Quite a few people have asked me "what in the world is the hold up for the MRI??" (right - still no appointment for my daughter). So rather than dwell on the negative (hehe) I say "check my blog - it's all there and by writing it, I explain it once, otherwise I'll get angry rehashing it all the time". So here's the explanation (from my point of view and what I've learned thus far). I've come to realize that hospitals are very political. At times there are battles between the surgeons and the other departments. Other departments get annoyed and think surgeons act "God-like" so when they have power, they use it. Thus here we are stuck in the power struggle between our surgeon and the MRI department. Seems there is a head radiologist who places patients in priority for appointments according to what they see in the patient file. The only way the appointment can be changed is if the surgeon fills out a special request and takes it personally to the department head to have it changed. In December when we met with our surgeon he wrote "MRI 2-3 months". Well he meant 2-3 months post-op which would give a date of January for her next MRI. The MRI department read the date from the last appointment and gave her an MRI scheduled for beginning of April. Here we are now. I have spoken personally to our surgeon's secretary and to my "friend" in the Oncology Clinic and believe it or not, our very busy surgeon went personally to MRI with a special request to change, and the "head" person in MRI was not there to receive it. MRIs policy states the surgeon must personally take the request to change date down to the department. Now our surgeon has gone overseas and it must sit in limbo until the first week of February when he returns and tries again. Absolutely ridiculous. As his secretary put it "yes, it's pretty sad that this type of stuff takes away from him operating and meeting with patients". I agree. How can that not infuriate me? So now we miss the January MRI time frame in my daughter's post-surgery monitoring. All because of hospital politics and one department making it difficult for a surgeon to do their job. Stay tuned...
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Someone came to me today with a problem. It seems someone comes to me everyday with a problem. I did my best to give good advice and then moved on. I try (okay I said "try") not to dwell on problems. Yes I discuss them, then I try to set them aside and put them away unless/until I need to deal with them. Why? I'm going to say it's because I spent YEARS dwelling on problems. But now in hindsight, I realize how tiny these problems were. My brain works in wonderous ways...it wants to dwell, dwell, dwell until there's resolution. Sometimes there is no resolution. Sometimes you just don't like a person no matter how hard you try. Sometimes you and your husband will never see eye to eye on a situation. Eventually you've got to accept that your kid simply isn't a sleeper. All of these little things add up and if they consume you, you will be a miserable person. And...miserery loves company. So more and more misery appears.
Back to my earlier point...I had a few years where my mind remained in that constant negative state. Then all of a sudden "bigger" bad things began to happen until everything hit me like a ton of bricks. Last week of August 2010, I break my foot. A few days later we get a call of my daughter's diagnosis of PFHT. A week later my son develops a full body Staph infection. A week after that my daughter has Scarlet Fever. I feel it all happened because of this simple reason - I was consumed by all the negatives that I no longer saw all the positives for years prior. My mind was racing about what I needed to do next and what I wanted to buy next and where I wanted to go next. I truly forgot about what was sitting right beside me. How in the world could I do that? I forgot about why I'm here in the first place. And what my purpose here is. I let go of my faith and forgot to nurture my spirituality. I found that less often, I told my children stories of old that they could learn from. This is what happened. I forgot to enjoy my life in the present. Truly enjoy it and not all the "stuff" a good life can bring. Shame on me. So...I'm trying now to enjoy the little things, and to stop dwelling on the negatives. It's hard work and I need to work on it everyday. At least now I have an awareness of it. Ahhhh...two phonecalls this week from "unknown number". You see it's all supposed to be confidential but when I see "unknown number" I now know that it's the hospital calling. First call this week was our appointment for the Genetics Clinic at the hospital. They will be testing for mutations in our daughter's chromosomes which may possibly be the cause of this rare tumor developing in such a young body.
The second phonecall came from my friend in the Oncology Clinic (I call her that because we speak weekly and seems she spends the better part of her day chasing down doctors and liaising with them and other departments within hospital). Unfortunately she didn't call with good news of a date for the MRI. It's now January 21 and three weeks later we are still waiting. All because of the politics between surgeons and MRI radiologists. Hope for a date next week. In November I set on a quest to clear the clutter in my brain. After my daughter's surgery, my brain was left in a constant state of "what now?", and that meant confusion. "Will it come back? What are her chances of it coming back? What will be the frequency of monitoring? What is her staging? Is there a hereditary factor here?". The list goes on of endless questions. I took it upon myself to de-clutter my brain through yoga and meditation. It has helped me tremendously. I've never been in such a frantic state in my life, and now I sleep. I eat (darn it those pounds lost came back!!). I can think more clearly without so much frenzy and anger. However...I'm on week 3 of calling to find out when her follow up MRI will be scheduled. It's now January 20 and still no appointment. I need to find my Zen place...
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Blog? What For?I've never had a blog...nor have I ever cared to have one until now. I feel I have something to write about. I feel I have something to share with the world. Perhaps it is yet another form of egotistic narcissism - my take on Facebook "status" posts, Twitter and all the other social networking websites. I guess the difference is that I'm not telling the world "going to meet my BFF for a coffee". I truly feel others can learn from my experience. I am certainly learning everyday. Let's see...so far I've learned to simmer my crazy spiraling of stupidity on stupid issues (haven't quite mastered completely omitting them from my life just yet). Not sure if I can re-train my entire personality and existence thus far. Plus I'm great at being passionate on stupid issues. Archives
July 2014
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