OK, I just thought I would have run into him.

He's been out here on the Left Coast for a while so he was probably at Moffitt before the time you started meeting surgeons, oncologists and the Phaser Folks...

On top of having problems with me, I am also having problems with computer.

Have made it through the various recycling procedures and recuperating at home after 13 days in hospital. Needed to have tracheotomy, so that hole is still open and the area is tender -- We want it to close, so I can't just stick a cork in it. Also another PEG tube so they wouldn't be sending me home with naso-gastric tube. Feels strange to have PEG feel like Old Home Week!

Have followup with doc's office tomorrow; tongue is still swollen in lower jaw and blocking throat quite effectively, so PEG will be with me for a while. Wrist looks a small shark had a go at it but is healing quite nicely, along with thigh graft harvest site and lymph gland vascular splices -- Looks like I had my throat slit before being tossed overboard to the sharks!

Daughter leaving tomorrow and son got here today, but I am handling all the cleanup, dressing changes, etc., by my self so they are just backup and good company.

Pete:

Hope you heal quickly and this can be a distant memory soon.

Christine

I like your descriptions Pete. You sure have a good way of stating things. Luv that attitude. You ghad me smiling as I read the post. Have great day and enjoy your sen when he gets there. Jim

Hi Pete,
Sounds like things are progressing well for you post-op. I'm glad to know you have had your daughter and now son there to keep you company.

Most of all I'm glad to know you are out of the hospital and now it's just a matter of time as healing takes place! Too bad you ended up with the trach after all, but I'm happy to know you didn't need to go home with it. My husband Mike enjoyed thinking up adventurous stories to explain his many scars, and it sounds like your shark tale will do the trick.

I hope you are having a chance to enjoy our recent beautiful weather as you get back on your feet (you know how important it is to walk as much as you can). I was on the Seattle ferry yesterday and it was a magnificent trip with sailboats in the background, the sun making the water really glisten, and Mt. Baker and Mt. Rainier both looming majestically - a perfect Pacific Northwest day. Take care and please keep us posted on your progress.

-Tricia

mom calls the scar on her leg from where the docs took the bone to re-build her jaw "the sharj bite." She has actually convinced quite a few people who didn't know the details of her disease that it was a hammerhead.

Slight digression to a sea story: In a former life, I was on a trip to the Florida Keys with a bunch of guys, boats and coolers of beer.

Drifting along behind my drifting Boston Whaler 16' Montauk, I spotted a couple of small (4') nurse sharks dozing under a coral head, so I called to the guy currently resting on the deck to hop in to see them. He replies that he's now nice and comfortable and would I be so kind as to bring one up so he could see it. Sure, sez I, but the first one slithered away and I told him that -- "So get the other one, sez he" -- OK, sez I and next thing he knows, he's sharing the boat with a shark flopping around on the deck, flashing its teeth.

He starts to hurriedly jump the railing and I hollered "Don't come in the water -- The first one is still here and it's P***ED!! The look on his face as he contemplated which way to move was priceless!!

The swelling of my new "made from recycled materials" tongue is not expected to go down for four-six weeks, so I received a second PEG tube (In-hospital feeding was with pumps and a nasogastric tube, which was nowhere near as uncomfortable as I had been led to believe).

Quite different from my first PEG -- The new one was not installed using an endoscopic tool, but with local anesthetic and X-ray -- The new one is much smaller in diameter (inside the body) than the old one was, which means I have to use the plunger on the syringe to force each syringe-ful of "food" through the PEG -- With the old one, I could just sit upright in front of TV or window and let gravity do the work.

My energy levels are going up and down, so I'll tackle this by pieces. It's strange to be writing for a more experienced set of readers on this forum than the first-time-around folks in the other areas here.

Got to UW Med Center early in morning and they got me ready. Some of my worst surgery recollections are being parked on a gurney in a cold hallway, partially sedated and slowly freezing -- Surprise! They've decided that warm patients do better than frost-bitten ones, so I get this pneumatic blanket inflated by heated air -- That's progress!!

When I wake up, if it can be called that, it is evening and it's been a long day for the Docs, eight to ten hours.

The recovery rooms are dimly lit with both lighting and with the spill of numbers of computer monitors for each patient, with various and sundry alarm noises as they come on and are either ignored or dealt with, depending on the severity. There's got to be a better way to do that -- The alarms become background noise to the staff and an incredible annoyance to those of us trapped in the beds -- I am very strongly reminded of some of the scenes from Apocalypse Now -- Now I'll have to re-read Heart of Darkness.

Tubes hanging out all over me, NG Tube for feeding, which seems to be jammed -- Doc is called back in and readjusts it after checking X-ray -- They don't want this one to be accidentally pulled out, so there are three sutures through my septum to secure it, so now I am tensed whenever anyone gets near it because a slight pull evokes sharp feelings!! Still being a bit under the anesthetic weather, I am now confusing the sutures with the traditional burial at sea ritual of taking the last stitch through the canvas and septum in case the poor dead sailor isn't quite dead yet -- I keep checking that I am wrapped in blankets, not canvas.

Apparently, they had to do the tracheotomy because there are is a tube connected below my Adam's Apple and Darth Vader noises are coming from there.

Drains are attached to the incisions made to remove the lymph nodes, plus another drain from under the massive splint and bandages on my wrist. These all have mild suction on them to increase drainage and folks come in to examine the results and log them.

My mouth is full with this 'new' tongue and my lower teeth look like deck cleats at a busy marina with all sorts of suture lines tied off.

The final tube is my urinal catheter, which apparently has a small balloon on the end so draining my bladder is automatic.

The skin harvest site on my thigh, where they took skin to cover the forearm harvest, has a metallic patch over it (which turns out to have been stapled in place). At some point, when they were moving me between recovery and ICU, someone tried to yank the sheet straight but it was tangled in the patch -- Hard to communicate with trach stuf in place, but apparently I was successful, using a whole lot of body language and Darth Vader noises!