Finally, finally, finally. The answer to wait, wait, wait.
Lew had his nuclear thyroid treatment on Tuesday morning. He is now "radioactive" and can't cuddle and kiss, can't lick my spoon, and has to flush twice. Hopefully the long-awaited drink will be the answer to the misery he's been suffering the past two months. Whether it's coincidence, luck, or the drink working quickly, he has managed two full nights without having an angina attack. Today he decided not to put on his nitro patch, and at suppertime has still had no "twinges", as he calls them.
Today he went to get his Holter monitor, so he is now wired to a heart monitor for 24 hours. Somehow we doubt that anything startling will be found. The one part of him that has remained strong seems to be his heart (and that can be taken both ways!).
Tomorrow we both pay a visit to our physiotherapists. Lew will learn what kind of exercises he will have to do to get his shoulder and arm working the way it should following the cancer surgery and radiation. I've been taking treatments for a couple of months now for screwed up sacroiliac joints. I guess that's what comes of thinking you're 16 when you're closer to 61.
Two more work days! Whahoooo! Now, if I can dig through the snow I'll be able to finish planting the garden. No, it's not really THAT bad, but, yes, we've had snow today! My poor tomato plants are two feet tall and blooming, but they're still in their little greenhouse with a light bulb and blanket on. Even at that those that touch the plastic are a bit touched by the frost. We need the moisture that we're getting, but that's all the good I can say for the weather we're having right now. Thankfully, the really nice days have fallen on the weekends. But soon, it won't matter to me. I'll just take them when they happen.
The trailer is all ready to be loaded up for Montreal. Now that Lew has had his treatments, we are feeling more confident that we will actually hit the road as planned. Whatever follow-ups he needs can happen when we get back. This time the doctors can wait for him!
Happy Victoria Day to everyone,
Phyl and Lew
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Happy Mom's Day to Everyone Who has had the Joy of Motherhood
The best to all Mom's on this special day.
Because of this lady, I get to say "Happy Mother's Day, Mom":
And because of these ladies, I get to be a Mom:
---And the bonus is that we're actually having a beautiful sunny calm day that simply calls out to me "garden, garden, garden".
Monday, April 13, 2009
SPRING HAS SPRUNG!
What a lovely Easter weekend it has been! The yard is all tidied up. The lawn chairs are out on the back patio, barbecue has been cleaned and serviced, and the compost grinder repaired and back in action. Today (Monday) I even dug up a couple of flower beds and took all my seedlings off the windowsills and put them in their little plastic greenhouse. The 14-day forecase promises that it isn't going to freeze solid. Today was a balmy +20.
The only thing that puts a damper on the emergence of spring is Lew's inability to fully enjoy it. He is simply feeling rotten. He continues to lose weight, is getting shakier by the day, and has no energy or strength to do anything. Other than going out to play bridge, and cooking simple meals, he pretty much only watches TV. It's a good thing we've had the Masters and the Men's Curling to watch!
Tomorrow he sees the cardiologist and we're hoping he gets booked for a thyroid scan this week as well. Now that we've narrowed the problems down to angina and overactive thyroid, we're anxious to get the scan done and treatment started. We're still planning to travel this summer, and want him to be on the upswing so he can enjoy the holiday.
He's terribly frustrated at not being able to putter around in the shop or the yard. Even after he starts feeling better, it is going to take a couple of months to get back to normal. I think he is secretly glad that I am pretty independent and am able to take on the "man" things that he can't do at the moment.
My mom is doing really well after having her knee replacement, and is walking better than she has for the last couple of years. My Aunt is doing great for 92, and I've been trying to convince her it's warm enough to go outside and walk around her building. They were both over for dinner on Friday evening and enjoyed the season's first barbecued steak and some real homecooking.
Otherwise we had a very quiet weekend. It has been nice to have a phone visit with Betty, and a couple more with Carolyn. It helps us keep up with what is happening with Lew's family. Hope everyone is doing well. Will try to keep the blog updated as Lew's medical saga continues.
Cheers,
Phyllis and Lew
I wish I could lose weight at the rate he is doing for about a month! But I don't want all the other nasty symptoms along with it. I'm looking forward to some serious gardening to get some muscles going here.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Good grief, two months have passed since our last blog. Maybe it's time to tune in again.
Lew finished his radiation on January 15, and has been recovering very nicely. His sunburn peeled and healed, and he has regained most of his energy. He will see the oncologist at the end of April for a follow-up. We expect there will be a call for an MRI prior to that.
Phyl spent all of January preparing for her role as Delia in "Bedroom Farce", one of five plays presented annually by the Gateway Theatre--a non-professional volunteer theatre here in Saskatoon. At first, the play seemed like it would be less than exciting, a typical English farce without much real humor and including a lot of anachronisms that only the British might understand. But as it came together it became more and more enjoyable. The local newspaper reporter gave it rave reviews. Phyl was pleased to read ".....Blake Cumming (Ernest) and Phyllis Johnston (Delia) were perfectly cast as the oldest couple". In reality, Blake is 30 years old! That also means, that in reality he is exactly half as old as Phyl. Later in the review, "Johnston was even more believable when she provided motherly advice to her daughter-in-law". Given that I will never have a daughter-in-law, I guess it worked!
While Phyl was away in the evenings, Lew spent his time keeping tabs on golf, NCIS, Business News Network, and West Wing. He had his sidekick, Melissa the cat, to keep him company. On January 17, Phyl's Mom came to stay for two weeks as she had just had a knee replacement. So she and Lew could watch TV together. Lew was in his element looking after her while Phyl was off to work or to rehearsal. Ella stayed until the first of February when she went back to her condo. But both Lew and Phyl have been on the reserve list for grocery shopping, medical appointments, etc. The plan is for Ella to be completely well so that she can babysit Melissa and water the garden while we are away for six weeks this summer.
The first weekend of February we flew to Winnipeg to help celebrate Aunt Merle's 100th birthday. Even though her body was weak, she was amazingly keen-minded and could keep track of everyone as they came and went. It is unfortunate that she wasn't able to be up out of bed to have her party, but everyone had good visits with her. And we all had wonderful visits with each other. Betty and her clan did a wonderful job of feeding and entertaining all of us.
Phyl's last official day of work will be May 20. We hope to be on the road by May 22 with our cargo trailer behind the Sorrento. With any luck we'll have the piano, a big sewing desk, the kitchen table, several boxes of books, tools and hardware, an office chair, and perhaps the tea wagon tucked carefully into the trailer. These are all items destined for Leslie and Trevor (Phyl's eldest daughter and hubby) in Hudson, PQ. We hope to arrive there by the 27th of May, unload, get our work clothes on and help them rip the stucco and brick off the exterior of their house.
For some relaxation, we will fly from Montreal on June 2 and be in Finland with Lindsay and Jukka (Phyl's youngest and her hubby) for a week. Back to Montreal/Hudson on June 11 to recover from jet lag. Then another week helping replace windows, add styrofoam insulation, and install vinyl siding. End date for the travels depends a lot on how things are going here at home. We'll hire someone to mow grass, and hopefully the weeds won't get any higher than the back fence in the garden. We can hardly expect Ella (at age 83) to take complete responsibility. Perhaps she could bring Florence (92) over to help her!
The past week we have torn the house apart in order to lay laminate flooring throughout the dining room, kitchen, and hallways. Every door casing had to be removed of course. There never were any respectable baseboards, but there was linoleum glued, screwed and tatooed onto the walls. So there was a lot of dismantling done before we could mantle.......hmmm I wonder if that the correct use of "mantle"?
Effective yesterday we laid the last piece of laminate. Today has been a day of scraping off old paint around the door frames and building new casings. It's slow work. As we go, Phyl is doing some patching and painting. That expanded into painting an entire wall, and it appears that entire hallway into the bedrooms will need the same treatment. No rest for the wicked.
Lew is anxious to get this job put to bed, as we are supposed to get some warmer weather (they've been wrong for the last two months on that forecast!). Regardless, he has plans to head to the cabin for some snowmobiling. Given the doctors' prognosis last year, it's pretty exciting that he has full use of his arm and can wrestle the snow machine and quad around. We've been discussing going golfing this summer--something that was out of the question for the past two summers for Lew.
That's the news from 55 O'Neil in Saskatoon. We'd love to see some information come forth from Mike and Charlene, and David and Tina and crew. Did manage to catch up on Lynn and Noni's lives and kids while in Winnipeg. Take care everyone.
Lew and Phyl
Lew finished his radiation on January 15, and has been recovering very nicely. His sunburn peeled and healed, and he has regained most of his energy. He will see the oncologist at the end of April for a follow-up. We expect there will be a call for an MRI prior to that.
Phyl spent all of January preparing for her role as Delia in "Bedroom Farce", one of five plays presented annually by the Gateway Theatre--a non-professional volunteer theatre here in Saskatoon. At first, the play seemed like it would be less than exciting, a typical English farce without much real humor and including a lot of anachronisms that only the British might understand. But as it came together it became more and more enjoyable. The local newspaper reporter gave it rave reviews. Phyl was pleased to read ".....Blake Cumming (Ernest) and Phyllis Johnston (Delia) were perfectly cast as the oldest couple". In reality, Blake is 30 years old! That also means, that in reality he is exactly half as old as Phyl. Later in the review, "Johnston was even more believable when she provided motherly advice to her daughter-in-law". Given that I will never have a daughter-in-law, I guess it worked!
While Phyl was away in the evenings, Lew spent his time keeping tabs on golf, NCIS, Business News Network, and West Wing. He had his sidekick, Melissa the cat, to keep him company. On January 17, Phyl's Mom came to stay for two weeks as she had just had a knee replacement. So she and Lew could watch TV together. Lew was in his element looking after her while Phyl was off to work or to rehearsal. Ella stayed until the first of February when she went back to her condo. But both Lew and Phyl have been on the reserve list for grocery shopping, medical appointments, etc. The plan is for Ella to be completely well so that she can babysit Melissa and water the garden while we are away for six weeks this summer.
The first weekend of February we flew to Winnipeg to help celebrate Aunt Merle's 100th birthday. Even though her body was weak, she was amazingly keen-minded and could keep track of everyone as they came and went. It is unfortunate that she wasn't able to be up out of bed to have her party, but everyone had good visits with her. And we all had wonderful visits with each other. Betty and her clan did a wonderful job of feeding and entertaining all of us.
Phyl's last official day of work will be May 20. We hope to be on the road by May 22 with our cargo trailer behind the Sorrento. With any luck we'll have the piano, a big sewing desk, the kitchen table, several boxes of books, tools and hardware, an office chair, and perhaps the tea wagon tucked carefully into the trailer. These are all items destined for Leslie and Trevor (Phyl's eldest daughter and hubby) in Hudson, PQ. We hope to arrive there by the 27th of May, unload, get our work clothes on and help them rip the stucco and brick off the exterior of their house.
For some relaxation, we will fly from Montreal on June 2 and be in Finland with Lindsay and Jukka (Phyl's youngest and her hubby) for a week. Back to Montreal/Hudson on June 11 to recover from jet lag. Then another week helping replace windows, add styrofoam insulation, and install vinyl siding. End date for the travels depends a lot on how things are going here at home. We'll hire someone to mow grass, and hopefully the weeds won't get any higher than the back fence in the garden. We can hardly expect Ella (at age 83) to take complete responsibility. Perhaps she could bring Florence (92) over to help her!
The past week we have torn the house apart in order to lay laminate flooring throughout the dining room, kitchen, and hallways. Every door casing had to be removed of course. There never were any respectable baseboards, but there was linoleum glued, screwed and tatooed onto the walls. So there was a lot of dismantling done before we could mantle.......hmmm I wonder if that the correct use of "mantle"?
Effective yesterday we laid the last piece of laminate. Today has been a day of scraping off old paint around the door frames and building new casings. It's slow work. As we go, Phyl is doing some patching and painting. That expanded into painting an entire wall, and it appears that entire hallway into the bedrooms will need the same treatment. No rest for the wicked.
Lew is anxious to get this job put to bed, as we are supposed to get some warmer weather (they've been wrong for the last two months on that forecast!). Regardless, he has plans to head to the cabin for some snowmobiling. Given the doctors' prognosis last year, it's pretty exciting that he has full use of his arm and can wrestle the snow machine and quad around. We've been discussing going golfing this summer--something that was out of the question for the past two summers for Lew.
That's the news from 55 O'Neil in Saskatoon. We'd love to see some information come forth from Mike and Charlene, and David and Tina and crew. Did manage to catch up on Lynn and Noni's lives and kids while in Winnipeg. Take care everyone.
Lew and Phyl
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
SEASON'S GREETINGS!
To the left is Lew and I just before we left for a Christmas party last year. We like to think we haven't changed significantly over 2008!
I chuckle to read Gary's blog. You guys are only getting a little reminder of growing up in Winnipeg! Shucks, we'll take the snow and give you our -30! Actually it has warmed up significantly this Christmas Eve day, and we're at a balmy -18 this afternoon.
Lew is off playing bridge and I've just finished the peanut brittle and have the carrot pudding steaming, ready for a quick heat up tomorrow. Christmas will be very quiet. Just the two of us and the two little old ladies. We have plenty to be grateful for. Lew has finished 20 of his 33 radiation treatments and the oncologist told him yesterday that everything is going as planned. We hope that the middle of January, when the last treatment is done, we can kiss this whole episode good-bye and get on with life.
I'm revving up to do a play in one of our semi-professional Theatre groups here in Saskatoon. The run is the last week of January. Thanks to Lew's help, I have all my lines memorized and am just working on getting all the inflections, gestures, etc. in place.
As soon as that is done, we look forward to heading to Winnipeg for Auntie Merle's party. It will be a grand reunion of all the crew.
In May I officially retire--even if the stock market doesn't recover. We have a Sally Ann and food bank here, so somehow we'll survive! Hopefully we're off to Montreal as soon as the garden is planted. We plan to drive down with our trailer loaded with furniture for my oldest daughter and her fiance. They'll have a job list for us, as they are updating their six bedroom house, and every room needs some kind of attention. We're hoping we can focus more on the exterior of the house. The garden will likely call us home around the middle of June. My Mom is to have a knee replacement sometime this summer, so we hope everything works into a schedule.
Our relatives and friends have been wonderfully supportive during Lew's surgery and recovery. We had a marvellous day in June to hold my youngest daughter's wedding in our back yard. Life is good and we are thankful.
We wish everyone a happy Christmas filled with fun, family, friends and fellowship. May 2009 give all of you good health and happiness, and perhaps the urge to travel to 55 O'Neil Crescent in Saskatoon!
Cheerio!
Phyllis and Lew
Sunday, October 5, 2008
99.9% Out of 100--Great News
We are home from Edmonton where Lew had his surgery on October 1. Nobody (including the surgeons) knew what the outcome might be. We were given "possibilities" as grave as: 1.) He may lose all use of his left arm. 2.) He may have to have the nerves removed and reconstruction attempted by taking nerves from his leg. 3.) He may have any degree of mobility up to 80%.
He was under the knife for a little over four hours. Result? The A-team pulled through! He has at least 85% mobility in his arm and hand with no numbness or tingling. They were able to excise 95% of the tumor. He was released yesterday at noon, only three full days after surgery. He is on precautionary antibiotics and only takes a pain med at bedtime. We will phone the oncologist tomorrow and begin proceedings for radiation. The dosage will be quite low, and there is almost 100% guarantee that the tumor will be completely eliminated. Thus, this past year will become a "blip" on the road of life, we hope.
For anyone who questions the existence of a Higher Being, I can't help but disagree. Our prayers have been more than answered.
My mother looked after house and cat and had a lovely supper ready for us when we got home. Last night was the first night that Lew had a really good sleep. Hospitals are notoriously noisy and disruptive. Although he had a room all to himself, he was right across from the nursing station and public washroom, and everyone who came into the "West" wing had to walk past his room from the elevators. So sleep was not an easy thing for him, especially when he doesn't sleep that well anyway.
He stayed awake for the six hour drive home--probably because I was driving! I think I did a really good job of getting us home safe and sound. Edmonton has grown phenomenally in the past several years and the traffic is getting a bit crazy, but no problems were encountered.
Unfortunately Lew spent three of the most gorgeous Fall days stuck in the hospital. The temperatures were around 26 degrees during the entire time. I made sure I went out for a good walk every afternoon. The drive there and back was beautiful with all the colours. Nobody needs to say that Ontario and the Maritimes have the market on Fall colors. This year on the prairies is more beautiful than we have ever seen. Even my mother, who has gone through 83 years says she can't remember ever seeing such rich color. And to date we haven't even had a significant frost. Flowers are still in full bloom!
Today we are having the first rain in about six weeks. It is an old-fashioned "soaker"--just the kind we should have before winter sets in. Amazingly there were still many fields of grain not combined as we drove home yesterday. I have no idea what the excuse is. Never in my 60 summers has there been a drier, more wide open Fall. I guess too many farmers have too much land and just can't get it all covered.
For now, no further exciting news. We hope everyone else is happy and healthy. Now, "wealthy"--that's another issue with the world economy in such an uproar and the stock market in chaos. Oh well, c'est la vie.
Take care,
Phyllis and Lew
He was under the knife for a little over four hours. Result? The A-team pulled through! He has at least 85% mobility in his arm and hand with no numbness or tingling. They were able to excise 95% of the tumor. He was released yesterday at noon, only three full days after surgery. He is on precautionary antibiotics and only takes a pain med at bedtime. We will phone the oncologist tomorrow and begin proceedings for radiation. The dosage will be quite low, and there is almost 100% guarantee that the tumor will be completely eliminated. Thus, this past year will become a "blip" on the road of life, we hope.
For anyone who questions the existence of a Higher Being, I can't help but disagree. Our prayers have been more than answered.
My mother looked after house and cat and had a lovely supper ready for us when we got home. Last night was the first night that Lew had a really good sleep. Hospitals are notoriously noisy and disruptive. Although he had a room all to himself, he was right across from the nursing station and public washroom, and everyone who came into the "West" wing had to walk past his room from the elevators. So sleep was not an easy thing for him, especially when he doesn't sleep that well anyway.
He stayed awake for the six hour drive home--probably because I was driving! I think I did a really good job of getting us home safe and sound. Edmonton has grown phenomenally in the past several years and the traffic is getting a bit crazy, but no problems were encountered.
Unfortunately Lew spent three of the most gorgeous Fall days stuck in the hospital. The temperatures were around 26 degrees during the entire time. I made sure I went out for a good walk every afternoon. The drive there and back was beautiful with all the colours. Nobody needs to say that Ontario and the Maritimes have the market on Fall colors. This year on the prairies is more beautiful than we have ever seen. Even my mother, who has gone through 83 years says she can't remember ever seeing such rich color. And to date we haven't even had a significant frost. Flowers are still in full bloom!
Today we are having the first rain in about six weeks. It is an old-fashioned "soaker"--just the kind we should have before winter sets in. Amazingly there were still many fields of grain not combined as we drove home yesterday. I have no idea what the excuse is. Never in my 60 summers has there been a drier, more wide open Fall. I guess too many farmers have too much land and just can't get it all covered.
For now, no further exciting news. We hope everyone else is happy and healthy. Now, "wealthy"--that's another issue with the world economy in such an uproar and the stock market in chaos. Oh well, c'est la vie.
Take care,
Phyllis and Lew
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Garden Pics as promised
Here is our backyard on July 6, one week after the wedding. Too bad the kids couldn't have delayed for three weeks, as this is what
happens by July 26:
The tent you see in the background is the tent we used for the wedding. My brother, an engineer, figured out how to move it from the lawn to the car park without having to take it completely apart. Four people were able to "walk" it through the gate, post by post. It is now a great place for Lew to park his car. However, the last couple of weeks he has been using it as a cover while he works at re-vamping the trailer. Due to some overloading by his buddy, a wheel bearing fried and chewed up the axle. So a new axle was ordered and new tires were installed. Then the box and floor were completely torn off and will be replaced with new plywood. Since it's down to the bare frame, Lew has scraped and sanded and prepared all the metal for a fresh coat of paint (the color is up for further discussion since I discovered the plan is Robin's egg blue!) Today we pulled new wiring through the conduit, and tomorrow there will be further wiring and new tail lights and lenses will be installed. All in all, it will be right back to "new" again. This is a job Lew wants to get done before he goes for surgery.
Meanwhile I have torn out all the bean and pea vines and hope this will make some room for the cucumbers to crawl. I also pulled out some of the flowers that are now finished and going to seed. Here are some of the closeups--Lew is getting really good with his camera!
Coleus, Portulaca, and Impatiens Ice Plant
< Candytuft and Portulaca ^ Hope for Humanity Rose
Ageratum Day Lily
So there you have it! We CAN grow things on the Prairies--it just takes a lot more work!
All for now. Phyllis
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
