Well, good news and bad news again. Judy has had a lot of trouble with fever spikes during the night, usually around mid-night. When she got in touch with her oncologist, she was told that she thought it was probably "tumor fevers". Apparently when the tumors die and are flushed into the kidneys they clog things up and cause infections, etc. So the dying tumors sound encouraging, but the fever spikes are taken quite seriously and can be fatal. They put her on two tablets of Aleve, twice a day to help control the tumor fevers. Its too early to tell if this will work, or if it will be just one more pill that she has a hard time taking because she is feeling so poorly.
Unfortunatley, last night Judy had the worst night ever. She was up every hour or two most of the night, feeling quite ill and often accompanied by fevers. She got up this morning and ate a little then went back to bed.
Aunt Bunny has been coming over every few days and helping Judy go through the boxes that she never got around to unpacking. They have gotten through most of them, have organized the basement storage and are wanting to get into the boxes of pictures and sort them out. That will start the process of writing Judy's life history, with a full compliment of pictures (and perhaps even a few videos for the DVD version).
Looks like we are going to have to cancel our cruise and try again later, if at all. She is scheduled to see her oncologist again on Feb 17th. We are again anxious to see the reading for her tumor maker.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Saturday, Jan 24, 2009
Judy had her monthly appointment earlier this week with Dr Buys, her oncologist. It was one of those good news/bad news deals. I asked the oncologist if she had reconsidered her prognosis of Judy lately. She thought a moment and said that Judy had actually deteriorated more slowly than she had expected, so she thought that was good news. However, when Judy began explaining her new symptom (numbness in her left chin and jaw) the nurse said that it, combined with her unmanageable nausea indicated a possible brain tumor. She went into the neurosciences new MRI unit this afternoon for another brain scan, this time with a more powerful imaging machine. We won't know the results until sometime next week. A brain tumor was one of the ways that the oncologist had told us that Judy might succumb.
They also put her on a new medication (Reglan) to help her bowels move the food through and perhaps decrease the nausea. She went on it and it did get rid of most of the nausea, but it caused sever stomach bloating and pain. They then instructed her to half the Reglan and start taking GasX to control the bloating. That combination seems to work pretty well.
Judy got quite sick last night around 8:00 PM. We had Brother Miller, from across the street, come in and help give her a blessing. He blessed her that the fever would be taken from her and that she would know Heavenly Father's will concerning her situation. By midnight her fever was gone and she felt much better! As far as I know, the balance of the blessing has not yet been granted.
They also put her on a new medication (Reglan) to help her bowels move the food through and perhaps decrease the nausea. She went on it and it did get rid of most of the nausea, but it caused sever stomach bloating and pain. They then instructed her to half the Reglan and start taking GasX to control the bloating. That combination seems to work pretty well.
Judy got quite sick last night around 8:00 PM. We had Brother Miller, from across the street, come in and help give her a blessing. He blessed her that the fever would be taken from her and that she would know Heavenly Father's will concerning her situation. By midnight her fever was gone and she felt much better! As far as I know, the balance of the blessing has not yet been granted.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Well, Judy ended up in the hospital last week trying to get her blocked bile duct unblocked. They put her on IV antibiotics overnight and the jaundice, the fevers and the pain all stopped by the next morning. They toyed with replacing the stint right away, but ultimately decided to wait until the end of her 3 months to do it. That would have been on Jan 26. The surgeon was already just way over committed.
However, they called back mid-week and said they had decided to move it up and so they rescheduled her for yesterday morning at 6 am. I really dislike those early morning surgery appointments. They are so hard on both Judy and me.
The surgery went very well and we got home about noon. Judy had a good rest in the afternoon and we were actually able to go to our Ward Temple Night last night. One of the sisters in the Ward (Sister Mordecai, who I have home taught for many months now) took her under wing and helped her throughout the evening. She did really well!
On the way home we stopped at Cafe Rio and picked up some soup and salad and she was able to eat a larger than normal portion of that. However, she has lost a lot of weight this last year, dropping from 220 lbs to 160 lbs. She now looks like an emaciated little old lady. She is little more than skin and bones. She looses 1-3 lbs per week. She just has little appetite, and when she does eat it often comes back up. The Ward is really good about bringing food in, but she just doesn't eat much. She often feels too nauseated to eat!
Perhaps today will be a better day!
However, they called back mid-week and said they had decided to move it up and so they rescheduled her for yesterday morning at 6 am. I really dislike those early morning surgery appointments. They are so hard on both Judy and me.
The surgery went very well and we got home about noon. Judy had a good rest in the afternoon and we were actually able to go to our Ward Temple Night last night. One of the sisters in the Ward (Sister Mordecai, who I have home taught for many months now) took her under wing and helped her throughout the evening. She did really well!
On the way home we stopped at Cafe Rio and picked up some soup and salad and she was able to eat a larger than normal portion of that. However, she has lost a lot of weight this last year, dropping from 220 lbs to 160 lbs. She now looks like an emaciated little old lady. She is little more than skin and bones. She looses 1-3 lbs per week. She just has little appetite, and when she does eat it often comes back up. The Ward is really good about bringing food in, but she just doesn't eat much. She often feels too nauseated to eat!
Perhaps today will be a better day!
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Thursday, January 8th
The liver ultra sounds did not show anything to be alarmed about. Judy is scheduled to next see the oncologist on Jan 20th and have her bile duct stint replaced on Jan 26th. However, this schedule will probably have to be advanced, as she is turning yellow again. She had a fairly good day a few days ago, but has since been in bed most of the time, including most of the day today.
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