Today Friday October 18, 2013, I received a free ticket from Mercy Medical Airlift for round trip STL-DEN for Sunday October 20 departure. This would be my 22nd trip and 4th donated ticket since a little over a year ago when I started participating in clinical trial out-of-state. The ticket had cost 100,000 United Airlines miles. Ouch. Of the 200,000+ miles I have used from ACS, I have donated (out of my family and relatives mileage) about 60,000 miles back. I will never be able to give it all back, but at least tried.
I had given up on the application for donated ticket yesterday afternoon, after the coordinator at MMA failed to call me back about my credit card info (to charge a nominal fee). I emailed her to explain why I asked help for the 4th time after more than half year absence on their client roll, "if I lucked out, please let me know. I drove the 1700 miles round trip on July 1, July 29, and Sept 24, exhausting but still doable. Because I just had surgery on my shoulder on Tuesday Oct 15, so was worried about long-distance driving in less than a week. But if I have no choice, I will do it. Air tickets are too expensive for me" I have a bloody big ugly scar under my armpit, but no longer need pain killer today. I just found out, even the $7.50 Nine-eleven fee was paid by someone's credit card, anonymously. But I guess who that is. Thank you, everyone at MMA for your compassion.
On Tuesday the 15th, I was not allowed to eat or drink anything before going to my surgery appointment at 11am. My surgeon showed up a few minutes before 3. My surgery lasted a little less than an hour, and it took me another hour or so to wake up. I was opened at about the same place under arm as last year to excise a similar "axilliary" lymph node, except this time the node was buried at least 3-4 inches deeper under my shoulder bone. Actually when surgeon said she was going to do an axilliary lymph node biopsy for me I thought she was mistaken. I said I was given a fancy-name lymph node by PET-CT radiologist and it is rather a surgery. She spoke the magic word that calmed down my nerve - "subpectorial" node, and explained to me that it is still an axilliary node despite being buried deep under some subpectorial muscles. After the procedure, Speed-movie actress (she said she gets that a lot) wheeled me down to the street after I called my friend Lovell to come "pick" me up. I got ride for a good 50 yard or so and thanked my old friends for rescuing me up. If no one showed they would have locked me up there in surgery holding room for 24 hours. There was no way they were going to allow me to exit to parking on my own.
Originally, I was scheduled to have some "real" biopsy on September 23, a day before my most recent visit. It would have been a very different kind of biopsy, done by "interventional" radiologist, rather than surgeon, and there would have been no 3+ inch incision. Instead, my should would have been punched by a large-gauge needle though my pectorial muscle while being imaged live by something like CT or Ultrasound. After collecting part of the presumably cancerous node, they would discharge me and I would be back home a day later 850 miles away. The rest of the cancer node would be destroyed by strong focused radiation beam in the ensuing days. It was a plan, almost sound perfect, until I hear about the alternatives. Thank you my radiation oncologist Cliff for GIVING UP the job on me, and thank you my surgeon Rebecca for CUTTING me up, for the 2nd time in a year.
Within one week, I had another visit to another hospital, but as recuer, not rescuee. On previous Friday Oct 11, I picked up my Ex from Mercy hospital ER. She was just about to be transferred to institutionalized psychiatric care when I came to her rescue. A week before that, on Oct 4 while I was out of town, she was found deep into psychosis by our neighbor after my son's call to her went unanswered. She had quit taking her zyprexa pill for some period of time but we don't know how long. The lack of paranoid control eventually led to life-threatening acute brain inflammation. She was found on her couch semiconscious in the dirtiest and most horrible state you can imagine of a human being. Later it took me a whole morning to clean out her living room. Her days of independent living seems to come to an end now and she is under my care for now. She remembers the discomfort of being cuffed to her hospital bed, but denies anything bad happened before being picked up by 911. She still thinks she is normal and she was being persecuted.
I don't blame her, even I still think I am normal, after eight years of lung cancer, terminal since 2007. I have definitely not broken survival record and am still a terminal patient, but may have set a few other wacky records.
Yes I am jaydad, the infamous jaydad, yes I am a terminal cancer patient, an old timer in the concentration camp generally known as cancer community.
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