June 25

My visit with Nancy today
I drove up to SF to hang out with Nancy this morning and surprised her by being the first one there. Her friend Collette brought her bacon and waffles which she was SO glad for. Hospital food sucks! She had her first coffee in about two months because her prednizone medication has been tapered down to a little dose. For those of you who don't know, prednizone and coffee do not mix! That's the worst medication I've ever been on in my life- a nice huge jolt of anxiety to the bloodstream. She said that when she first got the bad news prognosis from her doc, she told him, "Next time you have bad news for me, would you mind not ratcheting up my anxiety to its absolute highest first?!?!" SERIOUSLY. So it's good she's almost off that crazy stuff. They are also lowering a few other medications so that she can get all the tubes out of the port they put in her chest. That will make her much more comfortable and as she put it, "less tied to the ground." The doc also said it was ok to resume relatively normal eating habits. She hasn't been able to eat fresh fruits or veggies for fear of bacteria but now the doctors are saying it's ok.

Nancy is feeling a little bit more tired but still seems to be doing fairly good. She does cough up more gunk and says it's harder to breathe. Several times today she said, "I anticipate it probably won't be much longer." She's at peace with it.

The doctors are upping her morphine a little because it makes her feel like she's breathing better, even though she's really not. It just makes her a little bit more comfortable but it's not a high enough dose to make her spacey, so that's good. She's still cracking jokes that throw the docs off guard. When the doctor accidentally dropped his pager, she sang, "Nah na na naaaaaa.... I didn't do it." Which is Bart Simpson's rap song, I believe. haa haaa

Nancy has non-stop guests and she keeps saying, "you'll have to do most of the talking" but you know Nancy, she's the best storyteller in the room and she invariably chimes in with a story every few minutes. She just can't help herself! It's awesome.

I showed her my new tattoo with her tattoo incorporated into it. She really liked it. She had me show everyone who came in to visit, saying, "isn't it amazing? Just really beautiful!" I'm glad she was able to see it.

People are coming in from far and wide to visit Nancy and it really means so much to her. Every day she mentions all the awesome people who are coming by and she is really just so happy to see everyone. It means the world to her, as well as her family, to see this outpouring of love. While this experience is sad, it's also very beautiful and moving.

Allegra said, "So, Nancy. You're going on a journey soon." and Nancy said, "Yep." Allegra mentioned something about haunting and I got all excited. "Oh yes! You better haunt me every so often! You know, make the lights flicker or make the picture frames crooked..." and she said, "oh god no, you know I can't stand crooked frames!!" So we decided that when I need her to visit, I'll make all the frames crooked myself to bug her so she'll have to come visit me. I told her to randomly turn on my radio to her favorite song, too. I hope she does.

In the mean time, she's still here, cracking jokes, and enjoying life. Since I'm working in SF this week, I'll get to visit her on my lunch breaks and that makes me happy.