My Dad's Story

by Cathy Weeks

The Second Interim: Waiting for surgery

Post-treatment/pre-surgery: The doctors sent dad home at the end of his 21 days. He wanted to go home so badly, and I think they let that influence their decision to release him. I think it was a mistake. On Monday, December 18th, 1995, Dad wasn't allowed anything by mouth after midnight, because he had an endoscopic ultrasound at 2:45pm and a cat scan two hour later. At 5:30 pm, Mom took Dad home. He was coughing, and went to bed as soon as he got home. Dad's coughing woke Mom up in the middle of Tuesday night, and it was then that she discovered that he was feverish and very sick. She called the doctor before dawn on Wednesday morning, and a health nurse drove out to help Mom get Dad to the car. She drove him the 30 miles back to the hospital, where he stayed for two more weeks.

Dad's white blood cell count had bottomed out, so when we visited him, we had to wear masks in order to not give him any germs. Dad didn't really want visitors other than Mom this time around. When I saw him the Thursday after he re-entered the hospital, I was shocked. Dad had been kind of out of it when I saw him 4 days prior, but nothing like this. Suddenly, he seemed like an old man, not my Dad.

He drifted in and out of consciousness, and fortunately has little or no memory of this time. He looked at me and told Mom that he didn't want the children to see him like this, and I think that even though I'm an adult, it included me, too. Not just my younger brothers. I didn't see Dad again until Christmas Day.

I think I can safely say that Christmas of 1995 was the worst Christmas I've ever had, worse even than the Christmas in the sixth grade when I had a nasty case of the flu. This Christmas was the first without my Dad around. And I missed Chris, my fiance terribly. He had flown to California to spend Christmas with his grandmother, whom he hadn't seen in a number of years, and I was lonely without him.

We spent Christmas morning at the home of the same family friends with whom we'd spent Thanksgiving. We hadn't gotten a regular Christmas Tree, but my brother's had decorated the large fig tree we keep in the sun room. It was much nicer over at R and G's. More merry than our own home would have been. But despite the niceness of our friends, I was blinking back tears all morning. At noon, Mom left to spend Christmas day with Dad, and I stayed with my brothers, trying to be as cheerful as I could.

Lest this story turn too much into a sob story, things actually got better quickly from there on out. Mom called us from the hospital and told me to bring the boys. Dad was much better, and wanted to see us. My mood was immediately better. We drove to the hospital and found Dad *sitting up* in bed! He then got out of bed, put on a robe, and walked twice around the nurses station with our help. He was lucid, though quiet. He didn't smile much, but it was very evident that he was feeling much, much better. His white blood cell count was up, within a normal range.

It was also on Christmas Day, that Dad fired his oncologist. We had been very unhappy with Dr. Z. for a long time, for his insensitivity and lousy bedside manner. It was the radiation oncologist that always called the counselor for Dad when he sensed that Dad was getting depressed, not his own oncologist. Dr. Z. had ignored Dad's wishes that he not be told the "statistics," for fear that they would only dishearten him, and had never seemed to place much faith in the mental aspect of fighting cancer. Somewhere along the way, Dad asked his counselor, who knew all the members of the oncology group to rank the oncologists in order of who was the most "mental oriented." Mrs. Dr. M. was the most mental oriented, followed Mr. Dr. M., (they were a husband and wife team) followed by the others. Mrs. Dr. M. probably wasn't accepting any new patients, since she only worked part-time in order to raise their children, so Dad chose Mr. Dr. M. instead. Christmas Day, Dr. M. was on call, and when he was checking on Dad, Dad asked if he'd be his doctor. Dad also explained to him why he was unhappy with Dr. Z. Dr. M. agreed, and both my parents have been very happy with him ever since. On the few occasions that he had to interact with Dad, Dr. Z. was much more friendly to us. Moral of this story: shop around until you find a doctor you are completely comfortable with, one whom will work *with* you, not *on* you.

Dad went home again on New Year's Eve to recuperate and gather strength for the surgery, which was scheduled for January 12th. He and Mom went on short walks together during this time, and Dad rested a lot.

It was during this time that we got some really wonderful news. Dad's tumor had responded really well to the chemotherapy and radiation. It had shrunk by 50 percent, and his involved lymph nodes were now clean. It was our first bit of hope in a long time.

A few days before the scheduled surgery, Dad started coughing (not an unusual occurance during this time) during a meal, and asperated a piece of food. He developed Bacterial Pneumonia, which was discovered when he was admitted to the hospital for hydration the day before the surgery, when dad was complaining of chestpain.

However, they didn't reschedule the surgery, much to my surprise. It seems that after a certain period of time, radiation causes a hardening of certain tissues around the surgery site that makes surgery extremely difficult. So after radiation therapy, there is only about a 3 week "window" in which surgery can be performed. So it was a "now or never" situation.

The surgeon went in before the surgery and vacuumed out the goo from Dad's lung, to speed the healing from the pnuemonia. He was also already on a "antibiotic cocktail" when he went in for surgery.

Entry 6: The Treatment: Surgery.

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