Two weeks

until I go into the hospital to get this thing removed.

I can't decide if I am relieved or terrified. Maybe a little of both.

Got some advice from a student who had abdominal surgery last year:
"You'll probably throw up a lot." Thanks, B. Love you.

Good news, everyone!

So at my mother's urging I go see her internist.

At the internist's recommendation I go see a vascular surgeon.

At the vascular surgeon's request I get a leg ultrasound (almost clear!) and a CT scan.

CT scan comes back with a clear picture of my lungs (no word yet) and the IVC filter that is tilted and pressing through the wall of my Vena Cava.

At the vascular surgeon's educated recommendation I will be losing my cyborg part. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

I laugh because it's the best news I've gotten in the last six months. I cry because it's surgery and it's scary.

I do both because it's almost over.

MEK Tuesdays

Dammit, I thought they wouldn't find me here.

Testing, testing

The ongoing mission to get me healthy again has taken a step forward. I am getting a CT scan on Friday at one of the top hospitals in the area, to see where the IVC filter is seated in my vena cava and hopefully to see what's going on in my lungs.

I am not looking forward to this.

I mean, yes it's nice getting checked and moving out of maintenance mode (as Fahnz so wisely called it when we first met with Vascular Surgeon) and finding out that I might get stepped down on my dosage once the 6-month treatment cycle is over made me cry with joy. But have you ever had a CT scan? It's nuts.

They inject you with some bizarro dye that makes your veins or whatever needs to be scanned show up--and it makes you feel very heavy and like you really, really have to use it. Then you have to lie very still while a big round thing--not to be confused with Round Thing--spins slowly around you, taking pictures of your insides. After it's over you drink a lot of fluids to get all this stuff out of your body. Fun, right?

This is how we found out that I had too many clots to count. I am hoping and praying that this time around the report is that the clots all scattered to the winds. It's been very hard, going through all of this without any real answers or anything that resembles hope, so to have all of this now makes me feel like I am more than my INR. I may not have seen the light at the end of the tunnel when I went down, but I can sure as hell see it now.

MEK Tuesdays

She loves Fahnz almost as much as I do.

In other news, it's almost 6 months. Time to find out what the next step is in my treatment.

How we entertain ourselves

The really impressive thing?


She doesn't care.

Yeah

I've been gone for a bit. Here's a kitty to make up for the neglect.








Shit's been crazy what with Nutcracker rehearsals and teaching and stuff. But on a good note my clot's almost gone. I feel hopeful for the first time in a long time.