Staying On Top Of The Pain

Today was a difficult day, but a lot easier than yesterday. Fortunately, my oncologist was able to get me in almost right away. Unfortunately he wasn't able to make anything of last night's CT scan because there was no IV contrast. So today, I had to repeat the process and I am currently awaiting the results. I asked my oncologist today point-blank "you think this Lymphoma" and he responded "not likely -- it would be very unusual for it to come on this fast and to hurt you as much as it is. What I'm seeing isn't symptomatic of Lymphoma at all. Now I'm saying it's unusual, that doesn't mean it's impossible either."

It appears NOT to be anything resembling a kidney stone. It's tissue that is pressing against something and hurting me an awful lot -- that's about all I can report right now. Fortunately I got a lot more done today than I did yesterday.

The biggest battle of them all is staying on top of this horrific pain. I've never had such an interesting battle... if I don't time things just right -- I pay for it. Last night I woke up about 3am and took pain medication, it was a wise thing to do because I didn't wake up in stabbing pain. I'd rather wake myself up via alarm rather than to have the pain wake me up at 5am stabbing me in the side.

I'm staying optimistic at this point. Hopefully it's just benign tissue and there is an easy way to make it go away -- that's the optimal route I am hoping for.

-LB

I Wish I Had Good News - 200th POST!

I wish I had better news on my 200th post, but I don't. I do have more excitement, however! Monday had plenty of madness involved, so it lived up to it's name in that respect.

The last couple of weeks I've had this small nagging pain in my left side. It was a dull pain that would kind of come and go... and with some more recent swelling -- I attributed it to just that. Figured it was just some swelling pressing up against something. Unfortunately, I was right but as with anything in my life this wasn't going to be easy. Early Monday morning I woke up almost crying from the pain it was shooting in my side so bad. I immediately got out of bed and took a variety of pain medications I had (within safe reason)... after about two hours of agonizing pain I finally felt some relief and started to snooze again. This had me missing the first half of the day at work and letting my boss know I wouldn't be coming in at least for a while. I called the doc in the morning and his scheduled turned out to be packed, and the receptionist suggested I go to the ER based on my symptoms. So that I did, and that turned out to be almost as painful as the pain itself (well, not really--but darn close!). I went into Salem's ER and it was packed as well. They were rather quick, doing a variety of tests right away with blood, urine, xray, blood pressure, etc. About four hours later I got a room and after another hour of waiting in the room the doctor arrived and told me what I had suspected all along--I had tissue of some sort folding under in my chest pressing up against my diaphragm which was causing all this pain. As the doctor was about ready to leave, he asked how long this had been going on... etc... etc... and said I had better have a CT to make sure it wasn't kidney stones as he was starting to think that could be a possible reason as well. I thought "oh no!" But I kept thinking to myself that it wasn't kidney stones... and after another hour, I found out I was right. The doc came in again and told me that news and also told me that the tissue is some sort of fatty tissue build-up in the same "tissue family" as what I had just gone through--but probably not cancer this time by the way it looked. I am hopeful that it is not, because after the chemo I had just weeks ago I doubt I would feel pain this quickly. That is my one good alibi out of all of this!

Later today (Tuesday) I will be going into work like normal, and then visiting my oncologist to find out where we will go from here--keeping my fingers crossed that this is not another 'cancer saga' I am faced with yet again.

So, I wanted this 200th post to be about reminicing about the previous 200 posts. About how I've taken this little blog a long ways in the past six years. It first started off as a small "side project" to my once huge website to turning into a "huge project" in my now small website. The little news blurp and top ten were always popular features of my website dovoted to cancer survivors. As my life moved along several different avenues (not forgetting my past), the blog took over the site discussing the other things going as well as the cancer scares along the years. Since cancer returned last year, the blog has been an enormously useful tool in communicating with my friends and family. It's useful interface has allowed me to communicate from almost anywhere -- not requiring any special software like my original website once did.

200 posts... I've come along way. 300, 400, 500... 1000 I am sure will come and go. Cancer scares or not, I plan on being with you through the long haul! Take care.... :-)

-LB

Another Week In The Clear

I wouldn't have ever thought that I would have two consecutive weeks of good health if you would have asked me a month ago. Sure enough, I remain in the clear. Another week back at work finds me on the receiving end of more and more projects from my manager at ODOT. This is a good thing as he is gaining more and more confidence in me that I am in it for the long haul. People often ask what I "do" at ODOT. Well let me tell you briefly: My title is 'Project Manager and Web Developer.' Primarily, I am the front-end webmaster for a site you may have heard of: ODOT's Trip Check website. Located at www.tripcheck.com, the site receives nearly 3,000 visits a day on average, and reaches a peak of 12,000 in the winter months when a storm hits. I am in charge of the look and feel of the site itself, while I have a team of programmers who work in the background to ensure the servers and scripts are in order 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In 2009, I will be responsible for a completly new graphic interface -- which is in the planning stages right now. Lately, I have been working on a traffic congestion map for the Portland/Vancouver area. Previously, the map only covered Portland, but I have been working on the expansion into Vancouver. The Trip Check website is the largest, most heavily visited site I've ever had the opportunity to be a part of. However, in my own private business (LB Productions - d.b.a. LBSITES) we have an organization's site who we manage which comes fairly close.

Though Trip Check is the largest part of my position, it's not all I do for Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) section of ODOT. I manage the internet and intranet ITS websites, publish a quarterly newsletter, work with the 511 telephone system, and work on other various duties within ODOT's ITS section.

For those of you who didn't know, I use to work for the Transportation Development Division (TDD) of ODOT as their Technology Coordinator. It was a position I very much loved, but this new position as Project Manager with ITS came about, and it was something I couldn't refuse. It turned out to be a very smart promotion for me and though I miss the folks at TDD everyday, I am enjoying the new work at ITS.

I am happy I can finally start telling you about other things going on in my life besides my health. Though, I will continue to keep you posted on that as well. Like for instance this week I was in pretty good shape, but I'm still dealing with some swelling on and off -- so far it's just a small annoyance.

Last weekend Thane *aka Sven* and I helped my friend Jonathan move to Eugene. It was a major bummer to see him leave Salem -- thankfully, though, he still works for ODOT here in Salem and I see him almost daily still. I have been trying to talk him into staying up here at my place every once in a while -- especially when the weather is bad.

Again, I am happy to speak with you all on somewhat good terms this week. I am still healing and it will take several months to return to "normal," I know with all the love, prayers, and support I've received from family and friends -- this is a goal that is within sight.

-LB

Communications Crisis!

This weekend went well. I feel like my body is trying to start healing itself. I am still noticing shortness of breath on a frequent basis, but that could be from being laid up for two and a half months. But all and all the weekend wasn't bad... until that is... MY CELL PHONE WAS STOLEN! My friend /slash/ roommate Thane *aka 'Sven'* was with me and we were at the mall. We were just looking around in a store, I sat my phone down for a brief moment, and BAM! it was gone. It appears whoever took it immediately shut it off because it was going to voicemail right away. I had just charged it, and where it was left there was more than adequate signal. Thane and I spent an hour retracing our steps and looking around and found nothing. I even let the clerks know at the store and nothing turned up. So, long and the short of it -- I will be without a phone for at least two days. Thankfully I had insurance on it, but there was still a deductable... oh and the big thing -- all my numbers! So, friends, I am asking you... if I communicate with you regularly and you think I might not already know your number by heart... will you send it to me? Those of you who I talk to at least once in a while, please send your numbers. DO NOT leave them in the comments of this blog, but e-mail them to me at: levi@lbsites.com ... Even if you don't send me your number, chances are I will be able to figure it out from my call logs, etc.

Yes, it made for a terrible evening, but it is just a phone and right now I could be stressed out over it -- but I'm not going to be. My health is trying to return, and the last thing I need to do is stress out over trivial things and risk a setback. So, for now, I shall keep all my energy for healing and forget the small things.

-LB