Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Modern Medicine

A few random health notes:

My mom called a little while ago just to let me know her doc visit went great, the bloodwork and the ultrasound came back perfect. Each sigh of relief gets a little easier. (And when I responded, "So you're saying the baby's fine?" she absolutely cracked up. Luckily she raised us, so she's used to our bizarre tendencies.)

I posted that first in total selfishness. I don't have enough words to say how grateful we've all been at Mom's recovery from cancer and her lack of post-treatment complications. However, I found out earlier this week that one of Dad's cousins just had a tennis ball sized tumor removed from her brain, and there are several smaller tumors that will be treated with the gamma knife surgery. That is frightening enough by itself, but Beth is a breast cancer survivor. It's been many years since her initial diagnosis, but there is a good chance the tumors are related. By the time her breast cancer treatment was finished, the cancer had spread to her bones. The bone cancer is more manageable, but has left her with extreme pain issues which has led to a whole host of other problems. To say the least, it's been a very long and difficult road for her, her husband, and their 3 kids. They are now waiting on the biopsy results for the tumor. Going through this once was hard on us, I can't imagine going through it over and over again for so many years.

And finally, sometimes working for a hospital threatens to rip out my heart. Like when I see a tiny baby being taken back for a heart cath. I didn't even know they could do a cath on an infant. I don't know who the family is or anything about their situation, but I do know that the mother has more strength than I can imagine. She was standing and talking to a doctor calmly. If my infant was being taken in for a heart cath, I would likely be a puddle of goo on the floor.

5 comments:

Webmaster said...

I know how you feel. My mom had breast cancer a few years ago. She had a mastectomy, and fortunately, didn't have to have chemo. She's cancer free now, but it scared all of us.
Your family is in my prayers!

clstigger said...

Glad to hear Mom's appointment went well! Was just talking to someone this morning about the fact that while I worked at children's I saw too many children die. Must say I don't miss that part of working there.

Supermom said...

cancer totally sucks

Susan said...

Absolutely - cancer sucks. We've been lucky twice (Mom and Dad) but had a horrible time when we lost my uncle a few years ago to lung cancer.

Jen - Do you miss any part of working here? =) And I never have gotten the missing emails from yesterday. It's a mystery.

Stacey said...

Woop woop! Go Susan's Mom!!!

Also, re this comment:
If my infant was being taken in for a heart cath, I would likely be a puddle of goo on the floor.

You'd be really, really, really surprised what you can handle with relative grace when you have no other choice.