Cancer Sucks: The Backstory

First of all, if you have a cough that just won't go away, go to the doctor and get it checked out. That was how this all started for me. I was miserably sick for about a week at the end of November 2014. It was just one of those things, but the cough kinda hung around. I didn't think much about it, just chalking it up to asthma. It wasn't until December that my daughter came to visit and expressed concern over my cough and general breathing sounding funny to her. It was at her urging that I went to the doctor in January. A quick in-office xray revealed what I was told might be a mass in my right lung. Since it was possible that it was just pneumonia I tried antibiotics for two weeks, but when a second chest xray showed that mass was still there I was scheduled for a CT. The radiology report recommended a PET scan and/or biopsy to determine what was going on in my lung so I quickly got both of those scheduled. The PET revealed suspicious but inconclusive results. The first biopsy similarly revealed inconclusive results. However, I had an incredibly hard time recovering from the biopsy, suffering three days of what turned out to be pneumonia before ending up in the ER.

Since I was having such a hard time breathing I was admitted to the hospital during which time it was determined that they would need to do a second biopsy. When that one also turned out 'inconclusive' it was recommended that I go ahead and have an entire lobe of my right lung removed by a process called a thoracotomy. That was not fun. If you research it, you will find that it is one of the most difficult and painful surgeries to try and recover from. They make a massive incision, spread your ribs, and cut out a piece of lung. This left me in ICU for about a week with virtually no memory of the first few days after surgery although I was told that I was conscious and responsive. The pain level is truly hard to explain although the hospital did a decent job of keeping me medicated to try and alleviate it. Because the first few days were so bad I ended up with multiple blood clots in my left arm causing it to also swell and be quite painful though I got lucky that they didn't break loose and cause any more trouble.

At the end of my hospital stay it was recommended that I go to a nursing home for a short time while they made continued adjustments to my medication. That was actually the worst decision of this entire process. While I had felt that I was successfully recovering while in the hospital, my week in the nursing home seemed to not only stop my recovery but make me feel worse. They couldn't cope with my vegetarian requirements, getting nearly every meal wrong and pretty much leaving me to eat grilled cheese for every lunch and dinner. I was expected to share a room with three people, one of which was in extremely bad shape, pre-surgery, and necessitating nurses come in multiple times a night turning on lights and making massive amounts of noise. It was nearly impossible to sleep for more than about 20 minutes at a time. My own blood was drawn between 4 and 5AM every day. I was basically begging to be released home every day until they finally said yes. While I understand that nursing homes are a necessity, this is not a good option for surgery recovery if you can possibly avoid it.

I am now home and working on my recovery before entering into the chemo step of this process.