MRI

Well this past week I had an MRI and we received the report on the 17th the report was as follows we are of course looking forward to talking to the Dr. about it.

1: The swelling around the tumor has decreased

2: the cyst is somewhat smaller

3: the tumor is there and lights up with the contrast but looks slightly thinner. I.e. the tumor tissue encapsulating the cyst

4: The midline shift in my brain has corrected itself the right brain is no longer being pushed to the left side

An odd side effect of this MRI was that afterward I was more fatigued than before could it be lying still for an hour in the dark lying with my head lower than usual, the radiation or just Psychosomatic. I am not sure but I tried to combat it by walking at a brisk pace doing some exercises and having a snack and a drink.

In other news I had a pretty good week I definitely could tell early in the week that I had an active weekend as I was pretty tired Monday but slept well Monday night and was pretty much reenergized by Tuesday. Even had a couple of people at work independently comment on how well I was walking and at a faster speed one person even asked when I was going to get rid of the cane. I have been doing pretty well on the beverage goals mainly motivated by the hope that hydration will not only make me feel better but will help with chemo in terms of finding and successfully taping into a good vein i.e. minimize the probing and bruising. It is kind of funny I used to nearly pass out when giving blood samples now it is routine to be poked and doesn’t bother me much in fact I can almost watch.

I am still working on setting up new computer and rebuilding old computer. This work used to not be so taxing but now it seems quite hard based on my ability to focus and my limited ability to craw around on the floor to connect and disconnect cables (Darby has been helping with this). I will get it done eventually.

I have been able to go to the gym some and I walk on the treadmill I give myself a pretty good workout and the treadmill keeps me honest it is hard to cheat on a treadmill the workout is similar to the following profile( sometimes varies based on how I feel) . Even though it is not running I still get a therapeutic work out. After the treadmill I do some weight training with my left leg since it is still weak.
Minutes---incline----speed
0-5 ---------- .5 --------1.7
5-10 ------- 1.0-------- 1.8
10-15 -------1.5 --------1.9
15-20-------2.0-------- 2.0
20-25-------2.5-------- 2.1
25-30-------3.0-------- 2.3
30-35------ 3.5 -------- 2.5
35-40 cool down


While this is pretty long post I guess I have more that say then I realized one thing I really like about where we live is the wildlife. We have the occasional visit by the flock of wild turkeys. We have in the past had a gray fox visit the back yard and of course skunks and deer we now have a resident groundhog and this week we had a visit by a red fox which was trying to get the ground hog, a failed attempt. Anyway I like the wildlife.