So it's been a couple weeks since my last posts. Things continue to go well and provided my health continues to stabilize, I feel these posts will get even further and further apart. It's been sad drifting away from blogging, but I just don't feel like I NEED it anymore... and that is actually a pretty great feeling.
As an update to last time, my car was fixed by the dealership for about 20% of the cost. Their diagnosis pointed to Midas having caused the AC issue, but when I confronted Midas about it they said they didn't touch/change anything. They claimed that all they did was diagnose a problem I already had. Needless to say, I am never going back to that Midas.
In cancer-related news, I saw my RO last week. He told me I'm going to make him famous. I was his first patient that he tried greatly reducing the radiation to a salivary gland. Normally the radiation dose is dropped to 60 grays or so in that area, but in my case he dropped it all the way to 40 grays. When he got the results of my PET/CT scan he expected that my salivary gland would have shrunken only slightly, instead of its normal amount.... Instead, he was surprised to find that my gland hadn't changed in size at all! It was completely spared! This is sort of a breakthrough in the oral cancer treatment world and so he submitted a paper with these effects... He said if it gets accepted and makes him famous, he'll give me a copy. ha! Previous studies have shown that when people are limited to one fully functioning salivary gland (like me) over time that salivary gland will learn to work overtime and can produce up to three times as much saliva. I am looking forward to that... right now I wake up every morning with an extremely dry, swollen mouth. I started taking Salagen (Pilocarpine) again to help, so hopefully things will get at least a little better in the meantime.
So, as I began sharing my good news with my coworkers/friends they all would say "Congratulations! We should go celebrate." I thought this was a bit much...but I agreed and last weekend Jake and I went out with 4 friends to a GameWorks-like arcade, go-kart, putt putt golf, laser tag, etc. place. We were probably the oldest people without kids there, but it was actually a lot of fun. I got to play skeeball (my favorite) and we raced each other in go-karts, which Jake had a really great time doing.... maybe too much. I was riding around the track and then this jerk came flying up beside me trying to pass where there was barely any room... and as the guy passes I notice it's my husband. haha We all then went out for dinner and drinks. I had a great time. We've lived in Tucson for about two years now and while I've made friends, I haven't spent a lot of time with folks outside of work. Within the past couple of weeks I feel like I'm finally to the point of regularly hanging out with some great people on the weekends (aside from my husband obviously) and that makes me very happy.
I'm especially enjoying the company of these new friends because Jake really likes them and for Jake that is hard. He's never rude, but Jake has a hard time being social and is pretty particular about the types of people that he can hang out with before getting annoyed. This brings me to some other recent news... ***EDIT: Content removed by request.***
...things continue to decline [for Jake] physically. He's still in pain most of the time and his dependence on pain killers has made it so that as he tries to wean himself off the meds, he feels sick, tired, and just overall icky. The pain management doc he saw seemed to be of absolutely no help and there still isn't a reasonable diagnosis for his problem.
Anyway, I'm sorry for the rambling... I'm just happy for my good health and good friends. I'm excited by the prospects of Jake being treated for *** and hopeful that someone soon can figure out what is going on with his pain problems. Thanks for listening!
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