When you see cancer commercials they deal with a specific disease or treatment center but one does not learn of the unintended consequences of the disease and/or treatments until experienced first hand with one's self or close relative. Early August and my left upper leg is bloated to the point that it rubs against my bermudie shorts. Standing up it looks like I have a saddle bag mounted in my inner thigh. Vanessa welcomed me to the world of fat legs. Apparently manufacturers of shorts in some cases have not caught up with the leg filling thighs fashion so they are not worried about placing seams and pleats in unfortunate areas of movement. I was glad to know I was not special in my plight, I guess. Never the less this is a far sight better than it was just a few weeks ago. It appears we have reached a plateau of sorts with the lymphedema, growing and shrinking within some preset volumetric boundaries governed by activity, rest and who knows what other unknown factors. The fluid moves about readily, but not entirely on it’s own. For me it means the cancer in the lymph nodes has not abated.
Got the bill from the hospital for the 13 sessions of occupational therapy to bring the edema down to the point I could be fitted for stockings. Remembering the first trip, when the left foot was in a sandal held together by a small bungee cord and large flat clip that I left the orange coating on for show I think I am proud of smiling through it as much as I did. It was there in case medical marijuana came to be. I figured I would always have a clip on hand. At least that is what I told the nurses. From ‘it’s part of it’ to Deanna, an angel of mercy who taught us about my condition and how to treat it. Her room was a narrow berth, clinically white with a small desk, exam table, harsh light with some man emblazoned on the ceiling (she usually had women with this condition in an arm after breast cancer surgery), cabinets and the exam table. Her work stool a second chair and a desk chair rounded out the furniture. The north wall was adorned with large posters showing the lymphatic system in all of it’s gory detail. At first it was all gibberish to me. Thirteen sessions later I was nominally ready to be fit with compression garments. Inger the Number 2 AOB (Angel On Board) at the house had taken over and mastered all the technical end of manual lymph drainage and within a few short weeks I wore two shoes again. The bill made me remember the experience. With a smile on her face and a spring in her step she led you into her parlor for MLD. She had all the equipment there. Devices to break down the accumulated proteins, charts and graphs, printouts, electronic means to contact and get information all were in the ready. Her initial assessment was grievous and she was angry for the amount of time it took for us to get to her. If not for Marietta’s efforts we seemed to be at a total loss. Her routine was the same every time at first, followed by wrapping with padding and compression tape. At the end we were using a lymphedema pump and taping. The shoe thing represented for us a huge victory in the fight to overcome the unintended consequences.
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