Thieves Everywhere

Esther has been calling me regularly to report things missing from her place. "Someone has stolen my . . . . ". That started back when she was still in her duplex in Gladstone. What keeps disappearing is her alcohol--not the rubbing kind. I asked her what the chances were that she'd have the same problem in both places--that her alcohol would keep disappearing? She didn't have an answer for that. Right now it's her sunglasses, her wine (a whole gallon bottle), her purse, her wallet--today it was the cheese I brought over for her yesterday. Amazingly everything turns up--except for all the alcohol. I did notice that by the count of empty and full jugs of wine in her apartment I saw this week--the lost gallon was found, or at least the empty one was. The part that stymies is the fact that Jerry looked high and low through the apartment and did not find it over a week ago. Maybe outside in the bushes? To keep someone from seeing that she had it? Who knows. Tonight she was absolutely disgusted with herself because she couldn't find her wallet again. It is in her purse, I saw her put it in there right before she got out of the car tonight at 5 p.m. when I dropped her off. It's hard to not remember and to be confused and know that something is not right. Esther likes to come to a conclusion or a solution to the puzzle, such as being sure that her ex-landlord was coming into the duplex at night and drinking the vodka and eating her food. He lived on the other side of Portland, and never came over there, even when somehting needed fixing, but she is convinced of the solution she came up with. Now she knows that everything that was "stolen" this past week turned up right there in her apartment right where she had left it. Sobering and frustrating.

Tomorrow we call to schedule her appointment for surgery. Hopefully it will be soon so she can be healing well by her birthday in October.

Pelvis is Healing, But Now For the Cancer

Originally posted Aug. 23, 2009

Esther's fracture is healing and after more than a month since her fall, she is walking slowly with a cane. Now she has seen more doctors and had more tests than she was willing to have in her whole life. We have seen 4 doctors, had 2 different scopes, one Ultrasound, one CAT scan and one X-Ray. There is another Ultrasound next Friday. She seriously has only been in the hospital twice--once to deliver her first son. She accidentally had her second son at home. The second was when she fell three years ago while walking and factured her arm and passed out on the bus stop. They took her to the closest hospital and she went home a few hours later. She has gone annually to health fairs for free blood work and blood pressure screenings. Then in the past few years she has seen one PA annually for monitoring of blood pressure and cholesterol--but never took her BP medication. She didn't belive in paying to go to the doctor or taking pills. When we went to the first doctor to find out what happend to her hip when she fell last month, afterwards she said, "That's all the poking I'm going to let them do. No more." Well, when you refuse to have your colonoscopy at 50 as reccomended, or to have your eyes screened for glaucoma or any other preventative test or screening, you put yourself at risk for advanced stage cancers and other diseases. Please take a lesson from this and go for your screenings. Getting inconvenienced by lowering your shorts and exposing your private places, or by being a little uncomfortable is nothing compared to the pain and problems that can occur later. If you just don't want to know, it won't change the fact that what is going to happen in your body will happen. Don't we really want to know early so we can take care of it? The things that can't be found early, well at least you are in tune with your body and tried.

She first told her surgeon that she thinks that she would rather do nothing, then she flipped to the opposite and said she wanted it done now. When she told him she'd rather do nothing he told her what would happen to her. He also said that people decide to do nothing and just end it, but then when it gets bad they change their mind and want to do something and then it really is too late. I could see that easily being the case here if we let it happen, which we won't. Now Esther is keen to have the tumor out. First she will have an Ultrasound of the Rectum, then a Colonoscopy to make sure there is nothing else in there. If it's all clean, then they will see if she's a good candidate for radiation to shrink the tumor and then they will operate. She thinks they should just operate today.

She has been very appreciative of help from us and it makes her calmer to have a clear head around to help her sort things out.

She has always been such a force to be reckoned with, and downright offensive, and guess what? She still is, but along with it now is this vulnerability, neediness and weakness which has made her contemplative and softer. The other day she was lying on her sofa and asked me if I believed in guardian angels. Of course, I do. I know they are there. She said she does, too, because she was walking in Clackamas once trying to cross the highway and saw a car coming for her, then she was suddenly on the other side right where she needed to be, in an instant, and had no idea how she got there. She said she has had one other experience like that (she didn't elaborate). She said she believes in angels. I've also heard her say, just last week, that she was "agnostic". Now, she's rethinking everything. Funny how that works isn't it? Some people deny what truth they already know, deep inside, until they are ready to let go and face leaving this life. This week she has been saying alot of, "This is the last time I will . . .", but she was referring to things she didn't like--such as going downtown to see the doctor. After she'd said it about the 4th time in one afternoon I said to her, "You'd better stop saying that, you might make it come true. . .this could be your last time." Well, she laughed at that, thankfully, and it made her stop staying it.

Now for the classic denial of what you have been doing. Long story short: when you have bowel troubles and bleeding that you can see, laxatives are not the answer. When I discovered them, we started making sure she ate properly, took them out of the house (they were stashed everywhere, even in an Altoid tin on the back of the stove), and things got better right away. Well, she called a few days in a row asking were they were, "Just in case I need them", which she didn't. We went to the Colo-Rectal Surgeon this week and when he asked her how long she had had a problem she didn't answer (as always) and I mentioned the laxatives. She said, "I haven't taken a laxative in a year." He smiled, and started writing. Then he went on asking other questions and she had difficulty giving a straight answer and in the middle of it all she turned to me and in a stage whisper said, "I haven't taken a laxative in over a year." More smiling by the doctor. THE QUEEN OF DENIAL. It doesn't change the consequences or outcome.

Get your screenings, take care of yourself--I'm going to follow this advice, too.