Good News and Gallstones

Can you believe it's been over a week since I last posted?  I've been rather busy around here.  I've had lots of visitors and expecting more next week.  However that is for another post. 

Last Friday wasn't fabulous at all.  Thursday evening I had gone to dinner with my cousins and didn't feel super well afterwards.  They were all trying to convince me to leave that night to go see the Grand Canyon.  Our plan was to go to Sedona on Friday.  I'm so glad that I didn't give into the peer pressure. 

Friday morning around 6 I started having some intense cramping in my epigastric region.  It was like what I assume contractions feel like.  They came and went and some were pretty intense.  I would breath through them as the sweat engulfed me and my heart raced. 

Around 8:30 I called my doctors office.  But a little before 10 when they hadn't called me back we drove there.  I felt like a crazy lady (and probably looked like one too) going to my doctors without an appointment, but come on I'm a cancer patient and I was in some crazy pain.

I knew they were going to tell me to go to the ER, but being an ER PA, that is the last place I want to go when I'm not working.  At that point I didn't care though.  I'm glad I went to my doctors first, because they told me to go to a specific ER where my doctor was there doing surgery. 

Thankfully there was only 1 other woman that was ahead of me when I got to the ER, even though it took them an hour to get me back in a room.  Meanwhile, Alisha had to get me into a wheelchair before I passed out from the intense crazy pain that I was having.  It sounds like I'm exagerrating here, but I promise I'm not. 

I must say, I was immensely impressed with the hospital.  The care I received and the massive rooms made me feel like I was in First Class.  The ER doctor actually met me in the room as they wheeled me in.  He was so awesome.  They did blood work and a CT scan and then the pain seemed to go away. 

After a few hours the ER Doc came to inform me that I had a partial bowel obstruction, which is typically caused from adhesions (or scarring) from my previous surgery.  The bad, very bad news was that they needed to put an NG tube in my nose and down my throat to pump my stomach.  I held it together until the actual procedure and then my tears started.  I had this done twice when I was in the hospital for 15 days remember?  I knew exactly what this entailed and I wasn't happy about it one bit.  The good thing was that they did numb my throat, but it didn't help the intense pain that goes along with sticking a tube into your nose. 

Thanks to Morphine, it did decrease the pain for a short time, but that's exactly how Morphine works...it's short acting. 

Oh, but the real culprit, that I knew all along because I had an Ultra Sound in May is the massive Gallstones; at least 3 of them.  An ultrasound was also done at my bedside when I got up to the floor, which was awesime, to see if there was a stone in the common bile duct, which there wasn't.  I wish there had been and I wouldn't still be having pain from the gigantic gallstones that sit in my gallbladder.  I don't know why they didn't just remove it then, however if they had I wouldn't have had the fun I did this past weekend.

Dr. J came into see me around 8pm.  My 5 cousins were there when he came in.  We informed him that we had planned a cousins reunion that weekend.  He was so nice to me, which gave me a different take on him from my previous encounter.  While looking at the CT scan at my bedside, he said that he wasn't totally convinced that I had a true bowel obstruction.  If I did have the bowel obstruction, I'm sure it was cleared by the time I had the CT scan.  I'll leave out those details for your imagination. 

I'm positive my pain was from a full on gallstone attack.  It was miserable.  I still have pain when I eat, if I don't eat and in between.

Thankfully around 1am when I couldn't sleep the nurse took out the NG tube and by morning I was ready to go have some fun with my cousins.

The GOOD NEWS:  The tumor on the vaginal/anal wall was not seen on the CT scan.  I can't tell you how happy this makes me.  There are still multiple nodules that are calcified which means the chemo is doing it's job. 

Last night I read a scripture that pretty much sums up my feelings on this matter,
Luke 18:27 "The things which are impossible with men are possible with God."  I know that these results are because of the many prayers that are being said in my behalf to our loving Heavenly Father.  He hears our prayers and He answers them in his own timing. 

It is my hope that continued chemo and miracles will dissolve all signs of cancer and that I will continue to see the miracles that are possible with God's help.