A Return to the Journey of 2011

 Part 1
So there it is.....I thought I was opening a new chapter filled with promise and instead the bottom fell out. I was hospitalized and diagnosed with colon cancer and the roller coaster ride began. Next month it will be two years since it started and there are no signs it will be over any time soon.

The series of posts about my hospitalization only got through my diagnosis with a pulmonary embolism before the posting was cut short by more complications in this journey. Reading back over the posts to see what I have written and I am surprised at all I have forgotten.

I have never been able to write a story from the middle. There is nothing simple about life and so many times the answers lie in the details. I know in this journey that has definitely been the case. What has happened to me over this time  was definitely influenced by events early on  so I think to do justice to the story I must pick up where I left off in the critical care unit........

I thought I understood the scope of my pulmonary embolism when it happened but within the next couple of days that perception changed. A first I thought  I had a clot in one lung. Next it was a clot in each lung but finally I grew to understand that the clots in my legs had thrown off hundreds of smaller pieces that had lodged in both lungs.

 It is called a shower embolism and mine was as deadly as it gets. My survival had indeed been one of sheer willpower because the blood vessels in my lungs were so clogged with debris I should have been getting no oxygen at all.

As I laid there in the CCU I pondered the facts I had dodged two bullets in just three days. Again my mind went to my horses and what would become of them if I didn't come out the other side of this.

All the things I should have done to ensure their safety haunted me as I laid there. I began formulating plans based on three different outcomes, death, disability or return to full health. The only question was a timeline. When was the right time to give up on my life, my health, my dream?

Not the best way to ensure a positive outcome, I'm pretty sure my doctors would say but then they are not me. Knowing my horses might end up in jeopardy if I didn't survive only made me more determined to beat whatever came my way and it's a darn good thing it did because the challenges continued.

If my memory serves me it was after the PE, my gut shut down. I ended up on TPN to keep me alive as they waited for my plumbing to kick back in. To be honest at this point I don't recall how long it took for that to happen but it was long enough I dropped around seventy pounds.

Within a couple of days of me regaining gut sounds they were sending me out the door. My discharge papers were signed and I was even dressed in my street clothes when I decided I needed to hit the bathroom first. Little did I know that little detour would result in another face off with death and this was just my first trip to the hospital.

To be continued.......

Another Set Back