Hod's health

[hod]

Hod is feeling very good today, in part because of his first official outside the family visitor, Linda Plaut. Hod was able to have a good conversation and read several of the notes all of you have been sending. Thank you everyone. Frank Plaut also visited and plans to come again later this week. We were also told that the physical therapist observed Hod moving his right arm from his shoulder - wonderful progress. Robin continues to read Jeeves stories to Hod while Hod4 continues his work to get Dad on the net from his laptop at the hospital. We are not supposed to ask how.

[hod]

Hod's therapy sessions today included a group therapy cooking lesson. Yes, a new era emerges - Hod cooks! He had to chop up and prepare all of the ingredients for a meat and bean filled tortilla, even frying the tortilla in oil. Unfortunately, Mom did not have the camera with her and I arrived at the hospital after the lesson. I don't think anyone was made to eat the tortilla so the day finished without injury.

[hod]

Robin and Michael had to return home to the east coast. Friends have been covering their lectures at MIT and U.Conn. and there is a mountain of paperwork to correct and examinations to set before spring break, as well as proofs on Robin's book on Picasso to get through. Dad is already missing Robin's distinctly French sounding British accent when she reads aloud from P.G. Wodehouse. Robin is going to try and get all her work done so that she can return to Denver for a week during spring break. Hod's therapy is going well, although he claims he can no longer consider cooking as an alternative hobby and is going back to carpentry. I think the Wednesday group and Uncle Phil are safe.

[hod]

Hod continues to progress. He startled Jackie this evening when he pulled his right hand from her grasp and moved it to his left across his chest. It took a few seconds for Mom to realize what she had seen - this is the first time she has observed Dad's gradual improvement in his right arm.

N.B. University of Colorado Hospital - wonderful, wonderful staff of caring physicians, nurses, therapists, and caretakers, just do not attempt the hamburgers or French Dip sandwich in the cafe.

[hod]

Hod4 returned to San Francisco today. He is going to clear up some work on his PhD and get his volunteer hours covered so that he may go home to Hawai'i when Hod3 does and help Jackie. This evening Hod4 had some good news from his end. He is working on a programme that will predict the 3-D shape of proteins within a few hours of entering the relevant data, a task which apparently takes several weeks at the moment and is much needed by several industries, and an unfortunate thing happened yesterday when, on his home computer, the programme apparently worked. Problem is Hod4 doesn't quite know why. He is, though, close to figuring it out tonight. (There, my occasional attempt to understand what Hod4 does for a living is completed for this week - stand by for corrections when Hod sets me straight and sends me some more books to read on the subject.)

Unfortunately, Hod's leaving for home means no more slightly borrowed Internet access on Hod3's computer at the hospital. Hod3 is doing well in
therapy again today, a little quieter tonight after saying a temporary good-bye to Hod4 - the two of them are planning woodworking projects for Canada. Hod3 is going to try sleeping tonight alone, aided by a couple of sleeping pills, as he is no longer having as many difficulties with bad dreams (a side effect, in part, of his surgery and anti-swelling medications which he no longer has to take as of today). This will allow Mom to get more rest as she has been taking turns with Robin and Hod3 to cover the nights at the hospital.

[hod]

This morning Hod was awakened at 4:00 to undergo several tests for pneumonia - coughing into a vial, blood tests, x-ray - spaced neatly at half hour intervals so he could not go back to sleep. This, added to his therapy sessions beginning at 6:30, medicine taking times, and vital statistic checks, meant his day lasted from 4:00 to 23:00. Yes, it is true, some sections of modern medical practitioners still believe in sleep deprivation as a proven path to recovery. After a short discussion with the treating physicians and head nurse, we have been assured this will not happen again.

In the end, it turned out that Hod does not have pneumonia, a very good result, and that the tests were the result of a mistaken vital statistics entry - the night nurse wrote down 38.8 for Hod's temperature at midnight, rather than 36.8 degrees C.

[hod]

*** ONCOLOGIST GIVES PROGNOSIS ***

Today was a hard day. During morning therapy, Dr. Gonzales, the oncologist following Hod's case, spoke to Hod and gave his opinion on Hod's prognosis. Dr. Gonzales believes Hod has only 2 to 4 months of life remaining. Jackie arrived at the hospital shortly after Hod was given this news, and she telephoned the rest of the family to pass it on.

The shortness of the time given in this opinion was a bit of a shock given what we had been hearing and Hod's good recovery from the first two surgeries. Hod is doing well with the news, is determined to go through with all possible treatments and to work hard at recovering the use of his speech and right side. Jackie is a bit dazed but calm and handling the news well.

Hod was able to talk with Val Nomura on the telephone this evening and Val cheered him up enormously with the news that the UH Men's Volleyball team defeated UCLA in 5 games. Chan Rowe is going to send a DVD with a recording of the games to Hod as a surprise. This will definitely get Hod to sit up and watch the small screen. Before this, we have only been able to persuade Hod to watch an hour of TV on Wednesday, East Wing night, to distract him. The best part of today came when Hod managed to move the fingers on his right hand during physical therapy. A great sign of returning control. Hod is also sleeping fairly well through the night with the aid of a couple of sleeping pills. He slept better after 2:00 when he threatened the
night nurse enough to frighten her into taking off the leg wraps that inflate with air and then deflate in order to promote circulation and prevent blood clots. I was told by her relief that the night nurse has decided to be optimistic and return to work tomorrow night.

[hod]

Today was a better day. Hod has re-doubled his efforts at therapy and is in good spirits. This evening I helped him to remember the Jabberwocky so that he could recite it tomorrow for his Greek speech therapist. Whenever Hod gets to her, she vents in Greek. She told me tonight "no one has made me blush like this in over 20 years". She insists that Hod enunciate, so he plans to floor her tomorrow with the "Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble" routine. He even memorized the first verse in German after I repeated it to him a few times. When Robin returns during spring break Hod's going to practice his French. I predict more Greek frustration. The night nurse tried to confiscate Hod's coke - that was a mess.

[hod]

Today Hod managed all of his therapy sessions beautifully right up until he learned that group therapy was a cooking class again this Sunday. At that point Hod refused to attend, claiming that his left hand was cramping and cooking would make it worse. Guess we should have taken a few photographs last Sunday for proof that Hod can cook when he has to. I have a vague memory of him fixing tacos at Kuilima when I was small - Hod denies it.

Happy Leap Year from the Greeleys!

[hod]

Hod is doing well in his therapy sessions. He now exercises his right arm by strapping it to a padded skateboard and moving his arm around on a table using the newly returned strength in his upper arm and shoulder. Hod is now also able to start to form a fist with his right hand, both palm up and palm down. He also took 5 or 6 steps, twice, using his four-footed cane, although he must be accompanied by the physical therapist at all times who taps him on the right knee to remind him to lock it before taking a step with his left leg. Hod looks great, though, dressing in his own clothes during the day, so no chance of catching him in one of those wonderful sea-breezes hospital gowns.

[hod]

*** DR. BREEZE PROGNOSIS BETTER - PERHAPS ***

Today was a bit of a roller coaster for Hod and Jackie. Dr. Gonzales, the oncologist, met with Hod and Jackie this morning during physical therapy and re-stated his belief that Hod has only 2 to 4 months left.

Later in the afternoon, though, Hod and Jackie received better news when they spoke with the nurse practitioner who assists Dr. Breeze during all of the doctor's Gamma Knife procedures. The nurse practitioner said Dr. Breeze has treated patients with as many as 30 Melanoma tumors with success (Hod has 10 remaining, 3 were removed by Dr. Kindt during the last two invasive surgeries). Further, Dr. Breeze has extended the life of many of his patients, following up with treatments for months, and, in some cases, years. This news is more in keeping with the articles we have been reading on Gamma Knife treatment of Melanoma. Hod4 has been digging up the literature on the web for us, and the articles generally state that Gamma Knife surgery is an effective tool in the treatment of Melanoma in the brain.

The times when we are able to speak with Hod's treating physicians are often short, so many questions remain. We get through a few with every visit, but it is still unclear why Dr. Gonzales is being more conservative in his estimate than is Dr. Breeze.

Dr. Breeze's nurse practitioner did tell us why no one seemed to be able to give us information on how many of Hod's cancer spots would be treated on the 19th of March during the first Gamma Knife session. It seems that the surgeon must make an educated guess about what portion of Hod's brain will be treated during each session, and must try to pick the best area for getting at the most tumors. Neither the Gamma Knife machine nor Hod may be re-positioned during the treatment, so an angle is chosen, the machine set over Hod's head, and the surgeon goes in and eliminates as many tumors as he may without damaging healthy tissue. It is during the treatment that the surgeon sees exactly where the tumors are and whether or not the tumors may be reached from the chosen angle. The good news is Hod can go back again and again for treatments, with a 6 to 8 week waiting period in between.

[hod]

Hod is in better spirits today, but is tired. He and Jackie are recovering from the roller coaster day they had yesterday. The various therapy sessions continue and Jackie is beginning to make plans to get Hod back to Hawai'i as soon as possible after the Gamma Knife surgery on the 19th of March. So far Jackie has tickets on United for the 25th of March. Hod4 will meet them in Hawai'i to help Hod3 and Jackie with Hod's reintroduction to the non-hospital world. The house on the hill will be too difficult for Hod to deal with for now (all those steps that my knees and I have hated for years!) so plans are being made to rent an apartment somewhere down the hill while we work out construction of modifications to the house and the building of a new one near by on flat land.

Hod and Jackie then have a rough plan to stay home for a fortnight and then travel to the Salt Spring house so Hod can get back to (supervising) the renovation. Hod just completed the kitchen during the last year and only has the bathroom left to remodel. I think we have him convinced to let someone else complete the tiling. In the meantime, Hod has designed a cherry and cedar table and a cherry cabinet he wants to build with Hod4 that will go along with the glass wall in the house depicting the Salt Spring Canadian landscape that Hod and Jackie commissioned and installed last year (featuring the eagle that lives nearby but not the deer who walk on the sod roof)! The woodworking designs and magazines are keeping Hod busy in the afternoons after therapy - the short articles being the perfect fit for the time in between Hod's frequent short afternoon snoozes.

This evening Frank and Linda Plaut invited us out to dinner, providing French food and good conversation at a nearby restaurant. Mom was able to relax a little and have the first green salad she has seen in a week. It was a great change from the re-heated hamburgers served at the hospital cafe, and the all-we-can-manage popcorn at 23:00 that constitutes dinner at the house most nights.

After this wonderful dinner with the Plauts we went back to the hospital and kept Hod company while he watched West Wing. His speech is very understandable now even when he is tired. He has a slight fever again but is doing well. Mom is catching up on her sleep and strength in the wonderfully relaxing home of Karen Mathis.

Mahalo to you all for the incredible help here in Denver and from home and afar - every letter and prayer brings comfort, hope and a smile from Dad.

[hod]

Burnham Horace Greeley (Hod, to all who knew him) passed away at approximately 10:45 am, January 26th, 2006. He died peacefully in his sleep, at home, with family at his side. This was the end of a long battle with metastatic melanoma, during which he showed a truly remarkable resilience and will to live. He had two good years after the initial diagnosis, even traveling to Thailand despite needing a wheelchair much of the time, for which we are grateful.

With love and affection:

Burnham Horace Greeley, Esq. February 13th, 1934 - January 26th, 2006.

Rest in Peace.