Lucky

I've decided I'm lucky. No, no big lottery wins, not that kind of lucky. But I can look around at the people I know and have heard about, and find ways I'm luckier than they are. Or have been, in some cases. I'm still kicking.

I have lost track of those who, over the years, have contracted cancer. Some are still fighting, but too many have lost that last battle. The list includes about every kind of cancer you can think of.

I've never needed an organ replacement, nor died from rejection after ten long slow years. I've never broken a bone bigger than a nose or wrist, and if one is a bit crooked, oh well. It still breathes.

Of the several - I won't say "many" because I'm the one who gets to define the terms here, folks - fender benders I've had, the worst I've been injured was a minor neck sprain, even though that one involved getting rear-ended by a school bus. When those accidents totaled my car, like a memorable incident or three with Attack Bambis, there was always a way to procure that next vehicle, including a loan from the president of the company I drove for. May he rest in peace. Another cancer casualty.

I've never been homeless. Never gone hungry. (You can tell, can't you?) Never lost a sibling, child, grandchild. Never been widowed. I wasn't an orphan until in my 60's. I've never been in a tornado, flood, volcano, or earthquake, never known somebody to drown, never had a home burn, never battled addiction - so long as chocolate doesn't count. I've never been touched closely by violence, nor since junior high, known somebody who has.

I've never had cause for PTSD though that previously mentioned school bus succeeded in making me leery of driving on winter ice. Fortunately I was already working on relocating to warmer climes.

I'm dearly loved by somebody I dearly love, and fully cognizant of just how lucky that is.

The list can go on. But what brings it all to mind is a call today from a friend who's been anything but lucky. For her it's been a long list of things, one after the next after the next. When I met her and became her friend back when she was about 35, she'd been dealing with MRSA in one foot. Having insurance that paid for... well, not the best of health care, and not the best of doctors, she's gone through repeatedly being under-diagnosed for her infections, under-prescribed for proper antibiotics, all by the same doctor who might have paid more attention to her chronic history and might have figured another MRSA infection wasn't was zebra but a horse, well before she required IVs to treat them. There were toe amputations. The other foot had a heel that had MRSA, then weakened bone which wouldn't heal after being broken, and still not healed after two bone grafts. Now, maybe it finally has.

But...

There was the shin bone on the other leg from that ankle, the same leg as the earlier amputations, which recently broke, was casted, and a follow-up x-ray that was misread as showing it had healed. As soon as the cast was removed and the leg bore weight, that bone was more of a "v" than a straight line. A new doctor figured it out, a new cast is on, and she is confined to a wheelchair for the duration. Her hip is giving her problems - the usual normal stuff that requires surgery though not so likely in someone now only 44, but won't be dealt with until that shin bone heals.

However...

During the last couple years or more, she has been bounced from primary physician, to orthopedic clinic, to U of M hospital in Minneapolis. A little head scratching was going on at the U, since the doc doing the heel bone graft took bone from the other leg. You guessed it: the one that broke. And since that break wasn't healing, a few tests were run. A problem was found.

You're expecting that by now, right? I mean, this whole thing has been going on for maybe 10 years now. So there's a new diagnosis. She has a bacterial bone infection - not the possible cancer she was freaking out about - and while it is slow growing, it is also rare and drug resistant. And did I mention it's in both legs? Makes the head scratching over taking bone from one leg for the other even more significant.

The doc giving her the test results didn't pull any punches with her today. The most likely treatment will be amputation. Since it's in both legs, well, you can figure it out. Given a choice of returning to the U, or trying a new set of docs at the Mayo Clinic, she's picking Mayo, even though Rochester is about an 80 mile longer drive each way from her home than the U. The way she heard today's doc's comment agreeing with her choice, it sounds like there may be solid grounds for a malpractice suit.

I bet you knew that one was coming too.

So with all my whining and complaining, the lists of procedures and symptoms and after effects, maybe you can understand why I feel lucky. And why I just couldn't get to sleep until getting this down. And why I ache from being 1800 miles away from being able to give my friend a long hug.

Well, along with that little ache from.... Never mind.