November 22, 2010 Good News so far

We are on the train heading back to Wassaic and we are SO looking forward to being home! These are definitely marathon trips to NYC!  We leave the house at 7 am and get back at 7 pm.    There was just an “altercation” between a woman and the conductor..actually 2 conductors.   Oh the drama!

Bob seemed to be  doing pretty well at the beginning of last week.  By  Thursday he was low energy, voice was very rough, mucous seemed to be worse again  and he was constantly chilled. He looked pale and .....frankly pretty sick.

We were both nervous this morning.... though  we were looking forward to this  check up and getting new blood work to see what's going on in his body.

On arrival at Grand Central  Bob  had a dizzy spell  which stopped us in our tracks  for a bit...he was nauseous as well as dizzy....I thought he was going to  pass out!   Thankfully after a few minutes it passed and we headed to the subway which brings us directly to Beth Israel. We saw our dear angel Louise.

This is our "angel on earth"..Louise 

The first doctor that takes all the “info” and does the  initial exam  (I think these are docs that are being trained to specialize in this field)  found that Bob has an infection in his mouth...Thrush. Oral thrush and other candida infections can occur when your immune system is weakened by disease or drugs .

"Cancer. If you're dealing with cancer, your immune system is likely to be weakened both from the disease and from treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation, increasing your risk of candida infections such as oral thrush."
They gave him a prescription to take care of this.   I'm sure the thrush is a portion of the reason that eating has been out of the question. His mouth looks sore.

Dr. Harrison used a  scope. The scope has  a “camera” on the end that makes it possible to  see everything on the attached TV screen...amazing.....they numb his nose and feed the scope through his  nose....Here’s what Dr. Harrison   found...
NO CANCER IS VISIBLE!  HORRAY!
It was evident the area is still quite inflamed.  The entire area  where the tumor was appeared white which indicates it is healing.

Dr. Harrisons nurse Elyse  

Blood work shows that he is anemic which they are not surprised about. Other than that the blood work looks good.

The next crucial test is the PET scan on Jan 20 then Dr. Harrison will give us the results  of that on Jan 24.  He doesn’t have to go back to  the doctor until then unless something comes up and he feels the need to go.

Until then he MUST eat food..tiny amounts VERY SLOWLY!  He has to continue to rest and take it easy.  He is still on pain meds which he will start to decrease soon.

The trip home from Wassaic was a tough one for Bob. He was very nauseous again  and we pulled over for a while.  I think motion must be playing a role in feeling so sick. This is why he does so much better laying low at home.  He can then just focus on taking in food and meds when needed and resting.  All the commotion of travel messes up the routine!

We are home now and he's in bed and I'm going to bed.

Good Night