Life turns a cormer when you least expect it . . .

What is the scariest thing you can think of that could happen to you other than dying? When does life take a turn for the worse . . . or for the better? How far can things go before you finally say uncle and break down and cry?

I lay in bed at night thinking about all the things I am not going to be able to do now. I can't live a minute without having some sort of anxiety about what is going to happen next week when I have to call the doctor or schedule a visit to the Oncologist. I am afraid of any sort of needle going into my arm thinking that I will never go without one for the rest of my life. I am dreading any idea of having to get any treatment that will make me throw up continuously or make me look sickly. I am scared of the idea that my life will never be normal again. Am I going to make it to my 50th birthday? Will I ever see my dream house in Oregon? Will I ever be able to have kids and share my life with my family? Am I going to be here a year from now?

I have had gall bladder problem since June 2009. Every once in a while I would have an attack and I would have really bad pains and take a percoset which eventually clears things up.

On September 27th, I had my final gall bladder attack. I was in bed with really bad pain. I took the strongest percoset I had and went to bed in the afternoon. Later that night I started getting severe pain and throwing up straight stomach acid. I have not felt more pain in my life. Saundra took me to the emergency room again at 3am on the 28th and I continued to thrown up 2 other times.

The doctor decided to admit me to have the gall bladder out finally. Saundra and I were really excited to hear that a doctor decided that it was bad enough to have it removed. Three other doctors previous did not think that it was bad enough and just prescribe medication to fix the pain or spasm attacks. The emergency room visit prior to this one, they didn't even scan the gall bladder, but prescribe an anti spastic medication.

The next day after being admitted I had the surgery. I later found out that they could not take out the gall bladder because of complications. The gall bladder was plastered with infection. It was also about 6 times larger than normal that could not be taken out laproscopically because of the size. The doctor would not take it out till the infection was taken care of.

The gall bladder was 6 times normal size. To get it smaller, they had to put in bags of antibiotics over the course of 12 days.

They also had to put in a second drain directly into my gall bladder. This one was inserted while I was awake. The procedure was one of the most painful experiences of my life. It was the longest 10 minutes I have ever endured to date. They give you a local topical anesthetic just under the skin and then insert a large blade through the skin, through the liver and into the gall bladder. They injected at least 4 viles of pain killers and it was still horribly painful. To give you an idea of how painful it was, take an exacto knife and slice about 10 inches down your arm without any medication and at the same time being held down by 4 nurses while on your side trying to hold still so that the blade does not break off in your liver. After the drain was installed I could not move without someone pulling on my arms for the first 5 days.

The doctor prescribed a CT scan to check the size and status of the gall bladder. It involved having to drink 2 liters of barium about an hour prior to the scan. I have had to do this before about 10 years prior to this moment and when I tried to drink it, I kept throwing it up. They finally had to put a 10cm tube up my nose and down my throat and push the barium through a syringe. As soon as they told me that I would have to do this again, I knew right away that I would not be able to drink it without throwing it up. The nurse had to put a tube up my nose again to put the barium down. I forgot how painful it was the first time. You are trying not to throw up while they are pushing the tube past your vocal cords. I had to drink sprite while they did it. They finally got it down and started putting the barium down. I could feel the coolness of the barium as it slid down the tube down the throat. After about 5 minutes, they got to about 1.5 of the bottles and by this time I could feel my stomach getting really full. I was so hard not to throw it up. I knew if I did, they would have to do it again. I had to get my mind off of it. I could talk with the tube in my throat and for some reason (I don't know why), started cracking jokes. You would think that being under such duress the only thing I could think of was to cry, but cracking jokes and "laughing" was the only thing that I could do. God, it took my mind off the fullness of the barium.

I had the test done. They found that the gall bladder was 6 times normal size, but also found some dark shadows in my liver. The Dr. decided to do an MRI to verify that they were just errors. I had to wait two days before I could get the MRI done. Once it was completed, They immediately schedules a biopsy. The doctor told me that they did find multiple masses in my liver and needed to check them. He did not say that they were potentially anything other than just a mass in my liver.

Just before having the MRI, my drain stopped working. They tried to flush the drain but each time it would be really painful. They speculated that it might be clogged. They tried to push harder with the flush and I finally had enough. The pain got so bad that it was going to make me throw up, even after they put three syringes of pain killers in me. They wanted to try going back in and putting the drain back in again the next day. I told them that I had it and no more. I was not going to go through that procedure again. My doctor decided that the gall bladder had been reduced small enough that they would just take the drain out. The following day they did the biopsy and took out the drain.

It took 4 days to get back the results of the biopsy.

On Friday, my life changed forever. An oncologist came to my room and told me that I have multiple cancerous tumors in my liver. The cancer is called Neroendocrine and most of the time originates somewhere else in the body. He told me that I would need to make an appointment to do a PET scan of my entire body to locate where the cancer originated and if there are other locations were the cancer is prominent. We do not know how far the cancer has spread. Saundra looked online and found a site that said that the life expectancy of a cancer patient of this cancer is about 1 to 5 years. I do not know how long I have had this cancer.

I am scared.

I lay in bed at night thinking about all the things I am not going to be able to do now. I can't live a minute without having some sort of anxiety about what is going to happen next week when I have to call the doctor or schedule a visit to the Oncologist. I am afraid of any sort of needle going into my arm thinking that I will never go without on for the rest of my life. I am dreading any idea of having to get any treatment that will make me throw up continuously or make me look sickly. I am scared of the idea that my life will never be normal again. Am I going to make it to my 50th birthday? Will I ever see my dream house in Oregon? Will I ever be able to have kids and share my life with my family? Am I going to be here a year from now?

Maybe it's time to crack a few jokes . . .