Hip Hip and No Hooray

I found out I had relapsed with cancer, Leukemia, around May 17, 2005. This was a big week for my family. The following Saturday, May 21, 2005, my sister was getting married. We didn’t want to spoil her big day so we kept my new cancer diagnosis a secret. She was married in Beaufort, NC at her aunt’s waterfront home, and it was simple but beautiful. We spent the entire weekend and had a really nice time with several things planned. I was still on crutches after my first fibular graft hip surgery with partial weight bearing on the operated leg. My hair had finally grown back, but it was very short. The morning of the wedding everyone woke and joined together at a local waterfront restaurant for breakfast. I remember eating and then the feeling came over me. I was trying to hold it together, but it was beyond my control. I got up as fast as I could (on crutches) and threw up over the boardwalk into the water. Ivey, my sister, came out behind me along with my trusty mom, and we did share the news with her. I know, it sounds terrible that we did that on her wedding day, but it was just a sign of things to come. LOL. It was not many years later they were divorced and she is now married to the perfect person for her.

For the next few weeks, I continued physical therapy. I had to get my leg and hip strong enough to carry myself after the next surgery. I also needed to work on my range of motion to have good movement in the joint. At the same time, I was going to my bone marrow transplant doctor to prepare for more chemotherapy. Another time line had to be worked out to plan when to start treatments for Leukemia after a major hip surgery. I do not remember when my second hip surgery was scheduled, but I think it was in June 2005. The surgery was done at Duke because the doctor who invented the surgery was at Duke, and only a few doctors who trained under him knew how to do it. Duke also had the equipment and operating room set up to perform the surgery. I had already had it once so I knew what to expect. Before the surgery I was given an epidural to numb the entire leg. Luckily, they gave me enough medicine through my IV first that I was out and did not know they were doing the epidural. When I woke up from this surgery it was one of the worst things I have experienced through this entire ordeal. During the surgery my blood pressure dropped so low they had to turn off ALL of my pain meds including the epidural. It was horrible. My leg had been cut open from my knee to my ankle and the bone removed along with blood vessels. My hip had been cut open, drilled out, and new bone pinned in place. I woke up to this unexpected pain and misery. On top of that I was so thirsty I could hardly swallow from dry mouth. I asked for at least ice chips and the nurse told me, “I can’t get it right now.” The ice machine was right across from my bed and she had enough time to get herself a cup of water. Later, I made it out of recovery and to my room. I was still in so much pain with no meds, and my mom was no where around. Finally, she and my boyfriend, at the time, came in and she was so upset. The nurse had given momma the wrong room number. They had been waiting about an hour, wondering where I was and what was going on, before someone gave them the correct room number. When mom came in, I shared with her what was going on and the pain I was having. She got the nurse to find out when I could get some pain meds. The nurse came in and talked with me. She couldn’t do anything at the time, but she did advise me to do deep breathing, and other pain-relieving techniques such as picturing myself on a beach. I had learned all about those in nursing school. There was not a calming beach wave or palm leaf breezing in the wind of Fiji soothing enough to take away the pain I was having. I had heard her tell me that so much that I wanted to shove her in a shark’s mouth for her to do her own deep breathing.

Finally, a few hours later I received pain meds and the nurse turned on my epidural. I was feeling much better. After a couple of days and in house physical therapy I was discharged. I had to be able to go up and down stairs and get in and out of a car on my own before they would release me, along with the medical aspect of the surgery being okay.

When I returned home my pain was not bad. I could not put any weight on my leg for about 6 or 8 weeks. That is hard to do. When the bones were healed enough to start applying weight, I was admitted into UNC to start chemotherapy. I did not go to physical therapy like I did with the first hip surgery, instead, I went straight back in to another hospital bed to begin chemotherapy. I did the same schedule of chemotherapy that I did in 2003. It was one week of several chemotherapy drugs given over different times. Again, when my immune system weakened, illnesses that had been lying in my body were wreaking havoc. One week of chemo would turn into a four week hospital stay fighting infections, nausea, vomiting, and other typical side effects you hear of from chemo. I would recover and be discharged to go home only to come back a couple of weeks later to start the process over again.

During this time, I was having to do the same precautions as with the COVID protocols, times 10 – mask wearing, staying away from crowds, no restaurants, eating only certain foods, definitely no buffets, and anything else to avoid infection. There were lots of infections and IV antibiotics that required hospital stays.  The hospital stays were more frequent than stays at home. We were in our own world focusing on my health, trying to stay alive, and not looking at anything going on around us.