Update on oggbashan's health

[JamesMiehoff]

Keep doing it. If it ain't completely broke, don't fix it.

Seriously, while your apparent continued good health may confound the doctors, we are all rooting for you! Keep up the good work.

James

 

[Vix_Giovanni]

Ogg, your words merely prove to us what most of us have deduced for ages;
you're a giant amongst us

Here, Here!

Ogg you’re phenomenal

 

[oggbashan]

Keep doing it. If it ain't completely broke, don't fix it.

Seriously, while your apparent continued good health may confound the doctors, we are all rooting for you! Keep up the good work.

James

Apparently good health? Apart from the reducing symptoms of Lambert-Eaton - unsteadiness on feet which has improved; slurred voice - I can now be understood all day long; and double vision - improving but still not good enough to drive; I don't have any signs that I actually have lung cancer.

My lung capacity is 97% but I think it is really 100% because I didn't know how to do the test; my blood oxygen is consistently 100%; my blood pressure would be great for someone a couple of decades younger than me and is fantastic for my age; all my other blood tests except managed Diabetes II are clear.

I'm stupidly fit - just dying.

 

[Handley_Page]

Apparently good health? Apart from the reducing symptoms of Lambert-Eaton - unsteadiness on feet which has improved; slurred voice - I can now be understood all day long; and double vision - improving but still not good enough to drive; I don't have any signs that I actually have lung cancer.

My lung capacity is 97% but I think it is really 100% because I didn't know how to do the test; my blood oxygen is consistently 100%; my blood pressure would be great for someone a couple of decade younger than me and is fantastic for my age; all my other blood tests except managed Diabetes II are clear.

I'm stupidly fit - just dying.

Thoughts & Prayers, Ogg

 

[Rustyoznail]

I'm stupidly fit - just dying.

Are you sure about that? I think you’re actually Dr Who, and will regenerate into a sexy blond.

 

[jehoram]

Ogg, your words merely prove to us what most of us have deduced for ages;
you're a giant amongst us

Or an alien. But you'll never know for sure until they call you back to your home planet.

 

[oggbashan]

Or an alien. But you'll never know for sure until they call you back to your home planet.

As Og, King of Bashan, I am a giant who survived Noah's Flood by riding on the roof of the Ark even if the Israelites thought they killed me.

 

[fifty5]

As Og, King of Bashan, I am a giant who survived Noah's Flood by riding on the roof of the Ark even if the Israelites thought they killed me.

1. Keep doing it, Ogg.
2. Keep enjoying doing it all!

 

[JamesMiehoff]

I'm stupidly fit - just dying.

Ogg, we all are dying. Some of us faster and some slower. And health often has little to do with it. I just found out that an acquaintance recently lost his son in a traffic accident. 28 or 30 years old and in perfect health, rear ended by an 18 wheeler.

So keep doing what you are doing and give the doctors something to scratch their heads about. And thanks for being brave enough to share your journey with us.

James

 

[oggbashan]

Odd

Last night I had a meal followed by a slice of eldest's daughter's birthday cake.

Yet my blood sugar reading was 4.2 - the lowest it has been for months. The cake must have affected me by the morning - 14.4. That is more in my recent normal range since chemotherapy raises my blood sugar levels.

It might have been since I walked over a mile yesterday shopping in our local city centre but I still don't understand the low reading. Neither the low or the high gives me any symptoms although I am not allowed to drive if my blood sugar is below 5 - but I can't anyway because my vision is compromised.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

I say this with love and respect, Ogg. Your name is never going to die, for advanced medical texts are going to have a full chapter on you someday.

 

[oggbashan]

Today I had an appointment with a consultant neurologist at the Ambulatory Care Clinic.

We were held up by unusually heavy traffic so I had to sprint from the car park. Not surprisingly, my blood pressure was slightly raised but not excessively so. My weight has increased since last measured by about a kilo.

The consultant was startled by my speed with my four-wheeled walker. I can do seven miles an hour on an even surface for about 100 yards before I have to slow down a bit. I need it because I can become unbalanced without warning but with the walker I am faster than my wife can walk. He is not used to patients who can move faster than him. Most are tottering around very slowly and carefully.

He can't do anything for me until oncology has finished with me but if they decide they can do no more - or - much less likely and improbable - they have eradicated the cancer - he can prescribe medicines which could alleviate or remove my symptoms but NOT while I am having chemotherapy or radiotherapy.

I will see him again in April when the oncology specialist has discussed in early March where we go from here, which depends on the results of my latest scan which I don't yet know.

 

[R. Richard]

All I can say, is 'Best Wishes!'

 

[yukonnights]

Ogg, thank you for giving us another reason to be happy today. Truly "The Force" is with you. I have personal family experiences that confirm that; you are certainly not conforming to the "rules".

Perhaps it's your picture here on you profile … you look like you would be so well behaved, and yet you continue to confound those doctors — and now, you're sprinting across the car park and startling the doctor

Hmmm, he does write naughty stories … maybe not so well behaved as we were led to believe ?

 

[TarnishedPenny]

 

[JamesMiehoff]

The consultant was startled by my speed with my four-wheeled walker. I can do seven miles an hour on an even surface for about 100 yards before I have to slow down a bit. I need it because I can become unbalanced without warning but with the walker I am faster than my wife can walk. He is not used to patients who can move faster than him. Most are tottering around very slowly and carefully.

That's probably faster than I can go at the moment. I have a crushed disk in my lower back and it interferes with the signals to my legs. I can correct for it if I am walking, but if I walk too fast or try to run, one leg pushes harder than the other and I begin to wobble until I either stop or I fall over.

I used to hate running, but I would love to start doing it again, if for no other reason than to build up some stamina after three rounds of bronchitis last year. But I can't.


Jamse

 

[oggbashan]

That's probably faster than I can go at the moment. I have a crushed disk in my lower back and it interferes with the signals to my legs. I can correct for it if I am walking, but if I walk too fast or try to run, one leg pushes harder than the other and I begin to wobble until I either stop or I fall over.

I used to hate running, but I would love to start doing it again, if for no other reason than to build up some stamina after three rounds of bronchitis last year. But I can't.


Jamse

I have NO disks at all in my spine and several fuzed vertebrae and haven't had disks for over 30 years thanks to Anklyosing Spondilitis. The cancer interferes with signals from my brain to my legs which is why I fall over.

But with a four-wheeled walker I can keep my balance and move fast. Perhaps you should try one. I had to choose carefully to find one that was strong enough for my weight (about 200 lbs) and could adjust for my height - still slightly over six feet despite losing inches with a twisted spine.

Many walkers are only suitable for little old ladies.

 

[Handley_Page]

Many walkers are only suitable for little old ladies.

Yeh, sad, innit. It's a serious engineering problem.
Fingers crossed.

 

[JamesMiehoff]

I have NO disks at all in my spine and several fuzed vertebrae and haven't had disks for over 30 years thanks to Anklyosing Spondilitis. The cancer interferes with signals from my brain to my legs which is why I fall over.

But with a four-wheeled walker I can keep my balance and move fast. Perhaps you should try one. I had to choose carefully to find one that was strong enough for my weight (about 200 lbs) and could adjust for my height - still slightly over six feet despite losing inches with a twisted spine.

Many walkers are only suitable for little old ladies.

Fortunately, I only have one crushed disk. But the first doctor I saw for it said he wanted to fuse the last 4 vertebrae together. I asked if that meant I would have to turn my whole body to look around. He said probably. I told him that I would see him when I wheeled my bony ass into his office in a wheelchair.

That won't ever happen now, because I outlived him.

The problem I have is that a piece of the disk is sticking into my spinal cord, pressing on it. But if the disk turns a little, the pressure mostly goes away and I can feel my legs. If he had fused it, it would always stick into my spinal cord and I would have been numb from the waist down for the last 40 years.

I think I did the right thing.

As far as a walker, I am over 6 feet as well and 250 pounds, so even fewer options.

James

 

[oggbashan]

Today was crunch day - a follow-up visit with the oncology specialist after the last session of chemotherapy and a scan the day before that session.

It was to decide 'Where do we go from here?" wherever here is.

The scan showed I have NO Cancer cells; NO enlarged lymph nodes - nothing.

But this cancer is the sort that recurs again and again. While I am cancer-free now I should expect to have it again in a few months.

We decided to go for preventative radiotherapy of my chest but NOT my head which could have significant side-effects of loss of cognition. That would be five x ten-minute sessions over five days. If successful that should reduce the recurrence - for a while but the cancer will still return sometime.

As my medical son-in-law said when told by my medical daughter who came with me:

"My father-in-law has more lives than a fucking cat!"

 

[THROBBS]

Great to hear. (great to report, I imagine)

I reckon you have one really good life, well lived. Keep it going.

 

[NotWise]

Great news Ogg! Keep it up.

 

[TxRad]

Great news Ogg. Keep confusing them, it keeps their lives interesting.

 

[SimonDoom]

Fantastic news!

 

[Vix_Giovanni]

This news just made my Thursday