Shortly after my last post I felt a slight change in the little bumps of my right breast, which I had for a long time already and were once diagnosed as calcifications of milk ducts. I observed this for a while and was alarmed when one lump was growing. Instead of going into lengthy details I will give you the action dates.
June 18. 2015 = Dr. Gelin in Floral City ( Blood Panel ) " 19. " = Dr. Gelin called me personally " 24 " = Mammography and Ultrasound in Inverness " 29. " = Biopsy by surgeon Dr. Pham July 06. " = Results delivered by Dr. Pham: Infiltrating lobular carcinoma with extensive lobular carcinoma in situ component, 2,5 cm ( one inch) in diameter. Cancer cells are ER positive ( Estrogen Receptor positive). July 10. 2015 = Blood panel and EKG in Inverness " 15. " = Technical tests and Surgery in Citrus Memorial Hospital I had opted for bilateral mastectomy. Surgery went good, waking up no problems, but I was kept there for one night for observation. I did not want opiate pills for pain and was allowed to refer to my all-time remedy Ibuprofen to take as needed. Not much pains at all, only tiredness and feeling drained. My husband Dieter did and still does the necessary housework. Thanks ! July 20. 2015 = Post-0p exam by Dr. Pham, drainages were working good. " 24. " = Drainages were pulled by nurse under observation of Dr. Fernandez " 31. 2015 = Dr. Pham August 14. '05 = Dr. Pham - -- -SHE RELEASED ME WITH THE NEXT APPOINTMENT SCHEDULED IN ONE YEAR!!!!!!!! hurray ! -------------------------------------------------------------------------- On July 31. I will be prescribed Tamoxifen, a long-term hormone pill for prevention of further cancers. When Dr. Pham told me that, I was originally against it, but one entire day researching the internet convinced me otherwise. I am prepared, and I think my overall excellent condition will keep the side effects low - at least I hope it and I will deal with it. I also support my system by watching the sugar and carbs intake. Cancer cells live on Glucose!!! Herein I want to take the opportunity to thank all my facebook friends for their loving support. They kept up with my postings there, uplifted me and brought me joy and the certainty that friends are a shoulder to lean on. My relatives in Germany give me kisses and hugs through emails and phone calls....I thank you too - and I am glad that we live in modern times, where connections can be made easily - even over the seas of the world....... I live my life as usual, never cried about the diagnosis or even felt threatened. I laugh with the neighbors and make jokes about my now flat chest. I never liked Bra's anyway..........................................
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When Dieter wanted to use the toilet after we had everything connected on Saturday, he stepped into water puddles. After turning the water off, he looked into that damage and found the leakage on one of the major parts in the back. We drove to Bushnell on Sunday, found an RV Store, but it was closed on Sundays. We repeated that trip today. The part we needed was not in store, so we decided to buy a new bowl. Our old one was plastic and hard for me to keep it looking nice after 8 years of use - the new one is porcelain...Hurray - easier to keep very clean and shiny....and the price of 200 Dollars was better than those in the catalogs. I am a happy camper now - and Dieter is an exhausted one. He still has maintenance work on our Alfa to do outside. Well - at one point end of June we will be done with everything - hopefully - and can rest and visit with neighbors.......
And I take Antibiotics now, was prescribed a double dose yesterday because of the inflamed and ulcered tonsils. After the intake of 3 big tablets I start to feel the pains to lessen. Things can only get better from now on. Our cat Ellie is sooooo glad to be home again, she is quiet and sweet like always. Since we arrived here in Bushnell, we were discussing how to tackle a problem we had already for a longer time: The bottom of our bedroom slide-out was rotting. Dieter had removed already once quite some handfuls of stinky stuff through an opening he made into the bottom of our queen-sized bed. When we lift the bed up, we expose a storage underneath. It was this bottom which was getting real moldy now. Dieter had covered the opening up with a sheet of wooden material, but it did not help covering the smell.
Even though I had everything in place which makes our trailer a nice home, Dieter explained to me that such a repair can only be done by totally taking the slide-out off the trailer - and it had to be done NOW, as soon as possible, before the raining season starts. The weather was sunny last Wednesday, when we placed a call to an RV place on Rt 301, not far from here. Dieter remembered having noticed that location when we parked in Bushnell the last time and he drove to that place. He was very pleased with the estimate the owner made and with other parts of the upcoming deal. He was assured by the owner Jim that a man very experienced in doing this kind of repair would do an excellent job. What can I say, we were putting away and securing all things which were not "screwed down" all over again, Dieter had to disconnect everything outside and he placed things we could leave here outside on the concrete patio. At that time I was fighting a cold already for a week and my body ached from working before driving. We packed bedding, towels and some food and milk and our cat Ellie and left on Thursday morning. The very nice owners Jim and Sandy talked us into living in their guest house during that time, which we greatly appreciated. That wonderful cabin is located in the middle of the woods in the neighborhood of Brooksville. The work was completed today, on Saturday, just in time before a bigger rain shower in the evening. We are glad that we made that costly decision - no health hazard anymore..... The following pictures shows our trailer with the slide-out in question at the shop, the others speak for itself. The "Florida Jungle" I took from one of the windows of the guest house kitchen. We know Grace already since 2005, we met her in Bushnell also, on Sumter Oaks RV Resort instead of this one. We had to spend the entire summer then because of Dieter's illness, and Grace and I grew close. She was a single RV'er living with a big bird, a cat and 2 dogs, now she lives in a big house in Orlando and has a loving human friend - Julie. She promised already in facebook that she would visit us here as soon as even possible.
When she learned that we will stay here, she cheered loudly and found that wonderful......thanks for visiting us, Grace and Julie. She drove us to Bushnell because she had invited us to have lunch together in a restaurant. After we had eaten at Hong Kong Restaurant she took us on a memory tour through the city. We were laughing a lot and had fun together. Being home in our trailer again there was coffee - and time to take pictures. Grace is the one holding her camera. Please, click on the following link to open the website of this resort: http://breezyoaksrvpark.com/travelinfo.html -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- When we arrived 2 days ago, we took more time to set the trailer up correctly without having to see the need later on to correct. The ground is sandy like everywhere in Florida, so we put wooden boards beneath all wheels on both sides, but we had to elevate it more on the entrance side.
Our patio is half concrete, half wood and t he entire site is huge, has enough room for a mosquito tent if necessary - or to entertain a big crowd. So far we did not speak with anyone of our neighbors, we were too busy. Dieter did all the connections and brought the big awning out, secured it also, and he engaged the window awnings, put the wheel stabilizers in, supported the front overhang with a king pin stabilizer. Then we had to rest. I was tired too because I had to re-arrange everything inside. Our site number is 40 - when you look into the resort website and click on their site map tab, you have the resort layout and you can see where we "sit".... The other morning we drove to Walmart because our refrigerators were empty. When we returned after noon and were only half-ways done with putting our groceries away because we had to eat our lunch first - - there was a knock on the door.....our friends Karen and Jack were starting their summer trip up north with their truck camper and made a detour to say Hello. They stayed here overnight on a rented site and left this morning. We are camper friends since 2002, when we met in Port Charlotte, FL and have met many times during our travels. They will return in fall. I had made a nice simple dinner and we emptied a bottle of Merlot we just had bought for a special occasion - and this was one! Our first driving day of that long trip from Rockport, TX, to Bushnell, FL, has been not a smooth one. We had a tire blow-out on the entrance side of the trailer and our Air Conditioner in the truck ran out of Freon. It had been a hot cloudless day - and the drive through Houston was only "Stop and Go" this time. We had planned 2 nights in Winnie, TX, where we used the second day there to get the A/C in the truck fixed and 2 new tires ( one for the shredded one and one new one as a spare). In the page Itineraries you can follow up with all the locations we have been guests during this trip. Highlight of it has been our 4-day stay in Robertsdale, Alabama. Our friends Brenda and Paul visited us one day and another day Brenda came again with her parents. What a wonderful afternoon that has been! Underneath I will post some pictures I took in resorts we liked because of the vegetation and the big site. We were so tired on this trip that I had to rest instead of walking around and taking pics.
The local weather is getting nice and nicer - and then we have to leave - haha. The mileage from here to Bushnell, FL. is about 1100 miles. We will reach that location after 7 driving days ( please, see my Itineraries page). A visual route: After reaching our destination I will give you some short notes about that trip.
Since we are parked here in Rockport, we did the following:
Setting everything up - 2 days overall. We are parked on a concrete pad and did not pay attention to the levelers, assuming the pad was even. It wasn't. Two days later Dieter hooked our truck to the trailer and pulled the unit forward, so we were able to put leveler blocks underneath the 3 tires on the entrance side. Shopping groceries at Walmart , doing laundry and hanging it outside to dry - next to cooking meals and doing the regular house chores. On Monday I was doing a jigsaw puzzle and Dieter was reading - when someone called outside: "Dieter". I jumped up and opened the door.......what a surprise! Our co-hosts from Port Aransas on Mustang Island we worked with in 2009/10 were outside - John and DeAnna. They came in and we talked for quite a while.....they are parked here since October and will leave about end of April. John thought he recognized Dieter's truck - and he was right. After going through our forwarded mail sent from Livingston, TX, we found out that new automotive laws in Texas are valid from May 1st 2015 , meaning that we better take our trailer to inspection in order to receive the registration sticker from Livingston because we are still in Texas beginning of May. We made an appointment for that, feeling happy that one of those inspection places was in Rockport. It meant disconnecting/connecting everything, driving there with the unit and after returning do everything in reverse, including all the inside work, like rolling up the carpets and securing everything which could shift. After having restored everything as it was, our cat was especially happy....cats hate disorder. In the meantime we had made an appointment to meet with our friend Janet from Aransas Pass, who is a widow since a short time. She and her husband Tom were the managers of the campground in Blessing, T X, where we spent one winter after going full-time. We had met every time we were close to this area in the past. We met at the Chinese Restaurant on I-35 in Rockport and enjoyed a wonderful Buffett together. Aterwards we drove to our resort and we talked further for a couple of hours..... Will we see her again? We do not know, it is unlikely. Yesterday, Thursday, Dieter and I washed ( and cleaned from tar and removed black streaks ) our trailer, which took us several hours. Nice and clean now - and shiny again. Today we drove to Walmart to have our big blue water bottles filled there with drinking water, 8 gallons of it. Even though we have 3 filters installed, we do not want to take any health chances by drinking water from the faucet. It smells a little odd, that is a big NoNo. It could be that we will be visited by other friends from the Hill Country in Texas.....will see. Our trip from La Feria, TX to here went as planned. It rained or drizzled but otherwise it has been a smooth ride. I knew from researching campgrounds that this one would be to our liking what the lot itself is concerned. We are parked on the concrete pad and the streets are concrete, too. Our backyard is lawn and the wooden fence is a nice feature, too. The bushes behind it have just the right height to allow a free view of the skies. Every site has 2 benches which can be put together as a table. We have free WiFi, paid cable - - and very friendly managers. We have our truck parked on the neighboring site ( advised by the manager...) because many campers left already for the summer The following pictures I took today show the Salt Lake and the fishing pier beginning walking up to the shore....... I did not take other pictures - the clubhouse is closed for the season.
But if you are interested you can look up my Itineraries page ( mouse over Travel Blog page to see it and click on it), then scroll down to Rockport location and click on their website link. Thanks for your interest in our travels and for your attention. Please, feel free to post comments. |
AuthorMy name is Karin Bartsch. Archives
July 2015
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