Good day my friends.

Today is day 3 of my cycle and I’ve been pancaked in Maggie’s bed listening to podcasts, meditating or just being. It is really about the most I was able to do all afternoon. But I missed my high energy day, yesterday, to post and I want to let you know why I was too busy to sit at this machine.

We had a turn of events here, I call this episode:

Mike’s Left Foot

Mike has had foot trouble for years. I will spare you the details and let him lay them out in his upcoming blog, or maybe he’ll do a podcast, not sure. But Saturday his second toe on his left foot (a really long toe, as long as my pinky finger, actually, I’ve compared them) was really heating up and bothering him. Red, puffy, sore, angry and sure enough at one point up crept that little red line of infection. OK, time to go. We called the doctor in our family, Carrie, who is not really a doctor but a medic for the Seattle Fire Department and told her he was going to urgent care. As Carrie is known to do she said, wait, let me see it. She came over quickly (she is conveniently living a block or so from us at this time) and said skip urgent care, go to the ER. So Mike took a solo trip to Swedish ER on Saturday evening, maybe 6 or 7 pm. It was not busy and for an ER visit not too bad. They gave him antibiotics and said if it gets worse come back and go see your doc on Monday.

It seemed to get better, the line was receding, that’s good. But on Monday Seattle got slammed with snow, 6-8 inches in our hilly West Seattle and when Mike called the doc in the morning, no docs had shown up! We hemmed and hawed and then suddenly it was clear to Mike that it was getting worse. Carrie came down again and off they went to the ER. She would make sure they did it right this time! So the ER was not so busy and they got into a room pretty quickly. They decided they needed to do a culture (Carrie was frustrated they had not done that Saturday) and start IV antibiotics. Over the course of the day they decided he needed to be admitted to continue the IV and the podiatrist that came in thought he might need some tissue removed. 

The ER was not busy but the hospital was slammed. There was no room in the inn. Mike was in the little ER room from maybe 10 or 11 in the morning until 8 at night! He felt lucky to have a room, he said there were others lined up in the hall! Luckily??? he had an unknown infection that makes him a bit of a biohazard so he needed to be isolated. 

Everyone agreed that the ER, the hospital in general was no place for me with my blood counts fluctuating. So we called and texted, a lot! The kids showed up around 5 or 6 and stuck with him until they finally had a room for him at Swedish Orthopedics Hospital, just a few elevators and sky bridges away. He got into his room about 9 I think…finally! All day stuck in those tiny ER rooms! Yikes! Then he found himself in one of the newer wings of the Swedish massive maze with a big room, a nice TV, a good view! Worth the wait, I’d say.

They’d taken an x-ray in the ER but in the middle of the night Mike got swooped back through those sky bridges and mazes for an MRI. On Tuesday the podiatrist, with new information and a little probing of the toe (gonna spare you the details here…you are welcome!), determined the infection had crept into the bone, but just the tip of the bone and they would need to amputate down to at least the knuckle. Dang! And I’m stuck at home in chemo land! 

On Tuesday morning Betty came up and gave me my booster shot. She watched a youtube video and Carrie gave her some tips (Carrie was working or would have happily given me my shot) and Betty did it like a champ! Yay for Nurse Betty! (And Terri, thank you for your offer, but we decided we could do it in house, but I so appreciate your offer!)

So on Wednesday, my blood count was good, I had an early appointment and all went quickly and smoothly and Dr. K cleared me to go see Mike. So after chemo I walked what seemed like 1/2 mile through the maze that is Swedish and found him with his mom and sister Lisa. It was great to be able to visit. Surgery was scheduled for 6:00 pm. I had to go home to take care of some business and so I left about 2:00. Michael came to pick me up, I was not quite ready and it took me awhile. We were really hoping to see him in pre-op but I’ll tell you, traffic Wednesday evening, in the dark, in the rain, it was just awful! But, it seems traffic from Ballard, where the surgeon was coming from was even worse! So we made it in time and got to visit with Mike in pre-op. He was in good spirits. We met podiatrist/surgeon 1, and the anesthesiologist. They were friendly, easy to talk to and eased our worries. Podiatrist/surgeon 2 was seriously stuck in traffic. 

They shooed Michael and me out to get Mike into surgery. Later we found out he came back out from the surgery room, cause of, you guessed it, traffic! Mike finally went under for his surgery about 7:00 and he said he woke in recovery at 7:25. Now that is some good, efficient surgery! He was up in his room with Michael, Maggie and I waiting by 8:00, and he was looking great! They used some kind of block to keep his foot pain free and gave him propofol which in my experience, and with Mike, too, you go out quick and come back quickly. Perfect. His foot was wrapped up well and he was able to use a walker with about 75% weight bearing. That’s pretty good! We stayed a bit too late (I was on my steroid high) and finally went home by 10:00.

Thursday morning, yesterday, is my day 2 when I have all that energy and get so much done. I started doing a few things around here with plans to go up to Mike around lunch time. About 9:30 he called and said he would be released in an hour or two! Yikes! I did what I had to do to get ready to go and headed up as soon as I could. When I got there the nurse was going over the last  of the paper work with him. I asked if we took the walker home and he held up his cute little shoe/boot and he is allowed to walk with as much weight bearing as he feels comfortable with. Wow! They don’t mess around! 

Mike is doing great now! He is spending most of the time on the couch with his foot raised, and that is what he should be doing. He just took his first pain pill of the day. So, he is clearly healing. He is going to a follow-up visit and even though it is day 4 for me, I’m going to bundle up somehow and go along. We’re a team, for better or worse.

This will be a lay low weekend for sure. A sick game of survival really, The kids will be around to support us and we have some friends lined up next week to bring us food.  So, survive, we will because of all the love and support we get from family and friends.

Sending love and peace to you all.
Janet