The Puzzle Savant

    Before I begin this post I need to apologize for being so long between posts.  Although I find it hard to believe that anyone actually reads these posts, I have been getting some serious flak about the delay. I'll explain more in my next post but the truth is that this process is just so overwhelming and exhausting that I just didn't want to talk about cancer anymore. I'm finding that I'm just not as tough as Joy. She continues to amaze me.

    So, as I write this chapter I'm sitting in the chemo suite watching over Joy while they pump the poison in her veins to destroy any remaining cancer cells. At least that's the plan. The reality is that only 5% of women are helped by chemo and we can only hope we fit into that 5%.  We are participating in a national study here at KUMed that will hopefully help them identify which 5% of women actually benefit from chemo.  As it now stands, chemo is standard treatment for most breast cancer patients and that is a troubling fact since the chemo is so hard on the body and 95% are doing nothing more than taking toxic risks while hoping for the best results.  We certainly were clueless about all this before our journey.  As good as medicine is, there is so much they just don't yet know. Our experience at this hospital has been very good. They go out of their way to answer any questions and to present any and all options and risks clearly. I'm impressed by the level of care in an environment where it must seem like there are more questions than answers.

    While this whole process does wear you down, there are some moments of serendipity and humor. Our favorite has been morphine.  Joy on morphine has given us some stories that will undoubtedly expand over the coming years.  Due to the removal of both breasts and 18 lymph nodes on the left side, Joy could only sleep in a recliner in the living room.

Brooke, Elizabeth, and I took turns camping out on the couch while she slept.  She always started her naps looking so peaceful but then the hot flash would hit and she ended up sleeping more like this.

We had to wake her for meds, bathroom breaks, and to empty the 3 drain tubes from the incision sites.  Joy would usually wake up and begin to talk to us along with several folks that weren't present.  The best times were when she tried to get us to engage the invisible visitors in the conversations.  Her conversations occurred at odd hours and made sleeping on the couch difficult as I always woke up with a start thinking she needed something or was in pain only to discover she was staring at a blank spot on the wall and talking up a storm with persons unknown and unseen. One time she was talking and turned to point at me and then back to the blank wall and said, "Scott Campbell is right there and he can't see you".  I confess I stared at the wall for a long time to make sure there wasn't someone there. After all these conversations, she would, at some point, realize it was the morphine talking and start to smile or laugh.

    While those episodes were entertaining, none were as funny as trying to put together a 1500 piece puzzle with someone on morphine. Let me tell you, it was a hoot.  The puzzle was difficult and the girls and I would go 5 or 10 minutes at times before finding one piece that fit. Joy, on the other hand, would sit there and we would hear. "Oh, found another one" about every 30 seconds. 

    It didn't take long for us to realize that she wasn't the puzzle savant she appeared to be. Take a look at this picture of a tree she put together. We laughed until we cried and had to take apart nearly everything she'd done.

Needless to say, we watched her progress a little closer after that discovery.  It was a time we will always remember and cherish.