Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Did I Ever Tell You Something Gross

This one will be slightly gross for the record...

I have to be honest and candid in my chronicle of this experience if I am going to bother writing about it.  My shame is secondary to my recording of this time of my life.   Lucky the experience thus far has destroyed most of my sense of modesty.   Here we go...you have bee warned.

I am quite tired of shitting myself at this point.   A 42 year old man has no business changing his boxers as often as I have been lately.  It seems my window from “I think I have to use the bathroom” to “where is the goddamned bathroom” is basically nil.  I can't even blink in the space between the two and it is getting annoying.  I have even been wearing Depends sporadically just to be safe.   Like I said before lucky I have no shame left.

Urinating is basically the same deal with the slight change of it not wanting to flow when it can.   The poo flows freely while the pee just likes to make itself known while not leaving.   The poo is a guest eager to depart via any opening it can find (prematurely ) while the pee is a guest content to stay and complain about its surroundings.

This probably didn't need to be posted to be honest, but this is a chronicle of what I am going through with this cancer and bowel mishaps are part of the saga.  I am Just shocked at how frequent they are.   I think a newborn has better bowel control at this point than I do.

Sorry to be gross

Still love ya, G-d

The modern day Job.

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Did I Ever Tell You About the Time I Suddenly Stopped Posting for a Month

I know, my faithful reader aka “mom”, that I have not been updating you and I am sorry for that.   As you know, it was a rough month.   And I am personally still amazed at the healing power of denial.  We need to bottle some of this shot,and fast.

“Hi, my name is Kanrei when online, and I have cancer.    The doctors have tried a myriad of drug concoctions on me: I've drank, swallowed, and had injected into me more drugs than a Grateful Dead parking lot pre-show ever saw.    You name it and I've tried it and none of it worked until I gave into the healing power of denial.”

6 weeks of radiation and chemo therapy?   Denial tells me I'm just stressed and it is nothing to worry about.

But what about the second degree radiation burn on your ass...not part of your ass, but ON YOUR ASS?  I've had worse sunburns.  

Lost over 40 pounds in 12 weeks?   Hey, I always needed to drop the pounds.    I've never looked better.

And passing blood instead of stool?   Hemroids.

Yeah, that denial stuff rocks.    But seriously, it has been a ry hard month.   I was put in the hospital a month ago and stayed there for twelve days, during which I had to have three blood transfusions and 24 feeding supplement via IV.    I don't remember much for those twelve days, but I am told I got tired of waiting for death and went a knock, knock, knocking on death’s front door.

And let me tell you, there is no rest being done in any hospital, period.  Every two hours someone is coming in to poke, prod, inject, or check on you.   And those few precious moments between the poking, prodding, injecting, and checking I would be serenaded by the machines I was hooked up to beeping, buzzing, and roaring the time away.

And I personally blame my needing supplemental nutrition directly on the cuisine served.    It is not food y any definition of the word I have ever heard of.  I was literally dying from malnutrition and the last thing the hospital provided was eatable food.   My mother and I actually got into fights over my refusal to eat.    I do remember saying to her “you taste this; if you can swallow it, then I will.”  She did and she couldn't so I didn't have to.   There was a two day window where they accidentally served food, but overall it rejected by the CIA as too cruel to serve. Suspected terrorists.

After twelve days, I was released, but not free.  I was put on 12 hour nutrition supplement via a port hey placed in a main vein.  The purpose of the poet is to save my veins.   I can tell you after 12 days of having blood drawn daily, your veins don't bounce back.   He port saves me lots of painful pricks.

Anyway, as I was saying, I was still on 12 hour supplement, so I was hardly free.    For the next two weeks, every day at 5pm a nurse would come to my parents’ house and plug me in.  The bag of nutrition was placed in a backpack I had to carry and sleep with.    A constant reminder that I was sick that was especially annoying when having to run to the bathroom at night.

I am sure I will complain about the experience again, but I think that is a good enough update for today.

Still love ya G-d.