Saturday, April 21, 2007

Well it's been a couple of days since I blogged. Not doing so good at frequency of the posts!

Healing continues on a daily basis and I have been trying to get out a bit more. Only did fluids 3 days this past week and we do not have anything scheduled for the weekend or next week. I am keeping hydrated well enough at this point to avoid more needle pokes. Andrea and I went to the office this past week for a little bit; it was really nice to see everyone again! Even though I am getting out more it doesn't take too long before I am wiped out. Not much endurance at this point; I think the body is sending the message to take it easy and let if focus on the healing.

The throat and mouth are getting better every day. The throat is still a bit sore but liquids are going down fine. The mouth sores are down to only one left this morning. My neck still has a pretty good burn spot going on the left side but when Andrea is cleaning it she is seeing a lot of new skin growing so it is healing. None of it is as fast as I would like but I can be a bit impatient!

Last night we decided to try some food via the mouth. We went with vanilla ice cream to take it easy on the throat. I was actually able to taste the vanilla ice cream and put some chocolate syrup on it because I can taste it too! This was the first time in a very long time that I have eaten like a normal person! It was great! The best is that I could taste what I was eating; not a full taste like before but the flavor was there. I guess my taste buds didn't get to destroyed in the process of radiation. I'll be trying more foods as the days go by.

Once I am back on a full diet through the mouth and maintaining my weight I can get rid of the feeding tube! I can't wait!

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Healing is the word at this point. They did say that some things would get worse before things got better...it was true! Both the chemo and radiation are cumulative and continue functioning even after the administration of either has been done. So...I still have zits (they seem to be coming in more now than before!!!) and I have a couple of really good burns going on the neck due to the last 10 radiations, as they were focused down tighter onto Bill and Earl than the first 28.

Based upon past time lines, e.g. when I had to break and we saw how that went, we are hoping that by this weekend we should start to see more positive improvement to normalcy. In the head when the treatments stop you really expect to see things improving over night right!?!?!? Maybe just me! Maybe I want to be done with all this and back to normal so bad I can't stand it! Or just an impatient old man!

At this point my tongue is still giving me hell and since Saturday the throat started to hurt. Once we can get past these two minor items I am hopeful to start eating again through my mouth! Even if I can't taste much at this point it will be a good thing...hopefully next week.

Let's talk cabin fever. Since I went on leave from work I have seen the inside of our house, the inside of two RMCC locations and one other doctors office. As these were the only places we went I know every blade of grass and every tree - I was on vicodine so they may be a bit fuzzy!!! But that was it! Kind of like watching reruns of Welcome Back Kotter! So.....last Sunday we got up and I was feeling really good (we are trying to get away from some of the multitude of drugs as well- so I am using Advil for pain instead of the heavy stuff!) Anyway, I was feeling really good, the weather was good, and we - Andrea has been stuck looking at most of these walls as well - so we loaded up the Saturn and went for a Sunday afternoon drive!!! You have know idea how nice that was for both of us! I have to be really careful in the sun now so we pretty much kept to the car but Red Rocks was as gorgeous as ever! It was really a nice break!

As the healing continues I will try to be a bit more diligent in getting my blog updated. I have an appointment with the oncologist this morning - just a check up and then we'll figure out whatever.

Have a good day and enjoy the little things....didn't the air smell great this morning after the rain last night? I know it did to me.