed him, especially the very visible badge of infirmity, the oxygen. There are a lot of things we want to do and see, sort of imaginary pictures on the wall, and they have dimmed. It is always possible that this will be repaired and we can carry on, but the odds have shortened.
We got a phone call saying that the mass is indeed malignant. At first it made me want to run and hide, just sort of go in some closet until it is all over. But the fact is, that there are many types of cancers of the lung, and this is not the worst, because inoperable, small cell cancer. ( Yes, I did go on line and scare myself a bit)
So today is Sat, July 11, and we have to wait until next Friday to learn more. We will go into St. George that Thurs night, hit the Super 8, and be ready for the doctors and their machines in the morning.
Plan A would be to get whatever done and return to the North Rim, where I can still work while he recuperates. But since he will likely need ongoing procedures, and bad lungs at 8,800 feet is a bad idea, more likely there will be a move.
Plan B, thin at best, is Don taking the 5th wheel to civilization for treatment, leaving me to work.
Plan C, we both leave for somewhere near medical attention, preferably where I can work off our site fees at least.
So many people here have been so wonderful to us. The Front Desk team, having lost several desk clerks is still pulling together and doing a great job, as if to show Don that he trained them well, and that although they would like him back, he is not to fret. Don has pretty well chosen his crown prince and the assistants to be, so they should be OK if we have to leave.
A wonderful man who has been driving the employee shuttle van idly asked me a few weeks ago if he could train as my substitute just in case. It didn’t seem that urgent then, and it would require changing the way we handle funds, so I let it slide. He has now had three mornings of training, and since he is both better at numbers than I am, and worked at a Post Office in a former life, he is pretty well up to speed. This particular Post Office has a lot of idiosyncrasies, some due to lack of standard PO machines (like no postage meter or cash register) and some due to its role as banking office for the operation. It was a daunting learning curve for me, as you may recall, and still has very hectic days where it’s all I can do to get through it all. He “soloed” today in the Post Office, so he’s ready to fly it now.
An amazing number of people here have shared their cancer survival stories, and Don reminds himself that his aunt, who as a young woman lost a lung to TB and was given 6 months to live, lived a long life to age 80.
Me, I am of two minds. I like challenges and emergencies. But I also fear being a long term caretaker again, and am not happy about the idea of being planted in one place.
Today, Friday July 17, we learned that Don has stage IV lung cancer which has now spread to his liver. We stood at the oncologist’s office and looked at the PET scan files. Since cancer cells live at a high rate of metabolism, the isotope that was injected gets collected faster there, and the tumors light up like miniature supernovas. We could see the one in the lung, but also more and bigger blobs of light in the liver. Since the cancer is now on the road in there, operating is useless, and so is radiation. Chemo may well lengthen his life, and we haven’t ruled that out.
It seems best to head for VA where two of his daughters live. So, on Monday we will very sadly leave the North Rim, and head out on the last great road trip while he can still drive. We will revisit some favorite places, stop and see family and friends along the way, and end up somewhere in the Richmond area. There we will see another oncologist, and ponder treatments. We will continue to make short trips as long as it is still fun. The doctors remind us that there is no way to predict how this will go, nor how long it will take for sure. 6 months seems to be the average for what he has.
So gentle reader, the tone of this story has taken a sad turn, but an interesting one. Many questions, some never will be answered. Tears, regrets that he will never see these magnificent rock formations again, that we won’t go to Alaska together, that he won’t get to ride a mule down into the canyon. I will lose a darling companion.
posted by Thistledown24 at 4:47 PM
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