stress mess

"Stress is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of mental illness."

Richard Carlson

I had an appointment to see Dr. Ingrey today, to get results of my CT Scan last Friday, but I cancelled. Today is not a good day. I've got the killer headache and fatigue that's been with me for over a month now, I'm queasy, lightheaded, dizzy and my ears are ringing. Perhaps not wise to head out to hurtle down the highway at 80 kph, wondering if I'm going to pass out before reaching my destination and maybe driving a bit faster so I don't before I do.

Dr. Ingrey phoned to say that no brain tumours showed up on the scan (dizzy or not, I did a little happy dance in my head over this news). He explained that the headache is likely caused by stress from having cancer and anticipation of my next surgery. My headache is all in my head.

This is good news, but puzzling. I've had my share of stressful jobs, relationships and situations, but I thrive on stress and always have. I embrace it and glory in it, love the challenge and excitement of it. In fact, I can remember times when I probably went looking for it.

As publisher and editor of the Harbour Spiel for 15 years, I was regularly faced with deadlines and responsibility for material that might get me sued, or at least result in half the people in town pissed at me. I get a thrill out of taking risks. I've never had headaches, unless self-inflicted by lack of sleep along with excessive sauvignon blanc, cigarettes and joints the night before.

There is no reason for headaches today. Several years ago I sold the Spiel and toned down my consumption of unhealthy substances to the occasional glass of fine wine with dinner. I'm not stressed by work because I have almost none, just making minor updates to information and uploading the occasional banner ad for Pender Harbour Online.

I've had a comfortable, stable relationship with the same man for nearly 20 years, and he will stay with me after surgery until I tell him to go back to his apartment in Port Coquitlam, back to work at the shipyard. No stress there.

Fraser, my old cat, disappeared last month and I think he became a meal for a litter of coyote cubs, as has been the fate of so many cats in the area. I worried how he would make out while I was in hospital for a couple of weeks with only a friend stopping by once a day to fill his dishes on the kitchen floor. I miss him terribly, but now I don't worry about him. Even less stress in my life.

Maybe I'm stressed out because I don't have any stress? Oh, wait. The cancer. Almost forgot about that. And the upper left lung lobectomy on Tuesday morning. Hmmmm. Being sick and tired of being sick and tired for well over a year now. Still not having a clear diagnosis of the cancer in my bone marrow, spleen and lymph nodes. Still not knowing the stage of my lung cancer. Well, maybe.

Okay, I'm stressed out.

I'm stressed out because I have cancer and my expectations of the Cancer Agency have crashed. I don't know if this surgery on Tuesday is the right decision, and I never will. So, let's look at it rationally. What's the worst thing that could happen? I'll die. And why is that a bad thing?

It will be sad for the people who care for me, but it won't be a bad thing for me. It will likely be a good thing, because that will be the end of any "discomfort" as the doctors like to say, and diminished quality of life.

Oh, and the stress will certainly be relieved. I'll be dead, so I won't need anything, want anything, miss anything, regret anything or ever again get annoyed at a telephone solicitor. Happily I'm an atheist, so I won't be faced with eternity burning in hell for my sins. It's all good.

But, I'm still stressed. I suppose I'm a tad anxious about the "discomfort" of having my ribs pulled apart to rip out most of the rest of my lung, that ghastly drainage tube and a lifetime of lessened breathing capacity and physical activity. But, I'm psyched to have it done.

After all, I thrive on stress.

giving thanks

        
St. Mary's Hospital has a CAT Scanner. Big deal, you say. It is, I say back. The hospital serves a population of only 2,500 people spread across the Sunshine Coast, and the scanner was bought largely by donations from local residents and businesses. We done good.

Back in the day of the Back the CAT campaign, it was impossible not to throw money at it. It seemed like a portion of every dollar you spent on the Sunshine Coast went to the campaign.

Plus there were profits from fundraising raffles, concerts, garage sales and pancake breakfasts, and then there were those collection tins. They were everywhere, and the glares of the nearby public demanded that you drop in a few loonies and twonies. (If you're reading from outside Canada, that's what we call our money. Really. No, we don't call our banks "loonie bins.")

I wondered if a CAT Scanner was the best use for all that money raised, if it might not be better spent upgrading the operating room, or making the parking lot spaces a bit wider for those of us who don't drive a Smart car.

In those days, people were sent to Vancouver for their CAT Scans. This involved several hours' driving and a ferry trip, blowing the whole day for a ten-minute procedure. I've had at least half a dozen CAT Scans at St. Mary's Hospital, and I'm thankful that I didn't have to make that trip to Vancouver for each of them. I'm also thankful that I never once needed a CAT Scan before the machine was installed at St. Mary's.

One of these scans turned up cancer, even though Dr. Cairns thought the "wee spot" was scar tissue from the bronchitis, pneumonia or t.b. that I couldn't recall having. I'm thankful that I moved on to Dr. Ingrey, who refused to dismiss the wee spot, and I'm thankful for that CAT Scan at St. Mary's Hospital.

It's a cool machine that wouldn't look out of place aboard the starship Enterprise. The "Computerized Axial Tomography" procedure is typically fast and painless. This morning I enjoyed breakfast and coffee, verboten in so many of the tests I've been subjected to, and there was no inconvenient prep such as three days of fasting or a high-octane laxitive the day before.

All I had to do was drink water, more water, and more water after that. St. Mary's Hospital is half an hour's drive away, on a road that needs an election to get rid of its bumps, wows and potholes. Once there, I sprinted to the automatic doors of the hospital, squirmed while they opened enough for me to squeeze through, then bolted down the hall and around the corner, nearly coliding with a patient being pushed in a wheelchair. I was thankful, very thankful, that the single washroom in that wing of the hospital was not occupied.

The water is required to flush one's kidneys of the somewhat toxic contrast medium used for the scan, and it's best to drink too much than not enough. So, $3.50 for two more bottles of water, sign in, sit and wait. Must keep drinking water. A good half-hour later, I'm summoned to the room housing the CAT Scanner and directed to lie down on a sheet-covered slab. My knees are raised on a triangular piece of foam and my head is strapped down.

I don't know why these rooms are kept so freakin' cold; it feels like about 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15-16 Celsius), but the technician kindly drapes a soft, pre-warmed blanket over me, on top of the lead blanket covering the areas they don't want to see. I feel like a dish of lasagna, prepared in layers.

Now I'm lined into an i.v. drip of salt water, and I'm so wishing I hadn't drank all that water. I'm told not to move an inch, and the technician leaves the room, unaware of the heroic effort I'm making not to jump up and dash to the washroom.

The CAT Scanner fires up, sounding like an SR-71 Blackbird's jet engine warming up for takeoff, only not that loud. With a series of clicks, the slab creeps horizonatlly into the maw of the machine, carrying me into a white tunnel. I realize that life must be hell for claustrophobics. There is a pause, then I'm slid back out of the tunnel. Part One is complete.

Part Two involves waiting, unmoving, for several hours. Okay, it's only five minutes, but I'm dying to go to the toilet and ever second drags on forever.

Finally, the technician ditches the salt water i.v. solution and replaces it with contrast medium, which is really radioactive dye but "contrast medium" sounds so much healthier for something thats going straight into your vein. I've had so many CAT Scans, PET Scans, MRIs and X-rays in the past year that I do not understand why I don't glow in the dark.

As the technician begins the dye feed, she says in a perky voice, "You'll feel like you peed yourself but you haven't!" It's been over half a century since I've peed myself and I can't remember what it feels like. It feels very warm in the area of my crotch. I think with horror, maybe I really have peed myself, all that water and all that waiting has my poor bladder screaming for relief.

Now I'm surprised by a sharp, strong, metallic taste in the back of my throat, which wasn't mentioned. Gah! Apparently only some people get this. Lucky me. The bad taste and the crotch warmth subside quickly and I'm thankful to learn that I've not peed myself after all.

Now the turbines fire up again, the clicking starts, and I'm moving into the snug white tunnel for a second time. I wonder if a Freudian psychologist with a sense of humour might call the CAT Scan a "Pussy Scan," given their fondness for back-to-the-womb symbolism. I wonder how they perform a CAT Scan on a really big person. They certainly wouldn't fit into the tunnel. Maybe they have super-size CAT Scanners. Then, the slab kicks into reverse and I'm back in the room, unhooked from the i.v., unwrapped and sent on my way.

I am most thankful to finally get out of that teeth-chatteringly cold room and back to the bathroom, not a second too soon!
  

latex, leather and chains

                  
Today I had blood taken, nothing unusual for a cancer patient.

I've had it done a hundred times before, at least. Sometimes it's a disaster, sometimes I don't even notice. Today it was way up there on the scale of Simple Procedure Done Well. A little jab, hardly pain, and that was it. The way it should be.

Why, I've wondered, do some medical professionals butcher such a simple procedure? I've had them repeatedly try to hit the vein, and miss (I have good veins). I've been left with bruises up and down my arm like a downtown eastside junkie. I've had shockingly painful experiences when the needle was inserted. It's not rocket science, why aren't all of them competent?

At one memorable St. Mary's Hospital fiasco where a nervous nurse repeatedly and painfully injected a large needle under the skin on the back of my hand, but couldn't manage to hit the vein, I suggested she go out on the street and bring back a junkie to do the job right.

Okay, I know that wasn't very nice, but I wasn't feeling well and that sometimes deteriorates my usually patient and kind disposition. She left, not to find a junkie, but to send back another nurse who slid the needle into the vein, first time, no pain.

Maybe nurses who can do the deed well should have a little badge on their uniform pocket. Like a Boy Scout badge, maybe with a brightly embroidered drop of blood or a syringe. I think they deserve recognition for their skill. Plus, it would warn unsuspecting patients, when they encountered a badgeless blood-taker or injection-giver, to grit their teeth because it's gonna not be nice.

One nurse told me that she was never trained to give an injection. What the fuck? How can you not be trained in this frequently performed procedure? Anyway, that was her excuse. She blamed the current Liberal government for their "heartless" cutbacks in medical funding.

I wished that the union would back off on their Poor Underpaid Nurses rhetoric. Nurses have no choice about belonging to the union, and paying the substantial union dues, so it's not like they're in danger of losing members.

Sorry, I digress. Back to the blood sample.

Today, I noticed that the nurse did not wear the ubiquitous latex gloves, and I asked her why. She explained that she was trained decades ago, when frequent handwashing was as automatic as breathing, and that she relied on a sense of feel that was compromised by the latex. Certainly, I barely felt the needle going in and she nailed the vein, so maybe that was a factor.

Nurses, like all front-line medical workers, are at a higher risk than an accountant for needle-stick injuries, which could result in infection with AIDS or hepatitis. We talked about how ridiculous it was to wear latex gloves as a safety precaution. Think about it: is a thin layer of latex going to prevent a needle-stick injury? Not.

I religiously wear latex gloves when making wine because even one rogue yeast particle can ruin an entire batch. Making wine, your hands are moving over a large, open primary fermenter, and a tiny particle that might have been hiding under a fingernail might find its way into the mix. It's the only time I wear them, and I don't like it. They decrease my sensory input, and make it difficult to do manual tasks such as ripping open a tiny yeast package. I certainly wouldn't want to put a needle into a vein while wearing them.

But are the gloves really necessary? Do they do any good at all?

The latex-glove craze started in the 1980s when AIDS was new and no one was certain how it was transmitted. Hepatitis C was yet to be identified as a disease transmitted exclusively by blood-to-blood contact. Someone came up with the latex gloves idea and I wonder if it was to protect medical professionals or to give a (false) sense of security to patients?

I remember a nurse coming into my hospital room with that wheeled cart holding numerous vials of blood samples, and she was heading for my arm to get my sample. She was wearing latex gloves.

She took my blood and moved to the next bed to take that patient's blood. Still wearing the same latex gloves that she wore when she came into the room.

So, it seems the gloves are to protect the medical professional rather than the patient. But, think about it. We already established that the flimsy gloves aren't going to stop a needle-stick injury, so that leaves open wounds on the medical professional's hands. Wouldn't they put a freakin' Band-Aid on it? Problem solved.

But, everyone working in a clinic or hospital or ambulance or first-aid shack, touching a patient, wears the latex gloves. Environmental awareness aside (how long does it take for a pair of latex gloves to decompose in a landfill?), just what is the point of wearing these gloves?

They decrease one's manual dexterity, don't offer much protection, and very well may instill a false sense of security that results in sloppy hygiene. I would much rather have the nurse or other medical professional be obsessive about handwashing with antibacterial soap.

Sorry, I don't really want to talk about leather and chains. Maybe another day.
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