Herbert (the medical port implant) has been nothing but trouble from the start. The first chemo treatment he pretended he was going to be awesome, but it was a lie. Starting the next treatment he started acting up. First of all, it hurt like hell when the put the needle in him (yes more than the average needle). Turns out they were supposed to give me a prescription cream to help with that and forgot – oops. But then he didn’t want to work right. Apparently they need to be able to inject a fluid into him and then also be able to draw out a little blood to make sure he is working properly before starting the chemotherapy. On session two he decided he was not going to give any blood back and that means they can’t do the chemo.
There are solutions of course. The first is that they make me do kind of yoga exercises to encourage the port to work. Sometimes that takes care of the problem, sometimes it doesn’t. The worse alternative is that they have to put a drug in to force the port to work – a kind of medical Draino. That can work, but it also adds an hour or so to the time at chemo – and trust me I do NOT want that.
I even took matters into my own hands and did pre-emptive yoga exercises AND hanging upside down off my bed for 20 minutes before going. This helped some, but with one chemo and several months of other drugs having to put through the port, the nurse recommended that we have some port maintenance done and the chemo doctor agreed.
Back to Inova Hospital – although this time I did take Lauralee (thank you Lauralee!!!!) along to look after me so I wouldn’t stay awake through the procedure if I had to have Herbert replaced (minor surgery again). The thought of that made me want to puke to be honest, but whatever. It isn’t like I WANT to do any of this crap.
After more blood work and a chest x-ray, it was back to the cardiac unit for me. The nurses and aides from before all remembered me (in a good way) and new nurse wants to be on Team Debbie.
However, the physician assistant wanted to rush to have Herbert replaced but fortunately I had a different doctor who was not so quick to cut into me again. He did a dye test first and showed me on the very high tech screen how Herbert goes into my jugular and where the trouble is.
Then we had this very awkward exchange.
Doctor – “Ms. Marshall, the port is where it should be and I don’t want to do another surgery on you, it is just that, well……. You are well……. You see if I had done the first procedure I probably wouldn’t have quite put it in that place because you are …..umm…… you see it pulls because you are….. well….. umm…. You know you are……. Uh well-endowed.”
Debbie (thinking – no shit Sherlock) actual response --- “I think I knew that.”
Good laughs for the O.R.
Anyway, he said that rather than cut into me again when I only need to get through one more chemo, he would run “medical draino” on a slow drip through it to be sure it has every opportunity to work and then he suggested that I try hanging upside down before the next chemo. So I was right about hanging off the bed!! Even without surgery, I ended up spending most of the day at the hospital. Ick. But when I left this time I got hugs from the nurses. So it wasn’t ALL bad and certainly better than last time.
The O.R. crew also liked that I named the port Herbert – I mean really he is going to be with me long enough I figured he needed one – and they wanted to know “why Herbert?” I should tell you that too!
When I was a little kid, I used to watch the original Star Trek (that means the one with William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy for you kids!) with my dad (except I would always hide my face when the scary alien came on at the end of the credits). Anyway, there was an episode with intergalactic hippies who called anyone in authority “Herbert” and they would chant “Herbert, Herbert, Herbert!!!” at people when they were coming down on them like The Man. If you are a Herbert, you are not cool. Therefore – medical port= Herbert.
Herbert is just not cool.
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