Contemplating Beijing

I’m still in hospital doing the food tray typing. Today the network is down, but I am determined to get a message out, so I’m going through the back door as it were—composing the old fashioned way in Word then moving it over to the blog, hopefully without incident.

I am feeling way stronger than a few days ago. They have me back on that artificial feeding routine from my previous hospitalization. The dietician says I am getting a perfectly balanced diet. That’d be a first in my life. This time they had to resort to drip and suck, so I have a tube down my nose to drain excess gastric fluid. One of life’s lesser joys, I would say. For several days I wasn’t able to take in anything by mouth, but yesterday, oh joy of joys, the doc suggested I could try a latte if I wanted—more for the taste than anything, since it ends up being sucked up into the tube. What an amazing treat. Good coffee, my mouth smiled—and I will never take a sip of coffee for granted again!

Alas, there has been no talk of barbequed salmon or steak. Too bad.

So things have gone significantly sideways in terms of this obstruction. I was admitted to the palliative ward of the Tom Baker Cancer Center, in part because my palliative doc was doing a home visit assessing what was happening, when I threw up all over her. She said she had been wondering whether another obstruction was developing—and she got her answer in a big way. As a rule, I would say no projectile vomiting over your doctor, but it sure put things into motion! She actually had to continue her day wearing a pair of my trousers, while I got whisked directly in, do not pass Go.


I have a very lovely big room with floor to ceiling windows, Totally unlike being on the surgical ward. I am also getting a sense of what it means to be a palliative patient, and have palliative docs. I like them very much. In this I have always been lucky, because I adore my oncologist as well, so I feel like I am being well held, and becoming well known to a new set of people who care for me equally well, but somewhat differently.

And here’s a surprising thing. Many of you know that I have had a meditation practice of sorts for many years. I have certainly been working on my spiritual journey, and on pain control. One of the palliative docs is amazed at how little pain I actually experience. She says the only other people she sees with this degree of comfort in what should be a pretty hard situation are elite athletes!

Now if you had to place me with fellow travelers, would it be with athletes? I’m thinking we might be in trouble in Beijing.