TheBanyanTree: Off on a New Adventure

[Sachet]

Your positive attitude, organized preparation and strong support system 
is amazing, Chris. I wish you all the best as you recover and move 
forward. I will be keeping tabs on FB.


A. Christopher Hammon wrote:
> I am off on a grand new adventure at the out set of this year and 
> decade. It is not one I would choose, however, but it seems to be the 
> one that I have drawn to be my next grand adventure.
> 
> A microscopic trace of blood in my urine sample during a routine 
> physical before Thanksgiving prompted an abdominal CT scan the beginning 
> of December to check for any problems with kidney and bladder. That was 
> an interesting experience and included my first ever experience with an 
> IV. The last time I was in a hospital as a patient was for a 
> tonsillectomy in 1957, when they still used ether...that was traumatic. 
> As an aside, I had my second experience just before Christmas for a 
> combination endoscopy and colinoscopy. I couldn't resist asking the IV 
> nurse to be gentle, it was only my second time. To which she promptly 
> shouted out for all to hear, "Hey, I've got almost a virgin here." Gotta 
> have some fun with this stuff.
> 
> The abdominal CT turned up no problems with the kidneys or bladder, but 
> much to our surprise we discovered mucinous material secreting from a 
> tumor on my appendix; apparently a rare condition known as pseudomyxoma 
> peritonei. This is not good. The good news is that it is very treatable 
> (you just have to recover from the treatment) and that it is typically 
> benign. It is a "Trouble with Tribbles" story where cells we need on one 
> side of the intestinal wall were reproducing on the wrong side of the 
> intestinal wall ... where they had no place to go except to accumulate.
> 
> The next stop for getting started on this grand adventure was to meet 
> with my lead tour guide, the surgical oncologist in the area that 
> specializes in the treatment for this. He is a great doc; a prof at the 
> medical school with a rep for being really slick in the OR
> 
> The most successful approach to this in current practice is to 
> surgically debulk all of the mucinous material gathering in my abdomen, 
> remove the appendix, gall bladder, areas of the colon where the mucinous 
> cells have gathers (in my case, most likely the right half), and a lot 
> of the omentum. Then as part of the surgical procedure to introduce a 
> heated intraperitoneal chemotherapy that they slosh around in the 
> abdominal area for a little over an hour. This generally gets it and 
> life goes on once you recover from the surgery. My job, the big part of 
> the adventure ahead, is to recover. And then they added that the big 
> side effects of the surgery/chemo are that it zaps all of your energy 
> and depletes your immune system. It will take time, patience, and 
> perseverance, they say.
> 
> So it is "game on" for this grand adventure; we have the surgery 
> scheduled for January 13.
> 
> The good news is that with the exception of this I am in very good 
> health and should be able to get right on through this fine. I 
> anticipate plenty of stories coming out of this and hopefully I will 
> find the energy to write them down before they get away from me. I have 
> loaded up my Kindle with fun reading while I recoup and my iPhone with 
> plenty of music. I also have myself a stack of DVDs to entertain me. 
> Most important to me, though, is that I am gathering the energy of 
> friends and family as cheerleaders to help me sustain my energy through 
> the journey. Family members have opened up a Facebook group where they 
> will be posting updates, if anyone is interested (Updates on Chris Hammon).
> 
> And now, like it or not, I am off on this grand new adventure to see 
> where my journeys take me and to learn what I might learn along the way. 
> In the meantime, I made my reservations for the week long bicycle tour 
> of Indiana State Parks in September that includes bicycling all of those 
> Brown County hills. I still plan to make that.
> 
> Cheers and bon voyage,
> Chris
> 
> 
> /_________________________________________
> A. Christopher Hammon, D.Min.
> Director of Online Learning and Publication //
> Wayne E. Oates Institute
> Integrating Spirituality, Ethics, and Health
> http://www.oates.org/
> 
> /Affiliate Faculty, Doctor of Ministry Program
> Drew University Theological School/
> 
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