My Stay at the Hospital Part 2

sunday wasn't such a big deal as i was home and had to be at the hospital on monday morning at 8am. though we were sure that surgery was to be on monday (mainly because we were told that), i took the adequate preparations to insure a complication free operation. i refrained from eating and drinking after midnight...even alcohol which would have made sleeping and relaxation a little easier. i went to bed around 12:30am and finally drifted off to sleep around 2am. i awoke bright and early at 6 in the morning and, as i was under the assumption that my conization was in a few hours, i denied myself my morning coffee as well as water or anything else. needless to say, i was incredibly thirsty and my mouth felt like it was stuffed with moth balls. i hadn't had cotton mouth that bad since my pot smoking days. which brings us to another chapter...monday
to be continued....

My Stay at the Hospital

i am back and not too soon. i got the results from my conization and am officially cancer free (insert extreme happy face here) though my entire experience was nothing short of a nightmare but gave me plenty of material that i will share with you starting now. however, since i have so much to say, this post or posts rather, will be broken up into little segments so i don't leave anything out. i wish to describe every little detail to its fullest and hope to achieve that. i also have a few photos that i took to prove this to be real, which i will post in some of the articles. here is part 1 of my story:

the once white walls were just a memory below the soot and everyday filth that cover them now. Torn and raggedy venetian blinds hung from the dirt and mildew infested windows (or at least the windows that did not have the security bars on them). the large, heavy doors were a dark green with what used to be cream colored molding, to which only fragments remained. plastered hallways were chipped and dimly lit. it was the type of place that one would think of when asked to describe a setting for a horror movie. unfortunately, it was real. it was the hospital that i had my surgery in...a woman's hospital actually. as you can tell, it was far from a pleasant experience.
the view from my room consisted of moss-covered rooftops and a dead tree. in the middle of the room was a black and white dinette table with 4 matching, yet taped-up, chairs. this was actually the only good thing about the room. though seeing how we were bedridden, it posed as more of a centerpiece that we could admire instead of portraying the functionality it was meant for. i guess in order for you to really appreciate the experience i had rendered, i should take you step by step.......to be continued

Happy Valentines Day

as the days get closer to my time of surgery, it is nice to be able to take a step back and look around on this day and see all the people i love and who love me. that is what this day is about after all.
i go in to the hospital on monday morning at 8am and will be in there for at least a few days. we visited the last doctor (anesthesiologist) yesterday and everything is fine for me to get the operation. but like i said, that is monday and today is a beautiful Valentines Day in Zagreb so i plan to live it up. we have plans to go to the mall and do a little shopping for books, so i have something to read while i recover. also going to get some food so i have snacks in there as well. i don't care what country you live in, hospital food is hospital food.
i also plan to quit smoking after my stay. i can't smoke in the hospital so will be without cigarettes a few days anyway....seems like the perfect time and the perfect thing to do. wish me luck as it won't be easy.
ok, going to get going and enjoy this lovely day...hope you all have a great one.

Borderline Personality Disorder

i know this has nothing to do with cancer, but a loved one was just diagnosed with this and i felt the need to write a post about it.
for those of you who are not familiar with this mental disease, i will give you a brief list of symptoms.

1: Relationship problems
2: Low self-worth
3: Intense emotions and mood swings
4: Aggressive behavior
5: Impulsive behaviors that are self-damaging (substance abuse, binge drinking...)
6: fear of abandonment

these are just some of the symptoms and are more severe than your average mood swing. if you or anyone you know has these symptoms, please get professional help right away as this is very serious. if left untreated it may lead to suicide, injury to ones self such as cutting, violent temper outburst and other acts.
for more information, please check here.

Test Results

well, my tests came back decent. chest x-ray showed no signs of lung cancer (great news). EKG was good and my blood tests came back ok as well. though i am lacking in iron and protein, it is still not major (i just need to start taking vitamins i guess). but maybe i don't. this brings me to the whole "blood test procedure" questions.
why do they advise you not to eat or drink anything 12 hours before a blood test just to tell you that you have low iron and protein in your system? shouldn't we be able to go about our normal routine and intake of foods before a blood test? that would be the most accurate of results i think. my normal morning is 2-3 cups of coffee with milk and sugar, so if i am denied that, then my sugar will be lower than it normally is at 8am. thereby making the results that they got while i was fasting, completely false compared to what my blood results would normally be.
now seeing how i graduated high school through a summer school program, i am sure (insert sarcasm here) that the doctors would know more about my body than i do. i am just making an obvious observation about medicine and how i think it should be performed.
everyone may be created equal, but our bodies are not.