Daily Blogs

An Update From the Family

November 22, 2010

We would first like to apologize for the delay in getting information out to Melissa’s friends, loved ones, and her amazing supporters. This has certainly been a hectic week, and we had some glitches with accessing her blog account. We know you are all anxious to hear an update.

Melissa was in the ICU at St. Joes. It was there that the doctors made the decision to cease all active care because the procedures were too traumatic for .. Read More

St. Joe’s Update

November 14, 2010

Here is the latest update on Melissa. She is still at St. Joe’s and we are unsure of a discharge date at this point. Her cousin, Julie and Aunt Amelia from California came in town and were with Melissa at the hospital the past few days. On Saturday, Melissa was scheduled for a procedure to cauterize the bleeding from the tumor in her lung. Unfortunately Melissa was not able to tolerate the procedure due to pain. In order to determine .. Read More

Movin’ into St. Joes

November 9, 2010

I’m still here at St. Joes. Nothing against this hospital, but I do miss the big beds, Starbucks cafe and plasma tv’s at CTCA. On the other hand, they are much closer to where I live and therefore get many more visitors who are likely to make the “trek”.

I didn’t get much sleep last night since I was constantly in pain. The most amount of dilaudid IV they would give was 1 mg, totally pathetic. Today, .. Read More

Up again

November 7, 2010

Hi, it’s me again. It’s been a little while since I have written, but I’ve been lucky to have friends that can give updates when I’m not able.

This past week has flown by. I left CTCA awhile ago, but I’ve had this consistent cough with blood for the past few weeks. I’m glad that I am finally able to address this. They are going to do a Broncoscopy. I am hoping they will .. Read More

Stopping the Bleeding

November 6, 2010

Today we received the results from Melissa’s CT Scan of her chest. The good news is that there was no evidence of a pulmonary embolus (blood clot in her lung). The findings did show an increase in size of the tumor in the lower lobe of her left lung when compared to the last report from CTCA dated 10.6.10. There is also an additional nodule in the left lung that is relatively small (9 x 9mm).

Melissa is continuing to spit .. Read More

Round and Round We Go

November 4, 2010

A quick update from Ann-Marie & Tera regarding Melissa’s latest hospital stint. Yesterday Melissa was admitted to St. Joe’s after evaluation at the ER. For the past week, Melissa has been coughing up large amounts of blood that have a clot-like consistency. Additionally, she hasn’t had much of an appetite due to nausea and vomiting which can be triggered even by a sip of room temperature water. After notifying CTCA, they recommended that Melissa immediately go to the hospital for .. Read More

November 2

November 2, 2010

This has been the longest stretch that I have been home in a long while. I still feel horrible, but I don’t think there is anything that CTCA can do to make the pain better. The quadramet kind of feels like the side effects from chemo. I feel like my whole body aches, but especially my chest. It’s almost like I have a chest cold because I have this cough that won’t go away. .. Read More

Oct 27

October 28, 2010

Another boring day gone by. Its so frustrating. The weather is perfect outside and I am not even able to enjoy it. I have friends over quite often, usually at least one person comes by a day. At least that seems to break up the monotony of things and of course I am always happy to see my friends.

Yesterday I had my meetings with the doctors at CTCA. Usually I see the doctors once every .. Read More

October 24

October 24, 2010

I can’t believe it’s Halloween already! Time is like a whirlwind passing by in a blur. For some reason the past two days I have been really exhausted. It could have something to do with the pain killers. I took an extra methadone yesterday because my shoulder and back was hurting. I just felt completely drained. I think I woke up and then passed back out at least 4-5 times yesterday. I have .. Read More

Thoughts for today

October 19, 2010

Today is October 19. I cannot believe that a whole new year is almost finished. It was about this time in 2008 that I started to feel pain in my back. I had thought it was from pilates or yoga, maybe I had pulled a muscle or had done something to my back. I started seeing a chiropractor. Little did I know that they were actually causing the fractures in my vertebrae. I know .. Read More