This morning I received noticed that I could go in to get drained at 11am. Last night we had dropped off the van at Kal-Tire to get a tire repaired, First General came today for their first day and Xavier had an appointment in the afternoon. We managed to pick up the van fairly early and as soon as Mel finished her morning meeting she quickly drove me to the hospital where I registered and then hung out in the recovery area until 12:30 where I finally had my 5 minute procedure. It is fairly painless procedure while the tube is inserted in as it is initially starts like a needle and then you can feel the tube entering into the space. I have had this doctor several times and he is fantastic and we have a great relationship. He has amazing bedside manners and I think that there were some patients that were struggling with things and he tried and helped them out a bit which led to the lengthy delay in my procedure. The guy next to me kept on wanting to move onto his side and all of the nurses kept on telling him that he could not or he would risk pulling out the tubes and things that they had put in. They tried to help him out as much as they could. The doctor estimated approximately 5l of drainage. After when I was in supportive care I was hooked up to the bag and as the nurse is a friend of mine we were chatting and 2l had filled the bag in quite a short time. She then went to do some work and she came back a bit later to disconnect me an the bag was completely full. By the end of it all I had 6.5l of fluid extracted and it was the milky color and not as clear as it was the last time I had this done. Removing the tube was awesome as I barely felt the procedure. But while laying down in the bed I could start to feel my internals shifting and by the end I was quite tired. Throughout the procedure my blood pressuure was fine and everything seemed to go well. She told me that I should take some of my pain killers in case I needed them. I asked her why would I need them that I could handle it. I think that you know what ended up happening. Every Monday we go to my parents fot dinner and boy was that a mistake. Driving there and back was painful. It takes a while for my internals to settle down. Women who have had child birth understand what it feels like. The worst part is the shooting pain that goes up my chest and arm whenever we hit a bump. It is excrutiating pain that is very acute and goes away and makes you question if it is that bad until it happens affain and you go, yeah that sucks. I ended up throwing up at my parents and I was concerned about that on the ride home as well. I did not overeat and it is not because of nausea. It is like your body is shifting things around and it wants emptiness. It is easier to move a fridge that is empty compared to a full fridge, so my body told me to empty everything. I eventually succumbed to my foolishness and tool some dilaudid a hydromorphine drug to block the pain. It works wonders as most of the pain is from nerve endings in the abdomen and this works by binding to opioid receptors in the central nervous system. See what my education in Neuropharmacology is used years later. Mel wanted me to get rid of those books but they are so useful. Drinking is a bit difficult still as every time I drink I can feel it in my stomach and it seems to be pushing against something internally and it is a bit uncomfortable. I know that it is temporary as I can still feel things shifting around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Olivier was a bit concerned when we got home and asked why we went over if it did not make me feel good and we said that the treatment today was a last minute procedure and we should have planned better. We ate pho and it was very difficult to eat. The meat is soft and tender and I struggle with it a lot when meat is soft. I drenched it in hoison sauce and that actually helped. My parents have this thing where they befriend random Asians at the grocery store, by helping them buy groceries and explaining things to them. One of them dropped by for dinner tonight as well, and apparently we have met her before as my parents have brought her to our house. She just got a job at IAMGOLD and we chatted a bit about her adventures in Kirkland lake and now back in Sudbury. She is from Shanghai so the size of the cities is quite a cultural shock to her. I still find it amusing how many people over the years my parents have made friends with by randomly approaching strangers in the grocery store. I can see them looking into their carts, criticizing what they bought, making them put it back and helping them choose better options. They would then go with them throughout the rest of the store to help them out with their shopping before leaving them. After a couple of weeks of doing this they build up trust and my parents invite these random strangers over. She enjoyed the meat and meal and I could hear them talking about how tender the meat was. They were speaking in Mandarin but I could pick up some words here and there to understand what they were talking about. You could argue that I do the same thing, except I do it with work people as opposed to random grocery store people. I could see Olivier doing this, I am not sure about Xavier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I can not remember if I have shared this story or not, but I did with Mel recently. While driving home I had asked Xavier if his friends did drugs or smoked and he replied why would I hang out with people like that. There is nothing wrong with people that do, but his views are that they do not align with his athletics, so he has no interest in it. I told him that he reminded me of his goalie coach who does not do that nor does he drink. Xavier told me that he is not going to drink and he is not even interested in trying. When he says it then I believe his conviction. As a child whenever he has set his mind to something he has always followed through with it, so I can see him doing that this time as well, even though that is a lifetime commitment. The U18 tryouts were posted and I tried to sign him up so he could attend the tryouts, but since I had registered him to play houseleague he was technically registered in a league already in Capreol. Quite a few people do not think that he should be playing houseleague and want him to play for a rep team. I made a comment that once he is cut from the team then he will go back to the houseleague team and he mentioned that he would be surprised if he did not make it. When I look at the team composition from last year, they had a pretty good team and finished the team number 1. Xavier would be underaged for the team, but he has the skill to make it and I will let him decide what he wants to do. He wants to ski this year and we told him that we would get him a season’s pass to Adanac so he could go when he wants to. The reason why he would play is so that it would help him out with exposure to try and get a scholarship to some school in a couple of years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mel reminded me that this morning I was saying that the draining was easy, and the last time when I only had 2 liters removed it was. When there is not such a large shift it makes it easier. I could have driven home last time and this time while I was going out I knew that I was in rough shape and my first thought was that if we went grocery shopping tonight I would definitely need my wheelchair. Mel thinks that I should not be so cocky next time about being able to handle these things. Or I can secretly take some of the pain medications and act like it is nothing at all. That would amazingly if I knew where all of my drugs are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dr. Mach<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This morning I received noticed that I could go in to get drained at 11am. Last night we had dropped off the van at Kal-Tire to get a tire repaired, First General came today for their first day and Xavier had an appointment in the afternoon. We managed to pick up the van fairly early…<\/p>\n