Hi there. It seems when I have a life changing event I end up talking about it here on the O’Club. I mentioned more than 20 years ago when I was getting engaged, then married. I also talked about the cancer my wife had and was fighting shortly thereafter. I also announced that I was leaving the game in 04 because of the cancer and that our someday was right freaking now, not in the future. I then let folks know when we settled down in TX in 17 and continued monitoring the board.
Now got another event. Last week I left to go to the funeral of a good friend, fellow Motor Officer and Private Pilot. He made a mistake on his bike on the way back from DC where he attended the annual Law Enforcement Memorial activities. This time the mistake, like many we all make when driving cost him his life.
Last Tuesday I headed back home a 2 day drive. I no longer do 12 hour marathon drives. I spent the night but woke up with a disturbing situation. Blood in the urine, a lot of it. I decided I had even more motivation to get home so got a quick breakfast at a truck stop and hit the road. I stopped at the first rest stop to off load the coffee. That’s when I had an even more disturbing issue. The plumbing, MY plumbing, wasn’t working anymore. Made the next exit and returned back to the city (El Paso) and hunted down the first ER I could find. The doc there heard my story and installed a catheter (Foley) and drained me. He looked at the results and told me this was an indicator of nothing good. What was in the bag wasn’t pink, it was dark brick red. He agreed that I was good to go to get home but said I need to be in an ER ASAP. Getting a catheter installed while you are conscious is no freaking fun at all especially if you have scar tissue from a previous surgery like I do. Having a couple younger pretty nurses do it was no help either.
The drive was uneventful other than being rather painful. It’s hard to sit in a confined firm chair for 7.5 hours with a tube RIGHT THERE. When I got home I crawled out of the car and ate a sammich the wife made for me. Then we headed for the ER. We got there at about 7PM. We left at 1 AM. The Doc there ordered a cat scan and came back telling me I had a mass on the left kidney. She had consulted with a Urologist who told me to call his office in the morning. I slept maybe 2 hours and called him as soon as the office opened. Saw him the same day. He looked at the cat scan and confirmed a mush ball sized mass on the left kidney. He said it had been there for years and was likely why my previous doctor had given me a diagnosis of chronic disease (microscopic amounts of blood in urine over time).
He ordered another cat scan with dye contrast. He also flushed out the bladder removing over a couple table spoons worth of blood clots so I could have the catheter removed. It was necessary as when it was removed earlier I plugged up again and had to have it installed all over again. Oh joy. So far so good, no plugging up.
I get the result of the new cat scan next Tuesday and the confirmation of the treatment plan. He is semi confident it has not spread but that is why the new dye cat scan was ordered. He is optimistic we can remove the mass, and almost certainly the kidney it grew from and get it all out. This is not related to the prostate cancer I had, it’s a totally different one.
My purpose in mentioning the details is to advise y’all (TX thang ya know) to pay attention to any traces of blood in the urine and or kidney pain. The blood is the most common way this kind of cancer is found but it does require a cat scan. If you get advised you have trace amounts of blood in the urine during a physical talk to the Doc about the possibility of a cat scan to find out why, stones or other reason for the bleeding.
I ain’t dead yet and plan on fighting like hell to kick this cancers bellybutton just like I did the last one.
