Mofungo

I must have started at least a dozen blog entries over the past few months, but as with many things in my life lately, they remain untouched and unfinished. I meant to post at least a brief entry to let everyone know that I (we) are all fine, just busy and distracted. I know how you worry when we go silent and for that I apologize. So, the good news is there is no bad news to report.

Since September I have been working almost full time. Pat has been working full time and overtime. He loves his job and they love him. He’s been with Trinity for over a year and during that time we had not taken a vacation – yes we had each taken trips, but not for long and more importantly not together (to us the definition of vacation is 5 or more consecutive days away from home, together). So we decided the time had come settled on spending Thanksgiving in Puerto Rico. We had been there briefly in 2002 over a weekend just prior to my 2nd surgery, but we never left the resort and hence never “saw” the country.

This time we decided to cover all our bases – we went to Vieques for a few days of sun, beach, and snorkeling; to El Yunque the rainforest, for a few days of hiking and climbing; to Ponce for a bit of culture; and finally back to San Juan for some history. Throughout it all I took over 1000 pictures, ate mountains of Mofungo, and we relaxed or at least tried to. Mofungo is mashed plantains combined with a meat (chicken, steak, shrimp) – a staple of the Puerto Rican diet and perfect for my digestive system. Unfortunately I did not leave my bathroom issues at home, and as I expected I had the same problems I do at home. Nothing worse which was good, but nothing better either, hence how I know that there is no poison ivy in Puerto Rico! (The woods in both the rainforest and surrounding the beaches on Vieques do have lots of trees with nice huge leaves that provide perfect cover!)

I enjoyed having a real camera back in my hands and took full advantage of it, filling up two 2GB memory cards. Pat is a patient travel companion and sherpa, he carried the camera bag for me, understood when I screamed “STOP!” that it wasn’t because he was about to hit something with the car, but rather that I saw a photo op (that one took a few misunderstandings to get us both on the same page) and most importantly, he made certain I kept both hands on the camera and the strap around my wrist when I was near water. When he left his snorkel fins too close to the edge of the water and the wave came in and started to pull them out, I let them go! No repeats of Costa Rica and no dives into the water with camera in hand. Now I need to find the time to go through all these pics and find the 1 or 2 that I like. I hope to post at least a few up on this site soon.

We enjoyed exploring and realized how much we missed doing stuff like this. It’ll never be like it was in the past, I’ll always have to chose the least daunting item on the menu; there will be places we can’t visit because of lack of facilities; my motion sickness will force us to either stay in one place or find a way to move between locales that does not involve a car, a bus, a boat or a teeny tiny airplane; But that doesn’t mean we can’t travel. It may take more planning, more energy and more time, but it’s something we love and we’ll do it together as long as we can, we won’t let CANCER take yet another thing away from us!

And speaking of the “C-word” - the medical update that I know you are all waiting for. I have a CT scan scheduled for next week (Dec. 10) and this will be followed by my check in with Dr. Lange on Dec. 17. It's been 4 months since my last scan and blood work and I have appreciated the break. This month however marks several milestones -IF my scan still shows no sign of tumor, this will be the longest period I have gone without a recurrence since my diagnosis 8 years ago December 15. There is a lot riding on these blood and test results so I'm doing my best not to stress (HAH!). This also will be my first attempt at a CT scan doing only the prep the morning of the test and not the night before. I really hope they are still able to get a good read and in the future I can get away with only 15 ounces of the yummy barium, instead of 30 and a sleepless bathroom trip filled night prior to the test. I promise to post the results as soon as I receive them, and not disappear for months on end leaving you all to wonder where and how I am.

Also on the medical front a brief update on my other "issue". My diarrhea is no better, the DTO and codeine no longer seem to have an effect and my doctor is out of ideas. It was manageable in Puerto Rico, but I still have good days and bad days. When they are good, they are very, very good and I am grateful and when they are bad, they can be very, very bad. Lately I have developed a new issue related to the diarrhea about which I am not going to go into gory detail. I’ll just say that I have been spending a lot of time using a sitz bath; got a prescription for the strongest hydrocortisone cream available, and botox injections may be in my future. I've talked with Dr. Lamont and he is at a loss, so it's back to the research. I am seriously considering making some major dietary changes, but will wait until after the holidays to research this.

I've much more to say, but I'll sign off for now. I promise another post soon.

Posted by gasbarro at December 6, 2007 06:36 PM