december already?

Things are looking stable, both in my chest and my brain, so I am free from the hospital until January 2, and free from scans until the beginning of February! (I'm knocking on my titanium as I type this)

I hope your Thanksgiving weekend was full of people you love and lots of good food.  I spent the first half in sunny Siesta Key, Florida.  Though it was cooler than I'd hoped it would be, the pool was still heated and it was nice and warm in the sun.  The strong breeze out of the north kept us moving along during our beach walks.  The second half of the holiday was split between time in Lancaster with friends from college and time at home with Jim, Colee, and Ben.  

Yesterday I spent four hours at Penn, mostly waiting in various waiting rooms.  I tried to remain patient as I was shuffled from room to room.  The root of the issue was the fact two people failed to place my IV on first attempt and refused to try again.  As this is pretty standard, I urged them to try again but they "didn't want to hurt me", which is nice, but really, trust me, try again.  Instead, they paged an ultrasound tech to come over from the hospital.  Let the waiting commence.  Not to mention, I was waiting with a semi-placed IV catheter hanging out of my left arm.  After they called the ultrasound person, they disappeared.  And I couldn't move my arm for the next half hour.  Because of where the attempt had been made, and where the catheter still sat, each time I moved my arm I was treated to a jolt of pain.

I finally ended up in the CT scan IV-placement area, which is just out in the open with the person managing the CT scanners and technicians moving patients around.  First order of business was to have someone get that dangling catheter out of my arm.  I continued sitting in my recliner, and finally, a technician/nurse asked what I was doing there.  I told him, he looked at the computer screen to see where I was supposed to be.  "Where is she on this thing?", he asked the woman at the desk.  "Dols, she's not here, we need to re-create her".  The woman responded, "ok, yeah, we need to recreate her".  I chimed in.  "Well, if you're going to re-create me, could you make this new version not have cancer?"  Both had a hearty laugh.  Then the technician/nurse turned to me, took my right arm, looked it up and down, and asked whether I'd mind having my IV placed near my wrist, along my ulnar nerve.  I hate that placement, but if it would get my day going, I'd suffer through it.  He was a gentle giant but he made a connection with that nerve on his first pass - I nearly jumped out of my skin.  He realigned his angle of attack, got the IV in, and finally, my day could progress.  Big sigh.  Thank goodness I can sleep through the half-hour long MRI, despite the loud clanging of the magnets.  All that waiting and slow passing time makes me tired.

Meanwhile, December is sure to fly past.  To me, even in the hustle and bustle of the end of the year and the arrival of winter, this is the best time of year to try to savor the gifts each day has to offer - the short days can be a blessing, giving us a bit more time to look inward and appreciate all that is good in our lives.  Yesterday, I was most appreciative of my nurse in the CT department; not only did he save my day but he regaled me with funny stories from his family Thanksgiving and his daughter's desire to make pie from the Halloween jack-o-lanterns (it was explained to her, yes, it is nice to re-use, but not in that way!).  Small gestures go a long way.