It's been a while.

Tuesday was my important appointment with the Grand Poo-Bahs of the GI service. I'll make it short. They were absolutely wonderful. I've rarely met doctors that respectful of a patient, that invested in explaining everything, that sympathetic to what a patient was going through, in my life. The head guy is nearly 80!!! His Fellow spent most of the time with me (what a sweetheart), then he came in as clean-up man, just like in baseball. The Fellow told me that the Big Guy was very, very conservative in his treatments, so you can imagine the Fellow's and my surprise with Big Guy prescribed a very aggressive course of treatment. He kicked me  up to predisone; a long-acting anti-inflammatory specifically for the bowel; a rectal suppository that treats inflammation, and an anti-cancer drug used in leukemia treatment. My immune system will be taken down so that it will stop attacking my intestines. Yes, I'll be vulnerable to infections, and I'll probably be on the chemo for months. They predicted that I could gain as much as 50 lbs., and that it's possible my hair could fall out.

Only the weight bothers me, and it bothers me to the point of terror when I think about it. Therefore, I've blocked it from my mind. 

They ran some blood tests. One is to make sure that genetically, I can take the chemo without problems. Another was to get a baseline blood value to watch how it is affecting my body. They checked my anemia again. It was remaining stable at 10, which isn't normal, but is damn good compared to before. No transfusion necessary. They also were re-checking my liver values, which were abnormal.

My protein and albumen were exceedingly low. I was startled, and asked how that could be if I were taking in over twice what is required for a woman my age and weight? The Big Guy said that the disease was causing malabsorption, and I wasn't getting much of the nutrition, including protein, that I was eating. He expected that once the inflammation was under control, I'd be able to use the protein again. Then my horrendous edema would go away. By looking at me, he estimated my weight as 100 or so. I told him I thought that was right, and that I'd been very good about trying to gain weight. But my weight on the scale was 121. Eleven pounds of water. That's gonna be some piss-fest once it starts to go.

He also said I should go back to eating normal food, and don't have to be on the low-fiber/residue diet. He said if it were going to work, it already would have. He said he didn't put patients on it except post-op. I was grateful for that, as you might imagine. I'm thinking of all the things I can cook/eat now. I'm pretty sure I'll make sloppy joes tomorrow. Chili the next day. I'll lay off hot peppers, cayenne, etc., since I know they irritate me even under the best of circumstances. He said if there's a food which bothers you once you go back to normal eating, just avoid that.

I have the fixin's for a nice pot roast, or maybe beef stew, here. I would have made them anyway, only with peeled potatoes and no peas, etc. Now I can have them the usual way.

Let's pray this works. If it does, I'll be overjoyed. Maybe I can even go to bed and sleep for several hours. I long to do that. Just so, so, exhausted and weak. 

Chick hasn't been on his bicycle for a few days. I've loved having him home. I feel safe, secure, warm, etc. What's weird is that usually he's watching movies or painting, and I'm reading either a book or on line. So we're not constantly interacting or anything. It's just comforting and wonderful to have him here. 

It was very odd to hear about the earthquake back east. My god! That's what happens here, not there. Then there was one in Colorado, I believe, around the same magnitude, today. WTH?? Scorching heat, which killed people from a variety of states; fires, tornadoes. No wonder some people believe the world will end in 2012. Spooky.


If I go bald, or nearly so, I'm going to learn how to tie scarves in pretty and varied ways, and go that way instead of hats or--god forbid!--wigs. I found a place on line that specializes in scarves for Orthodox Jewish women, and it has the most beautiful stuff. There are a bunch of videos on YouTube on tying scarves, too, so I'll actually see how to do it instead of just reading about it. 


Since you guys having EDs, too, you know how much the thought of gaining that much weight upsets me. Alarms me. Okay, petrifies me. Let's get off that subject again.


I didn't check my email once today. I'll bet my inbox has a zillion emails to go through. Let's go see. . .


Take care of yourselves, my friends. I think about each and every one of you daily. Soon I'll get back to the informational posts. I've been too under the weather to do much real thinking. But I'm planning on getting better, so you'll just have to put up with it! :~)