I’m very glad to be home! Got home late Tuesday afternoon (Feb. 15) from hospital, then was admitted back to Emergency on Thursday afternoon (Feb. 17) after chemo but was allowed to come home again later on Thursday (yesterday, Feb. 17).

Tuesday was a flurry of activity to get everything ready for me to go home from hospital. I’m very grateful for all the people who worked hard to make that happen.

We did a blood transfusion and organized home oxygen which is definitely necessary. My blood oxygen drops very quickly without it, but the good news is that is comes back up very quickly with oxygen. My blood oxygen was very low Friday night when I went to emergency, at a level where a person can faint. They quickly got me up into the normal range. My friend Shonna loaned her pulse oximeter to stick on my finger to check at home. It has been showing good numbers for both the blood oxygen levels and pulse rate with the oxygen.

While I was in hospital they ran lots of tests and ruled out many bad things which is such a relief, but they weren’t able to determine the cause of the low blood oxygen. One of the tests they did was a bronchoscopy, and it will likely take a couple of weeks to get all the results back from that. They took samples and are growing cultures to see if there is a treatable infection that we’re dealing with.

I am so very happy to be with my kids. I had left the house on Friday evening (Feb. 11) for a CT scan, then ended up being away four days. I went suddenly to Emergency straight from the CT scan, then was admitted to hospital a couple of days later. I got home late Tuesday afternoon (Feb. 15) – thank you Mieke for the ride, and everyone else who offered – so very happy to be home with my kids. It was good to talk with them and listen to them and just be with them. They spoiled me with cookies and cake and we enjoyed celebrating together.

Thursday (Feb. 17) meant back to the hospital for chemo as usual, every three weeks (cycle #22). This time another lung cancer survivor advocate, Taylor Westerman, was also there. We’d met online and have been trying to connect in person. (He heard about The White Ribbon Project, and I really want to give him a white ribbon, but we haven’t been able to make that happen yet.) I heard a nurse say “Taylor” and it seemed that the guy across the chemo unit looked like the Taylor I’d been connecting with through Messenger, so I called out to him and sure enough, it was Taylor Westerman! It was so nice to see him in person, and when I was leaving I popped over to say a quick hello and take this picture (below), though we didn’t chat for long because I wasn’t feeling well. Notice Taylor’s great tee shirt, and I’ve got a LUNGevity HOPE pin on my lapel. Lung cancer awareness happens 24-7, 12 months a year!

After chatting with Taylor, I paused to say a very quick hello to the awesome clinical trials nurses who took such good care of me when I was on a life-extending clinical trial for the investigational drug “Ceritinib” from 2015-2017. (The trial was testing to see how effective it is when taken with or without food.) I am so thankful for that trial which not only kept me alive until 2017, but long enough for more new drugs to be approved and accessible here in Canada, drugs that are keeping me alive today.

I planned to head home after briefly chatting with the clinical trials nurses but they noticed I was looking puffier than usual. They asked a few questions and before you know it they got together a bag of snacks (big thank you!) and a wheelchair for me to be wheeled to emergency, treated with IV drugs and observed for a few hours. The good folks in emergency wanted me to stay overnight, but agreed to let me go home. Mieke kindly came to pick me up and take me home again. The traffic was terrible, the weather was awful, but Mieke drove very carefully and got us both home safely. Thank you, Mieke. Thank you also to other friends who offered to drive.

So I’m home again, again, and very grateful. Also extremely tired, thanks to the double whammy of chemo and Benadryl. I can barely keep these eyes open so hope this post makes sense. Special appreciation to the oxygen people. Also to my awesome oncologist who happened to be on call the week I was in hospital. He’s only on call about three times a year, so this was a huge gift for me. I also am grateful for a neighbourhood connection with the very nice family doc who was working on the floor. When she mentioned that she teaches family docs and med students I went completely into advocate mode and steered the conversation. She told me she had been in contact with another lung cancer advocate in Ottawa. Andrea Redway had already reached out to her. Way to go Andrea! Andrea is awesome! I made sure the doctor knew it, and encouraged her to reach out to either of us anytime. Then after the doctor left I messaged Andrea to tell her that I had also met the doctor. It’s so good to be part of a team. Very grateful for Andrea and others like her who share the load. The more we work together as a good team, the better we’ll all be. #team

Very grateful for people from Parkdale United Church who are bringing us dinners: yesterday, today and tomorrow. Three meals every chemo cycle makes our lives so much easier. Thank you! #team

Also a big shout out to Hospice Care Ottawa for delivering a lovely care package (photo below) on Thursday (yesterday) with a homemade valentine’s day card from a local school and some snacks. Very thoughtful!