Fresh-faced and all chipper-like the nurse invited me to sit down before she began asking the usual battery of pre-surgical questions.
The Q-and-A session is part and partial for any surgery. In my case, that carving knife work will take place next Tuesday within the bowels of Lake Health System’s TriPoint Hospital. In the “out patient” section to be exact, though I’m not entirely sure where that sterile venue is actually located.
I’m sure I’ll hunt it down, especially since I’ll have my wife as the accompanying blood hound. When it comes to my health Bev is doggedly determined to do whatever it takes to get me there and ensure that my medicines go down with or without a spoonful of sugar.
Even if it kills me, or her, if that becomes necessary. You gotta’ love a wife who loves you that much.
Tuesday’s surgery will entail the removal of a pair of lymph nodes, located on either side of the gland associated also with the bladder. These nodes will then make their short journey to a laboratory where a pathologist will poke the things and determine whether the cancer has spread into my lymphatic system or remains locked inside the prostate gland.
The latter would be a good thing; the former, not so much. That would mean the cancer has made a sneak attack and infiltrated the allied lines. Under such a circumstances I’ll be looking at a three- to five-year life expectancy with treatments to suppress the disease rather than one that would whip the medically criminal antagonist at its source - the prostate gland.
My urologist - Dr. Lawrence Wolkoff - says in my case the odds of the cancer having spread is 10 to 15 percent. He noted also that I’ve been quite a good lad in getting both an annual rectal examine of the prostate as well as a PSA test.
I’m praying he’s correct and I’ve got a whole regiment of prayers warriors backing me up as well.
Back to the examination, the kind nurse did her duty, asking a gurney of questions not only related to my health but also that of my immediate blood family.
She answered my questions, among which included the likelihood that the surgery will require the shaving of my pubic hair. Yep, as distasteful as that imagery may be it is still necessary to help prevent bacterial infection.
“You’ll probably be asleep when they do it,” the nurse said.
Passing me off to a physician’s-assistant the nurse said I’d been a right fine patient. She put it by saying I’ve got a really decent sense of humor.
Good, I thought, the nurse didn’t pick up on the fact that I was nervously whistling in the dark, trying to wrestle with demons of my own mind’s making.
The physician’s-assistant also was top-of-the-line friendly as was a young woman who sat me down in order to draw a vile of blood.
For the former I answered a few more questions and promised that I’d be a good boy by peeing into a plastic specimen cup.
“The doctor ordered it,” said the physician’s-assistant.
Good thinking, I figured, since when in doubt, always blame the physician.
Similarly the blood-taking vampire was superbly pleasant, going so far as to ask which arm I’d like to volunteer for the mission. The right, as is usually the habit for such work, I replied.
After nearly 90 minutes the process was completed, about the same length of time the surgery will take, as I’ve been told.
So now I’m in the chute, waiting for the gate to open and for me to ride the bull out onto the arena floor. The prayer is, of course, that I can stay on and not fall off.
- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
JFrischkorn@News-Herald.com
Twitter: @Fieldkorn
No comments:
Post a Comment