Okay, cancer sucks and so do the side effects from the treatments. One of the side effects from radiation to the throat is the difficulty swallowing, and the subsequent lack of ability to eat. Also being nauseous doesn't help either, especially when you are supposed to be consuming 2200 calories a day in order to keep up your strength. And did I mention the loss of my ability to taste anything? So, like every other throat radiation patient I have talked to I finally decided to get a PEG (stomach) tube, which I had inserted on Wednesday. This was an outpatient procedure, and the actual procedure takes less than 10 minutes. I guess you can think of it like a beach ball plug sticking out of one's stomach. One then pours nutritional glop down it several times a day.
This seems like it should be simple, but let's start with the fact that the supply company delivering the bags, nutritional glop, etc, had my wrong address and insurance company. Let's add to that delivery of stuff I didn't want, and failure to deliver what I was expecting. Okay, now add the fact that neither Allen nor I have any medical competence and are a bit squeamish about all of this. Oh, and did I mention that between us we have 13 years of post high school education? This was not an asset, except for our ability to call the company about 12 times in one day. I have since learned a few things--here are two very important rules:
1) Read the directions
2) Follow the directions.
Okay, I also have a problem with mechanical things like little plastic clamps and valves, and subsequently we now have nutritional glop spattered all over our sofa and coffee table. Lastly, an understanding of gravity is important to this routine as well, resulting in our understanding that we can use household objects like curtain rods to hang bags of glop from, if needed. Anyway, we are getting the hang of this all, and I guess I could think of this as the ultimate piercing.
Hi Judy. You should ask for an IV pole to help you with the bag hanging. The treatment nurse should be able to help you by ordering it and having it delivered. If you need help with me calling them let me know.
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PS how is the hair????
Our anorexics used to prefer a peg so they didn't have to eat. Saves a lot of cooking and you can keep your teeth shiny bright. Can you get one of these pegs on the internet and self-insert?
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