Round Three

Well round three will be finished this week. Boy the time is flying by. SLOW DOWN! I can't help myself thinking that if all had gone well in Seattle, we would be thinking of coming home about the same time as we will be heading back. Sorry, just can't help myself.

I talked today with T. the transplant coordinator. She phoned to say that she has been in contact with Seattle and all the government agencies to make sure all systems are go and to tell us the Ottawa will pay for the dental bill that we received when we were in Seattle in November. John will be having a bone marrow biopsy on Feb. 17. and that takes about a week to process. She said that we should be heading back at the very beginning of March. I am going to start packing very soon.

Today I spent about an hour looking for all my travel documents. I finally tracked them down. I found them where they belong in the fire proof box. I looked everywhere they did not belong! Go figure. I left them there and wrote a note to myself on the whiteboard in the kitchen so I wouldn't forget again.

I have found myself being kind of weepy the last few days. The smallest things are setting me off. I think that for awhile I had tricked myself into thinking that things were normal and that life would just go on blissful day after blissful day. Cancer was far on the back burner of my mind. Now that the time is coming closer for the battle to begin (Seattle battle) I am having to start dealing with my emotions. I am sure John is going through this as well. It is still going to be hard to drive away from home. I am not stressed out about all the stuff that I was before. That is a blessing. Still.....

Some good news: The appointment that John had at the renal clinic went well. His kidneys are now functioning at 42 percent. That is 5 percent better than before.

A Lazy Sunday

Lets play catch up. I guess I haven't posted since Thursday. Friday was much like Thursday except that it was all medical tests. John had his bone marrow biopsy done. This will tell us what the cancer is doing. The last test was done in June and was very good. I hope that this one is just as good. The less cancer that there is when they do the transplant, the better. He had a couple different X-ray procedures. We had a break between these so we walked down to Lake Union and looked at all the old boats down there.



They sell boats there. We have a picture of the yacht we would love our children to buy us. The toys of the rich! Unbelievable!


We met another couple from Saskatchewan. I was wearing my Huskie bunny hug. They are staying over on Capitol Hill and have been here a couple of weeks already. The bunny hug worked! Our apartment is very quiet and we have not met anybody here.

Yesterday John had his Pamidronate infusion. He missed having the last one in Saskatoon because it was to take place the day after we left for here. They took five hours to pump it into him. The clinic here is very nice. Everybody gets a private room with a television. He still was a little grumpy. The people in Saskatoon do this same infusion in two hours. I think that they should be doing it slower to be easier on his kidneys like they did when his was an inpatient. I am going to check into that when we get home because I don't think they are doing it right.

We went to Target in the evening. The Target store has escalators for shopping carts. I should have brought my camera. I guess that I should bring it everywhere that I go.We had to fight our way through traffic on the I 5. Makes me nervous but John seems to be fine with it. When we came out of the store we noticed that we had a flat tire so we have to go find a place to fix that today.

We bought a mattress foam for our bed because it is very hard. We both slept much better last night. We bought a footstool. Now I can make John all cozy by the TV with his feet up.

Tomorrow we have a couple of teaching and orientation sessions in the afternoon. It seems like our morning is free. I am keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way and I want to meet my blogging friend for lunch. She lives a little outside of Seattle and is coming into town on Monday and can meet for lunch.

We didn't go to church today. John is on a 24 hour urine collection so he does not want to carry the jug along with him so today will be a lazy stay close to home day.

We still have not obtained a map of Seattle so it is impossible to figure out where the nearest church is. We don't have any trouble navigating our area but we don't have a clue about the rest of the city.

Seattle

I can't believe that the last post was April 8. Time has been going by very fast. I think that is because John has been feeling pretty good. He gets the odd bad day but for the most part I think he is doing wonderful. He keeps pretty busy. He does a lot of yard work, trims the hedge, whipper snips, mows and even rebuilt the fire pit. His cucumbers are starting to come along nicely.

We had a nice holiday at Good Spirit Lake. Did some fishing and had some great beach days. All in all, it has been a nice summer. It sort of has been a holiday away from cancer although it is always in the back burner of our minds.

Seattle is coming up fast. We were told that things could happen as fast as September,. I think that it will be October. All the final testing has been done so we are all waiting for the results. We should get this information soon.

John did phone the Kinsmen because he was worrying about funding and how long it would take to process an application. The lady he spoke to eased his mind in this regard. I guess they can process funding as fast as one day if they have to. They also fund the donor so that is another worry gone. She told John to quit worrying about anything regarding funding.

We are going to go and buy a laptop next week. This will help us to communicate with everybody. Four months will be a long, long time to be away from home. We are going to miss our kids and grandkids terribly. A web cam is a must. Pray that John and I can learn how to use this technology.

I think that I have been postponing posting about this because then it doesn't seem real and I really don't want it to be real. Sigh... I think this will be the longest four months of our lives.

Home Sweet Home

John is doing well at home this time. I think that he will be staying. We are starting to get out and about a little bit. Yesterday we went to the Cancer Center for his blood work. After that he took me to Lawson Mall. He bought a new purse for me for my birthday. I got a huge bag seeing how my other purse was always stuffed to the max. Now I can bring a book for each of us and a water bottle for John when we go to his various appointments. After that we went to the Sally Ann to get some used stuffed toys for the dog. I don't know how but that dog knew what John had in the bag when we got home and just about did a Dino on John to get the toys. We also stopped off a Wal Mart to get a birthday present for Noah. Jonathan and Melissa and Noah came over for supper. John did very good with all of this activity. His legs get a little stiff. This morning he went to the store to get coffee and went and collected the mail. It is so nice seeing him doing mundane things. He is making his breakfast right now. Nice and normal.

John has an appointment on Friday with the kidney specialist. Pray that his kidneys will fully recuperate from all of the treatments that he has received. On Feb. 28 he has an appointment for a stress test. Pray that his cardio respiratory system recuperates as well. So far he has had no more short breath episodes since he has come home.

I am going to be working a bit the rest of this month. I will be training my replacement at the end of the month. Pray that everything keeps going well so I feel O.K. about leaving John alone at home. I think he will be fine. Don't worry, If I think that he is not O.K. I will stay home.

9 Second Thermometer

The last couple of days John has had a bit of a sore throat. He may be coming down with a cold. He doesn't feel sick other than the sore throat. Pray that it doesn't develop any further. I talked to his nurse before we left the hospital. His white counts are very high. She said he would probably be O.K. but just watch him so I have been shoving ye ole thermometer into his mouth frequently. He can't complain as much as he did before. I bought him a new one that processes in 9 seconds. If he does complain I only have to listen to the whining for 9 seconds. Why did I not buy a 9 second thermometer sooner? He used to sit on the couch and bluster every 9 seconds "is this stupid thing done" Ha...not a peep out of him...sigh...

We went to Jonathan's and Mellisa's for supper last night and then to the Forestry Farm to see the Christmas light show. Jonathan had got a free ticket from work. Noah was delighted...he would not stop talking...it was fun.