After three days in Intensive Care, and another in a normal room (only 1,000 Euros/day), and 2 liters of effluent off my lung, the doctors gave me the go ahead to leave the hospital. The morning of discharge, Al went to see the social worker who was supposed to help with the tentative invoice in his hand: 12,000 Euros. When he explained that we did not have that kind of money to pay off-hand, she asked about what we had been doing in Martinique. As soon as she heard about the boat, she dismissed Al as not being needy at all. So that was that; we had this debt which could not be disputed or negotiated down. However, all they had as security was our address in Canada and a copy of my passport, as well as our boat in the marina. They let us go, indicating that the real invoice was to be processed and sent to our address from a French government office.
I have to say that, I felt lucky that I had been in the best possible place to get sick. In my opinion, no other island can offer comparable service as promptly and efficiently, except maybe Grenada’s St George’s university hospital, but I presume that it would be more costly, since it is owned by Americans.
On our way out, Al assisted me to the car park, and almost got a heart attack seeing the car. While being parked, the car was hit by somebody, who did not bother to leave any contact information. Al was very angry, but confident that he had full coverage and completely blameless. He was told not to worry when he returned the car. Yea, they always say don’t worry, and stab you with the news later. After we returned to Canada, he was charged 300 Euros, which was the deductible portion of the “full” coverage. People have to make sure what they are getting into while signing rental agreements! Now, we pay a few extra Euros for the “full full” coverage, and rental agency does not worry about showing the existing numerous dents and discolorations around the car.
BACK TO CANADA
While I was at the hospital, Al and Nejat brought Ruyam II to the Le Marin marina from St Anne, and tied it to a convenient dock tentatively, until our fate was to be decided. We left our keys with Levent, who promised to check on our baby from time to time, and flew to Montreal on December 13 th.
While he was looking at flight options, Al saw that there was one the next morning to Hamilton from Montreal, but we would have to stay the night for it. It was perfect for me, since it shortened the flying time for the day, and eliminated the one hour drive from Toronto. We notified our children, Devrim and his girl-friend Jen came from Ottawa, to our hotel in Montreal; and spent the night with us. They were worried sick, but were a little relieved after seeing that I did not look too bad.
Next morning, after arriving in Hamilton, my daughter Ayse and her wife Maggie met us at the airport, and drove us to St Joe’s hospital as instructed. Ayse had even gathered some necessities, in case I would be hospitalized.
The experience at the emergency was nothing less than awesome. We only waited an hour before getting my story told, seeing a doctor, having X-ray and CT Scan as well as ultra-sound performed. The longest wait was for the blood test, but the whole operation was finished before 4:00 pm. We had arrived around 10:00 am.
They told me that all appointments with doctors were going to be done by them, and I should just wait for calls from nurses, and let me go home. And they did. I saw three doctors before Christmas. There was some talk about taking a biopsy, but they decided against it, since there were enough of the cancer cells in the fluid. So the only intrusive procedure was pushing another drain tube to my lung to get a sample of the effluent for the lab.
CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR’S EVE
The whole family gathered at Hamilton for the holidays. It was kind of bitter-sweet for me, but since diagnosis was not completed, it was not completely hopeless for the children. We had a great time, and I was able to cook and enjoy the company. We even visited Toronto for sight-seeing. I was having a little difficulty in walking fast, but feeling fine.
Right before the end of the month, I received a call from my lung specialist to see him first thing on January 2nd, 2017.
DIAGNOSIS / PROGNOSIS
The lab results confirmed the existence of cancer cells, which appeared to have gone all around the body (stage 4), but not on any major organs. The doctor indicated that the chemotherapy was to be administered by an oncologist at the Juravinski Cancer Centre, and he did not have much to say about it. When I asked about prognosis, he asked me what I thought was likely to happen. I do not usually have too much confidence in most of the drugs anyway, but what I had heard about chemo was quite bleak. So I responded that my immune system was probably going to be shot without a cure, and he shook his head in agreement. He also said that I had heart disease on top of the cancer. I confidently corrected him, that it was not the case, my poor heart was as strong was ever, and that fluid had been the excess of the lung. I declared that the doctors at Martinique had assured me of that, and kind of prepared me for the diagnosis as well.
The way that the doctor handled the news made me so angry that, I swore to show him what I was made of. I did not believe that I could be dying before the end of the year.
ONCOLOGIST
Dr Juergens at Juravinski is also a professor at McMaster, and doing research in immunotherapy. She decided to use conventional chemotherapy first, and maybe proceed to immuno later, if chemo failed. It has been longer than two years now (first administration was mid-February, 2017) that I have been receiving chemo, and I am going strong, thank god. The fist part of the treatment was full force for six sessions, three weeks apart. Two separate drugs were given over two hours, and the expectation was such that, the poison would affect one’s stomach, as well as all the renewed cells growing in the body. Hence, hair, nails, skin would be adversely affected, and nausea would set in. A battery of other drugs were prescribed for the side-effects. Thankfully, I had no need for the nausea pills, and reduced the intake of steroids to one per treatment.
Before the chemo sessions started, I got a very short hair-cut in anticipation, so that if my hair fell out, it would be easier. Didn't happen, and my hair grew back instead. I started to joke with friends, whether I was getting a placebo or what. Every time I see the doctor, first question is about appetite. Unfortunately, thanks to the steroids, my appetite is growing, so are my hips and tummy.
FLUID IN THE LUNG
Unfortunately, chemo did not dry the effluent in my lung quickly as expected. In March, a surgeon in St Joe’s stuck a permanent drain to the lung, leaving the plugged end dangling, and arranged a nurse to come home and drain it three times per week. They said home care was more efficient and clean, and I tended to agree. My brother (doctor) was adamant that keeping the tube clean was utmost important, since it gave direct access to my lung, and any bacteria entering it, in my vulnerable condition, would be fatal. Moral of the story is to keep it and the environment clean.
I turned the sectional couch in our living room, and its coffee table, into our nursing station. First gave a thorough cleaning and sterilizing to the leather of the couch, and found a plastic picnic tablecloth for the table, which was to be wiped by Lysol before using.
Every time right before the arrival of the nurse, I would wash the floors, starting with the front door, all the way down to the station. I even washed the only piece of carpet under the coffee table. Fortunately for me, the draining operation was concluded without any incident. I was able to live my life between drainings, by covering the plugged tube, looped at my left side, by adhesive plastic. I even traveled to Linz, Austria with Ayse, on her business trip in June, 2017. She pampered me with first class tickets from Condor airlines (only $500 more than a regular Lufthansa ticket).
The best were the fully reclining seats during the long flight, and admittance to the lounge while waiting at the Frankfurt airport. Al and Ayse were trained by the nurse to operate the draining bottles, which gave me the freedom to travel wherever.
2017 WINTER AND SUMMER
The whole time between February and September was occupied by visits to the hospitals and receiving nurses at home. The drainage operation was a success, after a while, every session was yielding a lesser amount of effluent, until it became negligible at the end. My surgeon decided to yank the tube out at the end of September, and we started thinking of reuniting with Ruyam II.
SUMMER IN MARTINIQUE
In June, while I was away, Al decided to go to Le Marin, to effectively close the boat for the summer season. He got it cleaned, covered up all the hatches etc, and hired a guy to keep an eye on our baby while tied at the marina. Since we did not know when we would be back, we wanted to keep it safe.
Al always follows the hurricanes on the Internet. Every summer we had left Ruyam II at Grenada, and no major hurricanes occurred in the south Caribbean until 2017. The only year that we left it in Martinique, the major hurricane Maria happened to come disturbingly close. At the last moment it changed course to the north and hit Dominica instead. Even though its tail end created some havoc in Le Marin and St Anne, our side of the marina was safe from any damage.
Talk about a close call. While we were following its course, we were so anxious, that we called our guardian (in French that’s the title of the person looking after boats) several times during a day. He assured us that there were no loose objects lying around the deck, and the ties to the dock were tripled at every direction, etc. Last couple of days we were on constant watch, biting our nails. What a relief that it changed course, but also very sad for Dominica. Our hearts bled for the nice people of that beautiful island. In our opinion, it is one of the best in the whole Caribbean to spend time. And they are not rich, but independent, dignified and very industrious. They grow vegetables and sell in even in St Martin (not that close) and Martinique. We had bought from those merchants and talked to them about some vegetables we had never encountered before, got recipes.
Poor Dominicans were hit very hard that time, and once more slightly a year after. Apparently they started to recover, but what a blow to the people, who are trying so hard to carve out a living.
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