My leukemia's back.

[getaclue]

Bunny,

 

[Alaskan]

They did a CT scan yesterday while I was there. Nobody seemed to know why; maybe they were told, and forgot, or maybe someone didn't feel like dealing with a hard-of-hearing old person who might or might not be focused at the moment. I thought that they might be looking for the mysterious bleeding that keeps making her anemic so often (not showing up in stool, so probably not in digestive system). I haven't heard anything further about it; don't know if my brother has heard anything or not.

There are so many things going on, it's hard for me to keep straight, and so many medical personnel involved that I wonder if any of them really have the whole picture. First, there's the cancer. Then, there's the pulmonary fibrosis, and the pulmonary thrombosis which one doctor thought the clots were migrating from the legs to the lungs but another says no, the clots aren't coming from there so there's no point in installing a filter. Respiratory says that she has a habit of shallow breathing, so she isn't even using the lung capacity that she has. A few days ago, they said some of the problems are because of fluid building up in her body, and they put in a catheter and started giving her Lasix. Plus, she developed a rapid/irregular heartbeat, which is why she is now on the cardiac floor rather than oncology. Tonight, her heart has been racing again, and her bp has been low; from what my brother has told me, things have been so dicey we may be looking at days rather than weeks.

Yep. . It is very difficult to get everything coordinated when so many doctors are involved . My dad even had one doctor whose entire job was to just coordinate all care...

And no...it still wasn't always clear...

 

[Alaskan]

Bummer. We've had to cancel the party; she's really not up to any of it. Her oncologist wants her moved to Hospice. I don't know what kind of timeline we are looking at here.

So sorry

 

[FridayYet]

Bummer. We've had to cancel the party; she's really not up to any of it. Her oncologist wants her moved to Hospice. I don't know what kind of timeline we are looking at here.

 

[Alaskan]

Long time!

How have you been?

 

[sourland]

@FridayYet

 

[Bunnylady]

There may not have been a party, per se, but Mom had a lot of visitors yesterday. Several members of their church came by; bringing flowers, or cards, or edibles. BB2K made some cupcakes (chocolate coconut ) and Mom liked them well enough she asked for another bite (she isn't eating much, remember, and sweets generally don't appeal at all to her). My brother's stepdaughter brought his ex around. I hope that visit went well; I didn't ask, and nobody told. Because Mom was being moved to a nearby hospice at 8:00 p.m, several of the hospital staff stopped in the room to say goodbye.

As pleasant as it was to see all (well, most) of my family together, I'm sorry but I didn't take any pictures. I've never been much of a shutterbug, and I really don't want pictures of Mom like that . . . I have more mental snapshots than I want as it is, thank you very much (and I'm sure there are more of those to come).

I don't know - Mom might have been up for some party after all. She's on morphine now, so she sleeps a lot, but when she was awake she sounded a little stronger. At one point yesterday, she noticed my son fidgeting a bit, and said, "you've had about as much of a hospital room as you can stand, haven't you? So have I."

 

[Blooie]

This is all so hard to hear....sounds like that party, regardless of what kind of party it turned out to be, was just what the doctors DIDN’T order. Feeling loved and appreciated goes such a long way toward finding peace of mind and heart.

 

[Bunnylady]

I agree. Cards and cupcakes and having her whole family in the room at one time may be all she really could handle, but she's the one who said, "party," so I hope she wasn't too disappointed when it didn't come off.

 

[getaclue]

Bunny, There were cupcakes, so it was a party. A smaller party is still a party, and probably not as overwhelming for her as a big one. Just so it lifted her spirits, which it sounds like it did. I'm not much of a shutterbug either.