So, if you've got some positive energy to share...
* So. I know I've not been posting and commenting much, and I feel really bad about that. I have been reading my flist though, so even though I didn't comment, I probably did see your post.
Things have been hectic around here, which is one of the main reasons for my sporadic posting. As most of you know, my mom has a condition to her esophagus, which has landed her in the hospital a few times now. It landed her into the hospital at the beginning of this year as well.
Quick recap: My mom has a narrowing in the esophagus, down near her stomach, and sometimes that narrowing gets blocked, so no food and fluids can pass through. Usually, she'll go to the hospital, and the narrowing gets stretched, so food and drink can pass through again, and all is well again for a while. Not this time though.
During the treatment, the doctor who was doing the stretching, found a spot in my mom's esophagus that he didn't trust, and got it tested.
Conclusion? My mom has esophageal cancer.
That's the bad news. The good news is, there are no metastases, so it's treatable. My mom will get radiation treatment in combination with chemo. The chemo is once a week, and will help the radiation treatment, so it'll work better. The radiation is every workday for 5 weeks. Then there's a resting period of about 6 weeks, and then my mom will have surgery. During the surgery, they'll take out the entire esophagus, and create a new esophagus out of the stomach.
Yeah. I was flapping with my ears when I heard that, but apparently, she'll hardly notice any difference when everything has healed. So that's good.
Right now, she can only drink/ eat thick liquids (like soup, porridge, custard, smoothies etc.), and she's on tubefeeding during the night, to keep her condition and weight up to where they're supposed to be. I'm vastly becoming an expert in connecting and handling the feeding pump. :'3
Anyway. Treatment will start next week.
My thoughts are all over the place (seriously, just seeing how long it took me to make this into a coherent story... yeah.), and I have the feeling I'm forgetting things left and right. It's gonna be a heavy few weeks, but we're trying to keep positive, and keep our focus on the end goal, which is healing.
So yeah. Positive thoughts/ vibes and fun things for distraction purposes are loved and wanted right now. :)
***
On to some fun things.
* cha, I got your card. Thank you so much! :D
* Made an incense burner out of a Pringles can after seeing this tutorial.
Pretty neat, huh? :'3
* I finally got my birthday present! It took a little while because I had to order it myself, and like I said, my head is all over the place.
What is this present you ask? Well, it's a Wacom Intuos 4 drawing tablet. I had to pay about half myself, 'cause the fuckers are expensive, but I think I'm in love. Seriously, this is me right now:
It's so pretty and sleek and awesome... *__*
* Talking about art... Still working on the JiB art project. It's Sam's turn right now:
(Click on the picture to see it a bit bigger.)
\o\ \o/ /o/
Things have been hectic around here, which is one of the main reasons for my sporadic posting. As most of you know, my mom has a condition to her esophagus, which has landed her in the hospital a few times now. It landed her into the hospital at the beginning of this year as well.
Quick recap: My mom has a narrowing in the esophagus, down near her stomach, and sometimes that narrowing gets blocked, so no food and fluids can pass through. Usually, she'll go to the hospital, and the narrowing gets stretched, so food and drink can pass through again, and all is well again for a while. Not this time though.
During the treatment, the doctor who was doing the stretching, found a spot in my mom's esophagus that he didn't trust, and got it tested.
Conclusion? My mom has esophageal cancer.
That's the bad news. The good news is, there are no metastases, so it's treatable. My mom will get radiation treatment in combination with chemo. The chemo is once a week, and will help the radiation treatment, so it'll work better. The radiation is every workday for 5 weeks. Then there's a resting period of about 6 weeks, and then my mom will have surgery. During the surgery, they'll take out the entire esophagus, and create a new esophagus out of the stomach.
Yeah. I was flapping with my ears when I heard that, but apparently, she'll hardly notice any difference when everything has healed. So that's good.
Right now, she can only drink/ eat thick liquids (like soup, porridge, custard, smoothies etc.), and she's on tubefeeding during the night, to keep her condition and weight up to where they're supposed to be. I'm vastly becoming an expert in connecting and handling the feeding pump. :'3
Anyway. Treatment will start next week.
My thoughts are all over the place (seriously, just seeing how long it took me to make this into a coherent story... yeah.), and I have the feeling I'm forgetting things left and right. It's gonna be a heavy few weeks, but we're trying to keep positive, and keep our focus on the end goal, which is healing.
So yeah. Positive thoughts/ vibes and fun things for distraction purposes are loved and wanted right now. :)
***
On to some fun things.
* cha, I got your card. Thank you so much! :D
* Made an incense burner out of a Pringles can after seeing this tutorial.
Pretty neat, huh? :'3
* I finally got my birthday present! It took a little while because I had to order it myself, and like I said, my head is all over the place.
What is this present you ask? Well, it's a Wacom Intuos 4 drawing tablet. I had to pay about half myself, 'cause the fuckers are expensive, but I think I'm in love. Seriously, this is me right now:
It's so pretty and sleek and awesome... *__*
* Talking about art... Still working on the JiB art project. It's Sam's turn right now:
(Click on the picture to see it a bit bigger.)
\o\ \o/ /o/