Well, this sucks.

Not the on-going cancer issues or the other new issues only peripherally related to the cancer, but the fact that every every time I compose a long post (now I ask you, how often is that? Never mind, the question is entirely rhetorical as you must know by now�) something that causes the entire message to erase itself and close the thread, leaving me to exercise (my reportedly extensive collection of obscenities in several languages. but I digress, as I occasionally do.)

This time, I lost an introductory paragraph that invoked the spirit of Al Capp, and no way am I going down that path again.

So, Tuesday, I just dropped in (on my Post-latest CT conference with my MO) to see what condition my condition was in, only to learn nothing. Nothing is perfectly fine when you need it, but I actually needed (OK then, wanted) INFORMATION. That was absent in abundance.

My MO hates to deliver bad news, despite the fact that he knows it's all the same to me; I just want to know where I stand. When I called him on it, he danced around and finally muttered that "it looks promising, one tumor is down from 4cm x 4 xcm to a mere 4cm x 2cm." I immediately had the urge to break out the champagne, but then realized that was a 22 mile drive back home,so I stifled it.

I did learn one interesting thing, my upper colon has stopped cooperating with the rest of my colon, hogging the solid matter and passing nothing but various disgusting fluids on down the chain.

(Not entirely unlike some hippies I have known, handeling doobs...)

That was doubtless caused by adhesions that developed where a repaired bullet-hole stuck to the opposite side of the interior of the colon during the time I had a temp colostomy to allow infection-free healing. (I heartily endorse infection-free healing!)

Added to the fact that the same bullets caused a massive amount of neuropathy and the muscular sheath surrounding the colon no longer does much squeezing of material to move it down stream, it's blockage city.

Well, one can say many things about Mr. Murphy, but two things stand out, he is an incurable optimist, and...

I forget the other thing. Xin loi�

In any event, Herr M. was on the spot, and so when I got home that night, I inadvertently swallowed some phlegm down the pipe clearly marked "Do not swallow phlegm here."

Violent coughing promptly ensued, and so did a small, but somewhat "vocal" hernia on my lower-right abdominal wall. �

I strongly believe that the dry-heaves I experienced during the treatment with the SIRIspheres is the culprit. �Each time (half a dozen or so) that I was awakened by a strong urge to vomit, I was only able to dry-heave (except for maybe a total of a cup of clear liquid). �

What made this so remarkable is the sheer violence of the heaves, and the fact that there were around a dozen or more of them each time, all of significantly greater intensity than any I have ever experienced, �including recovering from my GSW. �

I believe this will require corrective surgery ASAP, I can't rebuild my body in preparation for the next assault on it by cancer (or cancer-treatment) and that's very serious in my book.

It's an interesting ride, for sure!