FINALLY!!!

Finally we have a diagnosis and a plan.  Spod's cancer is pancreatic/bile duct, which has spread throughout his abdomen.  He is truly unable to eat more than a tablespoon at a time.  Tonight he had trouble swallowing his pills.  And no matter what they do they cannot get his nausea and gagging under control.  They keep messing around with his meds to see if they can control his pain without knocking him out.  It is getting marginally better.

He isn't sleeping at night either.  They give him sleeping pills but to no avail.  He has taken to phoning me in the wee hours of the night, which is so good.  We get to visit quietly.  I read the news to him.  Then he gets sleepy and goes to sleep for a couple of hours and then phones me again.  I have a news website with different articles…so I keep the laptop set on that and just read him some more til he is sleepy again.

I had a long chat today with the dr du jour (or was that yesterday?) and today I received a phone call from the hospice/hospital liaison.  They feel its best for Spod to have constant care.  So he will stay in the hospital until a hospice bed becomes free.  If that doesn't happen they are set up in the hospital to care for him until the end.  He is relieved about this…he did not want to move.

Aryn and I were all over the place today, bouncing in and out of the hospital in between stops.  We went to the counter place and we have made a decision….quartz it is and its beautiful.  We had lunch in an awesome pub downtown on the water. I got a board of meat, cheese, pickles, pate and bread.  Mmmmmm….but it had a big chunk of blue cheese.  

Basically I just plain don't like blue cheese.  On a rare occasion it has been served to me in a manner that was somewhat pleasant…once Aryn made an apple horsederve (sp?) that was quite edible.  And once I got a salad at Wendy's that had a gooey quite delicious blue cheese on it.  But generally to me that cheese takes like plastic bags.

But today, it was delicious.  The whole lunch was good.  The cheese came from Little Qualicum somethingorother.  Really good, and as Aryn said it tasted more cheddary than blue cheesy.  The pheasant pate was curried..mmmm.  The thin ham was extra smoked and the bread buttery and crisp. We did come home at some point and kind of sat in purple room here in stunned tiredness.  Then off we went again down to a different pub for dinner…so good.  Back to the hospital to sit with Spod for a while and tell jokes and read him awesome emails people have sent.

Tonight Arnie and I watched some cooking shows, ate bridge mix and tried to stay awake.  April and Myles, also extremely tired, showed up and we have all gone off to bed.  Its going to be a really busy weekend with lots of people coming to see Spod.  They all know where he is so they can go see him without me having to be there.  He will love it.  Hopefully he won't get too tired.  Off to chair now…I is a tired old lady  (well I feel like an old lady tonight!!)  TTYL