10-20-10

Hi everyone,

been a while hasn't it? Not much has gone on in the past month, but I do have some things to update you on. To start out, I'm feeling pretty well lately. Since my last update, it has pretty much been smooth sailing with the exception of about a week stretch. This was an absolutely horrible time for me. I couldn't eat, drink, or pretty much move. It was seriously worse than some of my bouts of crap after chemo. I don't know where it came from, how I got it or how it went away, but it was pretty damn close to how I felt when I had Echoli in Costa Rica. It started out on a Tuesday morning a couple of weeks ago, and I really just felt bad all around. I had a small breakfast and took Floyd out. From there it progressively got worse and worse, to the point where I didn't want to move, and food and drink sounded just aweful. Aside from a few bites of some fruit and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, I had nothing to eat that entire time. It got so bad that I had to leave a good friend's wedding early. I made it through the ceremony, but had to pull the shoot after that and miss the reception. I felt terrible about it but just couldn't do it, so I left. Anyway, that was the Sunday following the Tuesday when it started. Every night that week I would go to sleep prayng that this terrible feeling would go away, then I would wake up the next morning feeling worse than the night before. It finally went away the next Tuesday, so for 7 full days I was in pure hell. Luckily enough for me, that as been pretty much it when it comes to feeling bad. I can only hope that I never have to go through that again, but that is just dreaming.

The other update I have is the results I got from the latest catscan on my lungs. Good news!!! The surgeon was successfull in getting everything out he was supposed to. There are still some specks on the lung, but those are of no consequence. I'm pretty much good to go and in recovery mode. I still have to do bags of antibiotics through IV every now and then, but that is really just to make sure that if there is any infection hiding somewhere, we'll kill it. Now it's all about staying active and trying to get that lung back into shape. I have tried to run a few times, but that is just too much right now. After a quarter of a mile or so, I am completely out of breath, almost to the point where I feel like I'm suffocating. My plan is to take it slow and mellow. I want to give the stationary bike a try, and maybe some light weights, and if that works out, I can start to work up from there...we shall see.

My Atrial Flutter has been kept under control pretty well by the medications I'm on. There have been a few times where I've take the medication late, and my heart popped into that 250 beats a minute mode. Even though the doctors have told me that it's not anything to really worry about, that is pretty scary. All I can say is the heart is an amazing thing for it to be able to take that many beats per minute, and have it not turn into a full blown heart attack. To fix it, they will probably do the cathetor thing where they put it in my hip and run it all the way up to the heart. When it's there, it has a burning device at the end of the tube that burns the part of the upper heart that causing the problem. Then they pull the tube out and I'm good to go. Pretty crazy that they can do that as an out patient procedure. I don't know, to me that sounds pretty gnarley but as I said, it's a pretty easy thing for them to do and it should fix the flutter permanently.

Finally, my bone marrow transplant is scheduled for the end of November. We don't have an exact date yet, but it will be right around that time. It obviously depends on when my donor has time. When our coordinators figure all of that out, I'll be a happy guy. I know it's right around the corner which is a very good feeling. This pneumonia has ruined enough of my life, so it's really good knowing that we're finally past it and done with that horrible chapter. Now we can move on to the important stuff. Soon enough, I'll be on the road to recovery and closer to getting my life back. I just want to get back to work and start exercising again...that is pretty much it and trust me, that time cannot come soon enough.

That's it everyone. I hope you are all doing well and I thank you once again for your support, love and prayers. Keep it all coming because I use every ounce of it. Take care, be well and make sure you have some sort of fun every day.

-Kurt