Brown Sludge

I went in for a port flush today. It has been six weeks and five days since my last port flush. Usually I go every six weeks on the nose but life has been busy and when I scheduled the appointment I did not think five days would make much difference. I was wrong.

Loredana was not there today, instead a nurse named Ellen came in. She called me a wimp for using the numbing cream, but I like the numbing cream. I do not even notice when they stab me in the chest. As soon as she started the first blood draw out of the port she asked, "When was your last port flush?"

I told her it had been six weeks and five days and asked if there was a problem. Usually I look away the entire time they do the port flush. I used to watch Kerri pump the chemo into my port but I do not want to watch anymore. When Ellen asked me how long it had been since my last flush I looked down.

The syringe that is usually filled with blood was filled with brown sludge. She drew back again and more brown sludge came out. Watching brown sludge come out of your body does not give you a warm, fuzzy feeling.

Usually when something in my life goes wrong, I shrug it off and say it is a long way from my heart. The problem is that my port is not a long way from my heart. It is right near my heart.

Ellen says that she has seen this before and it is not something to worry about. I will probably worry some anyway, I am good at worrying. In the meantime she needed to find more syringes and more saline since now she could not use the original syringe for the flush. "We're not pumping that sludge back into your system!" She went to open a drawer and it was locked. "Mother of Christ this is the most annoying when they lock these doors!" Then she quickly apologized for cursing in front of me. I laughed.

I told Ellen that I was getting the sharp, shooting pain in my port a lot more often lately. Loredana said that the pain was because I was losing weight and the port was readjusting to a new location but I have not had any significant weight loss.

Ellen said, "Have you considered having your port removed."

I replied, "Oh yes, every day since my last chemotherapy treatment I think about having it removed but Dr. Andemaeriam won't let me take it out until I reach one year past chemo, thats in April."

"Oh."

When I went to schedule my next port flush and blood labs for my next CT scan I asked for Loredana to do my port flush (since she is my oncologist's nurse) but they told me she no longer worked there and they had not replaced her yet. That explained why Ellen did my port flush today. I was crestfallen though. Loredana was with me from day one when I went to Farmington for a second opinion. She lectured me about farming and brushing horses and pushing myself until I was running a fever. She came and checked on me when I was in the treatment room and jumped through hoops to make the treatment cycle easier for me. I will miss her and hope that wherever she has gone, things are going well.