Saluting a special vet

It's Veterans Day and I want to write about a veteran who I have known all of my life.

My dad is a decorated veteran of the Korean War, and I'm very proud of him and the sacrifices he made for this nation before I was even born.

Dad is a vet in more ways than one. After serving in the Army in the 1950s, Dad went on to become a veteran care-giver. He didn't choose that role, but when the times came when his family needed him, he never flinched. He was always there.

This morning, Dad sent an email to remind me of a time in my life when I was facing steep odds, steeper than what I'm facing now.

"I remember when you were about three years old and had a bowel entanglement and went into a coma for a week," Dad wrote. "The doctors did not have much hope for you.

"Your mother and I were with you around the clock taking turns. I remember one Saturday about 6 a.m. I was with you when you woke up and started to smile. I had just opened the drapes in your hospital room and the sun started to shine in. Shortly after that Dr. Schiff came in and when he saw you were awake he said to you that you sure must have a lot of guts as you really needed it to pull through."

Dad isn't happy about the latest news about my cancer fight. But he wrote today that I have to "continue believing in yourself and remember not to give up."

Many years later, Dad was keeping vigil at a hospital after my mother fell ill and was also in a coma for weeks. But Mom pulled through, and stayed with us for another 13 years, thanks to her tough spirit and Dad's boundless capacity to care for her.

Dad's regular emails to me throughout this struggle have lifted me in more ways than I can ever explain. He always tells me that I'm tough, just like Mom. Today's remembrance from Dad reminded me that when I beat this current bout of cancer it won't be the first time I will have caught my doctors by surprise.

Dad has faith in my ability to overcome this crisis. What I want Dad to always remember is that whatever strength I have I learned from him and from Mom.

Thanks for being there for me, for Mom and for Mike, Dad. It has made all of the difference.

I am so lucky to be your son.

Love,

"Gus"

———

I lost a friend today: Longtime HIV/AIDS activist Howard Jacobs dies

This just in

This year roared in like a lion, and it looks like it's going to go out the same way.

On Tuesday afternoon, Dr. B1 emailed the pathology results of last week's biopsies, and they reinforce the observations made by my radiation oncologist late last month. "The results of your biopsy unfortunately showed a recurrence of the cancer," Dr. B1 wrote today.

Dr. B1 went on to say that he has spoken with other doctors on my Kaiser team, and their recommendation is for chemotherapy treatments. I'll be meeting with a new chemo doc Wednesday at 4, right after seeing Dr. B1.

I would have been surprised if Dr. B1 had told me that there was no longer evidence of cancer, as he said following the biopsy last summer. Just by looking in the mirror, I can tell that something wacky is going on with me from the neck up. This has been obvious to me for weeks. And on Monday, I noticed that the same kind of numbness that I began feeling months ago in my jaw was now advancing into my left ear.

So the bad cells are gaining ground. And the sooner that my doctors and I can initiate a vigorous counter assault, the better.

Pushing the panic button

Had a mini-meltdown the other day at the end of my workday.

The inside of my mouth was feeling increasingly full and I started feeling dizzy. When my breathing became labored, I was convinced that my airway was closing up and that the janitorial crew was going to have one unholy mess on its hands when it arrived to tidy up the office that night. Or I would have a shot at being picked in an audition for the Blue Man Group.

If I left work right away, I had a chance of getting to Kaiser before the Head and Neck Department shut down for the day. If I didn't get there in time, I would just go down the block to the emergency room. I sent a text message to my best buddy to loop him in on what was going on, and he phoned right away to tell me I should go straight to the ER.

I made good time getting across town to Kaiser so I decided to head first to Head and Neck to see if Dr. B1 was around. It was an economic decision, frankly: The copay for seeing Dr. B1 is $15 but a visit to the ER would set me back 50 bucks. My symptoms weren't getting worse so I thought I wasn't taking an unnecessary risk.

While riding the elevator to the sixth floor, I listed the symptoms I was feeling in my notepad so I could just hand it to the receptionist at Head and Neck as soon as I walked up to the counter.

She greeted me by name, as always, and sensed right away that I was scared. After reading the first few lines of my note, she got on the phone to see if she could find Dr. B1.

He was out for the day, so she found another doctor in the Head and Neck Department. And in just minutes I was sitting in the exam room for Dr. Ditirro, shaking like a leaf.

As soon as Dr. Ditirro entered the room, I thrust my note pad at him.

The first thing he did was check my airway by sliding a camera into my trach. He assured me that the airway was clear and that I was in no danger of suffocating. He said that my mouth was still recovering from the biopsies on Tuesday and that the swollen feeling would diminish.

Based on Dr. Ditirro's calming demeanor, I got the feeling that I'm not the first Head and Neck patient to have an anxiety attack like this. Right away, I felt at ease.

I am fortunate to have been able to walk in off the street and get looked at by a Kaiser provider right away. I thanked Dr. Ditirro for his time, and then spent a few minutes in the reception area steadying my nerves and texting my friend that I was fine.

I know that health-maintenance organizations sometimes get a bad rap from patients; even in this blog I've written about occasional loose cogs I've encountered in the Kaiser system. But those experiences are the exception, not the rule. The quality of care I get at Kaiser is excellent.

My mug . . . rhymes with 'ugh'

A biopsy-turvy day

The end of the year —heck, the end of the decade— is nigh (are bloggers allowed to use prose from the Middle Ages?), and so my hat trick of surgeries for 2009 is now complete.

I really don't expect to go under the knife again any time soon —not for Dr. B1, nor for anyone else. (And if the hoods who mugged me in my alley two years ago happen to be reading this, that means don't come prowling around my neighborhood wielding a blade rather than a gun.)

This time around, Kaiser didn't need me to check in till 11:30 in the morning, which gave me five additional hours of perpetual nervousness about the day's procedure. It also gave me extra time to properly underpack for a brief stay in the hospital.

The last time I had surgery, the folks at the admitting desk wouldn't let me bring my wallet —or any cash at all— with me into the pre-op room. So when I left my apartment for Tuesday's surgery, in one pocket I carried my photo I.D. and my Kaiser membership card and $16.25: 15 bucks for my copay and a buck-and-a-quarter for the subway ride. My other pocket held my house keys and a few bucks in case of an emergency on the way to the hospital.

I also packed my trusty note pad and pen, and a magazine whose name, Uncut, might seem an ironic choice for a guy about to be carved up. (Those of you snickering about the name Uncut ought to be ashamed of yourselves; Uncut is a music magazine, not what you're thinking.)

I sailed through the first few steps at the admitting desk, then found a seat in the waiting room. Without a wallet and carrying not even a penny (I wedged that emergency stash into the crack of my butt), I felt oddly vulnerable. So I reached into my bag for my magazine to try to relax.

I quickly put the magazine away. Uncut has a bold, red nameplate that can be read from across the room, and I didn't like the looks that some guy a few rows away was shooting in my direction. Lou Reed is on the cover of this month's Uncut, and I can imagine a stud like Lou being featured in another kind of magazine with the name Uncut.

Two cops came into the admitting area, along with an old man in a dark blue sweatsuit and a woman around the same age whose face was on too tight. I quickly sized him up as a white collar prisoner on a surgery day pass from San Quentin and I tagged her as his moll, mistress or wife. One of the cops was telling jokes and the crook and his wife seemed to be having a good time, even trading turns squeezing a stuffed animal, but I could tell that they were captives. Hey, remember how chummy Jack Nicholson and Otis Young got with their prisoner, Randy Quaid, in "The Last Detail"? Before I could eavesdrop long enough to get anything dirt on their situation, my name was called.

Before I knew it I was buck naked and fumbling for the strings in the back of my hospital gown. I stuffed my socks into one of my sneakers, my underwear in the other, rolled up my jeans and my shirt, and stuffed everything into a bag, along with Uncut, which I still didn't feel comfortable reading, not around people who are paid to slice guys like me open for a living, if not sheer sport. I laid in the bed with my notepad on my belly, prepared for the pre-op do-si-do of men and women in scrubs. I was kinda chilly, but there was no blanket to be seen.

First, a nurse queried me on the last time I ate (6 p.m. Monday), the last time I took any medication (6 a.m. Tuesday) and asked me to prattle off the names of all of the meds I'm now taking. That list was long before I got cancer and now is only getting longer. (I need to come up with a clever mnemonic for Epivir-Norvir-Prezista-Viread and Ziagen, and newcomers Acetaminophen Codeine Phosphate and Cyclobenzadrine and sometimes Flomax. Anyone help me out?)

Then a trio of anesthesiologists showed up, one at a time, to explain the day's procedure and to review what kind of surgery I would be having. Two of them were convinced that I was having ear surgery in addition to biopsies on my mouth, tongue and face. Another smiled that she would be back soon to give me my "Happy Juice." (If that's how some medical professionals tout that anesthesia to their patients, is it any wonder that Michael Jackson got hooked on the stuff?)

Well, it turned that propofol was not Kaiser's happy juice du jour, because when my next visitor, Dr. B1, came to my bedside, he said that there was a regional run on propofol —and he added that the shortage had nothing to do with Michael Jackson, although it wouldn't surprise me if some overly devoted fans are shipping tanks of propofol to Jacko's mausoleum at Forest Lawn.

Then, one of the anesthesiologists returned to shoot me up with Happy Juice, accompanied by yet another anesthesiologist. As I watched one of them approach my bed, my heart raced when I saw she was carrying a blanket. Imagine how I felt when, after reaching the foot of my bed, she let out a huge yawn and wrapped the blanket around herself. (Hey, Dr. B1, I may have smoked out an explanation for the shortage of Happy Juice in Kaiser's fridge.)

Finally, the nurses came to wheel me into the operating room. This is my favorite part of surgery day: the dramatic ride down hospital corridors. This time, they didn't wheel me around aimlessly until the anesthesia took hold; I actually remember being brought into the operating room, and what a shiny, gorgeous showroom of gore it was.

And that was the last thing I remember before surgery. When I came to, it was already 6:30 p.m., and both of my guardian angels had been called to come drive me home. Because the call came unexpectedly late, Guardian Angel Tweedledum deferred to Guardian Angel Tweedledee —I know, I know: that's no way to talk about one's Guardian Angels— and before long Tweedledee showed up at my bedside.

But I sent him away for an hour or so. You see, my bladder felt full, but I couldn't bring myself to pee. This happens to me a lot, but usually only in men's rooms with no dividers between urinals. When it happens to me in a private hospital john, I know that the anesthesia I was given may be wreaking havoc on my urinary tract.

To be on the safe side, I asked Tweedledee if he could find something to do as he waited for my text to alert him that I had successfully peed. Luckily, urine did flow before long, and I felt comfortable enough to check out, hop in the wheelchair and ride to my friend's car in the parking lot, making a pit stop at the pharmacy for Band-Aids for the oozing scabs on my face (Tweedledee paid. What was I gonna do: fish three bucks out of my butt and hand them to the pharmacist?!).

By the time Tweedledee and I got to my door, it was pushing 9:30. It had been a long day.

And it's going to be a long week of waiting for the first results of the biopsy to roll in.

P.S. to Tweedledum: Don't be cross I assigned you the less appealing moniker of the two. You know I love you, too.

The blogger is zzzzzing

Hello, my TP peeps: I'll write soon about Tuesday's biopsies, which kept me at Kaiser until 9 p.m. tonight. Right now, I need to sleep, heal, and get to the office in the morning. Come back later in the week. Deal?

Fun while it lasted

I'm making no predictions about what Dr. B1 will or will not find Tuesday afternoon when he slices tissue in and around my tongue for a biopsy, for the third time in 10 months.

There's only one guarantee about tomorrow, as far as I can see: When I get wheeled into the recovery room at Kaiser following surgery, no nurses are going to flutter around my bed mistaking me for Ben Stiller.

With the horrifying transformation of my face over the past several weeks, my days of faux celebrity-hood at Kaiser have come to a close. If anyone were to confuse me with anyone famous, I think it would be a hybrid of Freddy Krueger and the Incredible Mr. Limpet, with a hint of Nixonian jowls tossed in for good measure.

But the changes in my face are occurring at an alarming pace, so who can predict where my mug is ultimately headed?

Every now and then I'm tempted to take another self portrait and post it here so all of you can see what I'm talking about. But I don't want to shock anybody and I probably shouldn't embarrass myself.

And I'm grateful no one I saw at the office today took a look at me and said, "Hey, Serchia! Don't you know that Halloween is over?"