It was kind of a tough weekend. I’ve been struggling a bit, trying to stay cheerful and this weekend was too big a challenge for me. On Friday afternoon Ernie went for his checkup with the oncologist. I always worry a bit but wholeheartedly expected the doctor to breeze into the room saying "it’s undetectable."
He didn’t.
Ernie’s PSA is up….very, very slightly, but it was not undetectable. Now, my understanding had always been that once you don’t have a prostate the only psa that would show up would be from cancer cells. The doctor on Friday however said it could be some healthy prostate cells also showing up and that often times after treatment ends there is a small blip and then the readings go back down. He said it was something to watch but he wasn’t terribly concerned. Just the same it made me sick to my stomach. I gotta tell you, my little blog….I can’t handle a whole lot more. We go back in four months and will see what it is then.
Judi got through another week of chemo. It’s not easy. She throws up during chemo, she throws up in the car going back and forth to chemo, she throws up at home. She got a prescription for a cream compounded for her to rub on her wrists. Of course her insurance won’t cover it. She probably could use some good old-fashioned pot. Now I’m sure I could track some down but the thought of driving to South Carolina in our little minivan, complete with two boys in booster seats and getting pulled over by another friendly southern cop scares the shit out of me….just think, last time the cop was appalled by me not having the same last name as my husband….what would he think of pot?
eh, I don’t know.
My parents aren’t doing well. I really don’t think they can stay in their house much longer. I need to have a serious conversation with my mother. Right now she is in incredible pain as she hurt her neck somehow. She has a prescription for pain pills but she doesn’t like to take them as she hears on the tv all the time that people get addicted to vicodin. Now this makes me crazy—just take a pain pill for God’s sake. Anyway….she’s not up to serious talks at the moment. I didn’t even tell her about Ernie’s PSA. I wanted to but she was too caught up in talking about her pain. It makes me sad to realize that she’s not able to be there as a comfort to me anymore.
Owen also chose Saturday to throw a whiny temper tantrum the likes of which I’ve never seen from him. We finally got him calmed down, went to a junky antique show and found nothing other than some crap for the boys and found ourselves out on country roads when the ice storm hit. We slid right through one intersection but were lucky and managed to get home without ending up in the ditch like so many cars around us. Ernie did take me out for a drink last night while the boys went to a birthday party though and that was nice. We got home and the guys put the Lionel train around the Christmas tree and I went to bed early.
Today I got up and called the doctor’s office to ask them to up the dosage on my antidepressant.
Antidepessants are a good thing. Life can just add too much to the plate at times. I love you all. And I believe Ernie is just fine.
My mother was in a lot of pain when she was suffering from ovarian cancer. She also didn’t like vicodin. It wasn’t so much that she was afraid she would become addicted, but the drug constipated her. Her best alternative was a pain patch that I helped her apply every few days to the back of her shoulder. With this patch she had no side effects and could rest comfortably.