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Lebanon, Oregon, United States
We are Terry & Cathye Kinkelaar. If you've followed my blog in the past, you know that Lydia, my beautiful wife of 52 years, and I made the lifestyle choice to move to Oregon in 2017. You've seen my posts about losing her in May 2020 to cancer. Although I was left alone, I am pleased to say that I have found happiness again. In April 2021, I met Cathye, who also lost her longtime husband in 2020. Well, we fell in love and were married in April 2022. So, if folks are still interested, I will continue to post here as we move forward with our lives and adventures!

Sunday, February 9, 2020

Oregon Living 2020 – Blog #11 – More Appointments and Then A Step Back


 

Tuesday, Feb 4th, 2020……    No appointments today. Lydia got to stay in bed and relax for as long as she wanted. She did get a call today from her oncologist saying that her latest labs showed her creatine up too much. She needs to keep on her daily water intake regiment which will get those numbers back up. Re-test on Wednesday.  Butthead and I did our normal walk this morning and it was COLD! Temps got into the mid-30s this morning. The weather calls for rain but when that happens, it usually warms up so there is no snow. 

Wednesday, Feb 5th, 2020……  We had an early appointment this morning with wound care. This is done at the Lebanon Hospital wound center. We got checked in and Lydia was nervous. But, after a bit of counseling, they calmed her down a bunch. The bump only needed some medication and a wrap. They gave us some material for me to change out every other day. I asked about her labs, which were in the same hospital and they were nice enough to call them in to do that while she was in her treatment room. We stopped and got breakfast and were done with those chores for the day. Lydia has had some rough nights sleeping so she curled up in her recliner in the living room and I left her alone. Later, I made her some lunch and then went off to play bingo at the senior center. I told some of the ladies there about Lydia. I also spoke to our neighbor, Lou, but that is about the only local people we have shared info with to date. When I got back from bingo, I got out some stuff for dinner. Tonight is was leftover chicken and cottage cheese so she could keep up with her dietary requirements before tomorrow’s procedure. I fixed some mac and cheese for me and for leftovers tomorrow.  We watched Monday’s America’s Got Talent and also The Masked Singer. I had no clue The Llama was Drew Carey!     
         
 
Thursday, Feb 6th, 2020…… Today is the PET/CT scan. We got to sleep in this morning (7:30am) and I got up and going with Rylee. I made Lydia scrambled eggs w/cheese for breakfast. She can’t have anything more except water until after the scan.  Our appointment is 1:30pm at Lebanon Community Hospital Imaging Center. We got checked in they took her back in for the scan. They gave her a radiopharmaceutical through an IV and she had to rest in her room for 45-60 minutes. She said she had to lie on the scanning table for about 25-30 minutes and it was pretty painless but she was still very nervous. Once she was done, we headed back home and rested for the afternoon. Her next oncology appointment is next Friday so we don’t expect any results until then.



Friday, Feb 7th, 2020……  Today was not a good day. It started out as a routine trip to a medical appointment.  Today we saw the radiation oncologist (Dr. Wahl) for a consult
But Lydia was not feeling well from night before. Her blood pressure was checked and it was really low. He also told us the pet scan showed that the cancer is also in both knees, her stomach and her lungs. They will be starting chemo next week and had appointments for the port, a bone marrow extraction (both at the same time), and an ecg to make sure her heart is strong enough. He checked her BP again and recommended that she go to the er, if not now, then later if she still felt lightheaded and queasy.  We went home, stopping by the market for some Boost. I fixed her some lunch and she felt better. But Dr Ribeiro de Olivera’s office called and told her he had a consult with Dr Wahl and she definitely should go to the Corvallis er. He called ahead and they got her in a bed pretty quickly. They drew more labs and did an ekg and put in an iv. They had two ambulances come in just after so we had got bumped out for an hour or so. The dr. finally came in and looked at her and her BP was getting better by then. He ordered fluids and said that based on dr. R's recommendations, she would be admitted.  It took a while but she got upstairs and into a room and I went home. I called her and she said they had the red blood cells iv in and going.  Her bp was normal again. She will now get all of the next week’s work done while in the hospital. They also plan to start her chemo treatment while she is there as well.  

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