What a sunset!

I drove home from work tonight just as the sun set over the Great Salt Lake. Wow! Absolutely gorgeous. I haven't seen one that good for months. We live about half an hour west of my office building along Interstate 80 so I got to see the reds, pinks, oranges and yellows all the way home. Perfect way to end the day.

God sure made a beautiful place for us to live.

Life is Good

Guess who's reading books again? Yep, that would be me. I'm on my third book since surgery. The best part is that I want to read and I'm enjoying each book. I love being done with cancer treatment. And for Fiona, my second book was "The Book Thief." Wow. That is a different book, but a great story. I quite liked it. Now I am almost finished with "The Scarlet Pimpernel." Good stuff.

Guess who started back to work this week? Yep, that would be me. After seeing my surgeon last Thursday, he said I was able to return to work whenever I wanted. So I talked with my supervisor at the office and we agreed I would work partial days this week with the goal of working up to full shifts by next week. The good news is that so far my ability to concentrate and stay focused has improved immensely since I've been off of chemo. There's a surprise!

Guess who's going back to college? Yep, that would be me. I started thinking about finishing up my course work at Westminster College over this last weekend. Another sign I'm done with my cancer treatment. On Monday I dropped by the campus and visited with one of the professors in my department. He was excited to have me back and felt confident that we could get me graduated by next May (only 12 months after I was originally supposed to finish). I'll be going back on Tuesday and Thursday nights starting the end of August.

Guess who still hasn't had any accidents since coming home from the hospital? Yep, that would be me. Now that I'm done with my cancer treatment it is all about the poop. Or at least it certainly seems that way. I am happy to report that diarrhea is mostly a thing of the past. Soft and clumpy is a vast improvement. Things to improve would include my sphincter not feeling like it's on fire each time it passes anything (radiation damage) and less noise and gas from the new plumbing. Boy, does it make some great, gurgley sound effects. Even in public.

Guess who's pretty happy being done with cancer treatment? Yep, that would be me. What a crazy year it has been. Each day I feel a bit more human, a bit more like the other people around me. Just tonight I was over at our church and some respected friends of mine commented on how much more animated I am. One of them said I was even talking in whole sentences instead of short phrases. So there you go. I am back to talking as much as I ever did. I am still me! All in all, I have to say that life is good.

Timed Voids

First things first, I am home. They kicked me out of the hospital Monday afternoon. Of course, it helped that they also thought I was ready to leave.

I ended up not getting any kind of an appetite back until Wednesday night, so those first days home were interesting. I had to try and stay hydrated, my body was trying to recover from surgery, and my new plumbing was trying to make sense of itself all with little or no food to work with. This led to continual cramps, bloating, gas, diarrhea, dry heaves, all the fun stuff. I managed it with pain meds and forced eating. We stayed on soft foods like chicken noodle soup, yogurt, and protein drinks. (May I just say here that I love my wife. She is one strong force in my life.)

Sometime on Wednesday night I realized my salivary glands were running overtime. And I was craving food! So I headed to the kitchen and fixed myself a grilled cheese sandwich with Campbell's tomato soup. Dipping those sandwich strips into that creamy soup was pure pleasure on the palette, and my first real meal in a week. Eating has improved each day since. Yay! Eating is such a cool part of life.

Of course with more food comes more waste which leads me to the next part of this update...

So far so good on the bum end of things. I've been given enough trusted advice on this topic to feel pretty good about our progress. For example, no major mishaps since we've been home. (And yes, if you want to read between the lines put the emphasis on since.) This means I am getting to the toilet in time. 

Let's put this into perspective.

1) My pelvis received massive amounts of radiation pre surgery.

2) An extremely important part of my large intestines is missing, as in my rectum.

3) There is currently no communication between my new plumbing and my brain. Full and empty are indiscernible.

4) All I have produced since surgery is gas and diarrhea. Lots.

Under the circumstances I am pretty darn proud of my little sphincter at the end of the line. In spite of its own aches and pains it is doing its job admirably. That's a great start.

Oh, I almost forgot.

A friend, who is also a nurse, asked me how I was getting along the other night. I explained the situation and said that I was simply hitting the restroom at regular intervals to stay ahead of any accidents. He smiled and said, "You know, there's a name for that. It's called timed voids."

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there!
Unfortunately, Steve didn't get to go home for Father's Day. That would have been the best father's day present he could have had. I think he is getting tired of being here at the hospital, but doesn't know what he can do to make it happen. He is still having problems with nausea and has no appetite or real energy.
 I ended up leaving to go home around noon so that I could take a shower ( it had been three days since my last one), change clothes, attend church with the kids, etc. The kids and I all came back to the hospital at 4:00 p.m., but Steve wasn't feeling up to much visiting.  They gave Steve a large card they had made for him and a small plate of peanut butter cookies. They went home at 5:30 so that he could keep resting. We'll just have to have a delayed father's day celebration when he is finally feeling well enough to enjoy it.

This to shall pass...

Today got off to a bit of a rough start. When I arrived just before 7 a.m., I walked in just as Steve was starting to feel nauseated. When the nausea persisted, we let the nurses know what was going on and they gave him some medicine to help.  He ended up getting a couple of doses of anti-nausea medicine throughout the day. It seemed to help a bit, but he didn't have any appetite the whole day. Around the middle of the day he started passing gas. Unfortunately, with the gas also came some diarrhea. Steve ended up sleeping for most of the day. I'm hoping all the extra sleep will be helpful to his poor body and that he has a better day tomorrow.

Visitors Galore

Today was perfectly fun. Not much happening yet on the bum end of things. After a day on ice chips yesterday, I was given a clear liquid diet today. Lots of soup broth, jello, tea, water, juices and popsicles. Breakfast lunch and dinner were all the same. But, it is slowly getting things moving. At least it's making lots of gurgles and growls down in my bowels. I am told that when I can pass a little gas they will switch me to soft foods. So far I can burp. :-)

Carla joined me from home early this morning. In fact, she'll be leaving for home again tonight. Nathan drove all of our children out to visit over lunch. Carla brought in pizza for everyone and we played our Apples to Apples card game. I of course sipped my soup broth like a good boy. We had a great time together and nobody got kicked out for making too much noise.

When the kids left, I was just lying down to catch a nap when my neighbor, Mark, showed up. So Carla took a nap while the two of us visited. I took a walk around the hallway with Carla when Mark left and was just lying down for that nap when my Bishop (church leader) and his daughter showed up for a visit. Cool. No sooner did we see them off when Carla's parents showed up. I fell asleep before they left. :-}

We walked past my surgeon, Dr. Sklow, in the hallway during one of those walks. He was here on his rounds. He said he'll most likely put me on soft foods in the morning to take the next step in waking up my large intestines. Toast, noodles, things like that. Should be fun. That toast is going to taste pretty good by then. He was pleased that we were getting some walking in and said that our progress was normal and not to worry. Patience...

All in all it was a fun day. Any pain around my old stoma sight is minimal, with some swelling and tenderness in places. I still feel a bit bloated at times. I can press the magic morphine button for pain relief as needed. I'm sure that has been helping. My night crew just checked in. The nursing staff changes every 12 hours on the 7's. It takes the next shift awhile to make their rounds. I'll be in good hands again tonight.

I'll stop here and get this posted. Carla will leave next, and then we'll see if I get any late night visitors besides the staff. :-)

See you all in the morning...

Sleeping in my own bed

Good morning,

Steve had a good night with the usual interrupted sleep you get in a hospital. He actually had one of the aides he had during his earlier surgery assigned to him for the night. John was one of our favorites and knowing he was looking after Steve allowed me to go home, see the kids, and get a better nights sleep in my own bed myself.

I was back at the hospital at 6:45 a.m. and just missed the visit from the surgical team. They had changed the packing material where Stanley used to be. Steve has already completed a couple of walks since I had saw him last night. He is looking a lot better and has a lot more energy than he did yesterday. He went for another walk after I arrived, hoping to relieve some bloating in his abdominal area. He is now on a clear liquid diet and had chicken broth and a bit of jello to kick things off. Having eaten and exercised he is taking a short nap.