Cancer Ward

 When I was a kid I read Aleksandr Solzhenisyn's Gulag Archipelago and Cancer Ward. 

I found Cancer Ward to describe a rather dreary depressing situation in a Soviet hospital in the '40s. I hoped that I'd never get cancer.

Nothing at all like the situation I find myself in here at St Joseph's Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor. 

I wasn't supposed to start chemotherapy until today, leaving me the weekend and Monday to enjoy life a little before entering the hospital. I had intended to go to the gun range with friends and hopefully get my boat out on the lake. Friday night, our good friends the Nugents had Scherie and me over for dinner. Jeff prepared an Italian buffet that was marvelous, including dessert.

I woke up Saturday with an irritated throat. I did my radio show and except for the one guest being a half hour late for one segment, all went well. Except for the irritation in my throat. The irritation was more like a swollen gland than something like a strep infection. But it made the day less than optimal. 

I woke up Sunday with more of the same and given that I was warned that any infection could be dangerous, we called the hospital and they said please come into the ER. 

I was kept in the ER and they performed a CT scan on my neck with a number of blood draws looking to see if I had an infection or if this was similar to my swollen bleeding gums symptomatic of the leukemia. Out of caution, they admitted me to the hospital and last night found me a room in the oncology center to begin my chemo today. 

In the morning today, they put a PICC line in my right arm which is basically a catheter that goes through my vein towards my heart. This would then be used for any blood draws, transfusions, infusions of chemo, etc. 

They introduced the chemo into the PICC line along with some generic antibiotics they've been giving me for the last few days just in case I had an infection in my throat. This was generally unnoticeable by me. However, eventually I ended up with a bad case of diarrhea. I wouldn't mention that except that it seems there is a gastrointestinal infection you can get called c. Diff. And it seems that it can happen after a bout of antibiotics, which seemed contra intuitive. But very scary. It was later determined that it was probably the antibiotics killing off all the flora in my intestinal system and stomach that led to the diarrhea. No infection.

I'll have six more applications of the chemo in the next 6 days. During this time, for the next 21 to 28 days I'll be taking a tablet that is also part of the chemo regimen. They expect that in the next couple of weeks my white blood level should go down but also my red and platelet counts should go down also. It seems that the turncoat white blood cells are most susceptible to the chemo. So the clamping down of white and red blood cells along with the platelets will not be proportionally the same. An evaluation will be done after that couple of weeks.

They expect there will have to be blood transfusions around that time and perhaps more antibiotics to suppress any infection that might present itself. Interestingly enough, it seems I will be able to go for walks outside during this period of time. I did that last night, and it was quite nice. 

While I was sitting on a park bench out front, I saw a friend of mine from church at a distance. I wasn't sure it was him as I wasn't expecting him, but he turned and looked at me and stared across the parking lot. Since I was wearing my straw fedora I knew I was probably more recognizable to him than he was to me, but his locking eyes on me gave him away. Shortly after, we were joined by a couple of other buddies from church and Scherie also joined us. We talked for a while and then they laid hands on me and prayed for Scherie and me. It was very encouraging.

This won't be a diary, but it will be sort of a journal of my stay here. I won't be having daily entries, but only entries that someone might find of interest. 

In the meantime, here's a picture of a friend I made while I was outside enjoying the night air.