We returned to the doctor’s office three days later to have the bandages replaced. I had thought plenty about whether I was ready to look at the results, knowing it would be swollen and nasty looking.
Surprisingly it was not that bad. OK, it was bad but not as bad as my crazy brain was fantasising. After the doctor replaced the giant bandage with a more modest one I looked like Jack Nicholson in Chinatown. In fact I jokingly mentioned the reference to the doctor, who admitted she was not familiar with the movie but would watch it.
After the bandage change she wrote and handed me a quick order. “After about a month when the surgery has heeled I want a CT Scan and an MRI. Even though we got all the cancer, spread is possible.” I freaked and saw my life flash before me. I went to the darkest place.
The next couple of days I spent sleepless nights and Janet wonderfully tried to calm me down and said “we’ll get through this.” I was planning the funeral.
My mind has always been strong or so I’ve told myself. But this week my rational mind had come apart. It started the day of the surgery when the doctor showed me the photo of my nose. I literally thought “there is a giant hole in my nose going all the way through. Hole in the nose plus CT scan plus MRI means the end.” I thought this completely and believed it absolutely.
It was a couple days before I could express this to Janet. “No – there wasn’t a hole in your nose,” she said confused. “Yes they dug but did not through it. Go look.” She dragged me to the mirror. “Feel inside – they didn’t go all the way through.” It took a lot of convincing because I was sure of what I saw. But finally I was convinced and realized that my mind had made it up and I was incapable of expressing what I thought I saw. All I could say at the time to my doctor and Janet was, “OMG is that my nose?” “Well of course it was your nose,” Janet said. “Whose nose was it?”
Once I realized that my mind had fooled me, I saw that I had taken everything to the darkest place possible. OK, this is sort of my nature but never like this. Part of it is that I have been so healthy with literally nothing major and very little minor ever occurring in my 68 years that the shock of something serious made me more than a little crazy.
So it took two days for me to decide, ‘maybe it’s not the end yet.’ Sounds crazy and it is but for nearly 48 hours I thought this completely. I came to this changed realization just in time for us to arrange to return to Negros Oriental.
We got up Monday morning and tried to perform what we needed to do to leave Manila and return home. We found the local Barangay, the one nearest the hotel, and got a Barangay clearance. We proceeded to the City Hall and submitted documents for the medical clearance. This included a certification from my doctor as to what surgery had been performed and that I could travel. It also included negative swab tests for both of us.
Unfortunately I had done my swab test the day before the surgery, so technically that was a day or two too early for the clearance. I neither wanted to stick something way up my nose again nor could we afford the day another test and results would take. Janet asked (begged) for a special consideration. I pointed to the giant Jack Nicholson bandage on my nose and they agreed.
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Now, we could send all that documentation to Valencia and get permission to return. At the same time we asked for permission for me to quarantine at home. This is rare and unusual but we needed to try. We attached my doctor’s letter and to my pleasant surprise they agreed – contingent on a check of our home. “But where will Mrs. Weisbord quarantine?” they asked. “No no. I need her to quarantine with me. She is taking care of me,” which was certainly completely true.
Let me take this moment to state the obvious; that Janet has been incredible throughout all of this. If I ever made a smart move in my life it was marrying her. She stuck by me completely, helped in every way possible and remained a ray of sunshine when all I saw was the blackest of clouds. I love her more than ever!
Let me take another moment to describe the Covid response in Manila. Not only are face masks ubiquitous, so are face shields. You simply can’t enter anywhere without both. This included our hotel. And it seemed like most people complied though of course often the faceshield was propped up on people’s forehead.
Communication is nearly impossible. You have a mask and faceshield on and so does the other person. And there’s a good chance the other person is behind a sheet of plastic. At 68 with poor hearing I yelled “what?” a lot. Trying to communicate important information, such as surgical stuff or getting back home details was an effort in frustration. No wonder most people just use their phone to text or IM.
Signs throughout Manila encourage people to do the right thing. “Mask is the new smile,” one read. Yet the Filipino people are resilient and they seem to manage. Interesting that nearly everyone in Manila was aware that Negros “was strict” because we still maintain a 14 day quarantine. The quarantine in Negros is strict but the faceshield orders – not quite as strict.
In addition, as our 11 days in Manila progressed, more and more locations required a contact tracing app to enter. This was annoying but there was no choice. I know that a few paranoid people speculated at one point that the purpose of the Covid vaccine was to implant a tracking chip into everyone. How ridiculous – there is no need. All they need to do is track your smart phone and I worry that it will never end.
On the positive side, in addition to lots of mall shopping for both of us we ate great. The restaurants at the Shangri-la are excellent and the mall and surrounding areas had dozens of options. In additional I got New York pizza at SBarro. Now back in the US no one would consider SBarro to be excellent New York style pizza but for me it was close enough. In addition, I got to Subway and Wendys to complete the junk food trifecta.
Three days later we were back at the doctor’s office to remove the stitches. She removed the stitches and the truth be told, while there’s lots of healing left to go, the nose did not look that bad.
And the hits keep coming: She gave me my final results, confirming that all the cancer had been removed but there were cancer cells discovered that needed addressing. So after the nose heals in about a month I will need a round of radiation as a precaution.
But the best news within a series of difficult news events is that the City of Valencia gave us permission to quarantine at home. We’re homeward bound and I can’t wait!
Clearly 3 parts to this saga is not enough.