“Journey Inside” Ends …. For Now

16 Mar “Journey Inside” Ends …. For Now

The day ended without much fanfare, which is fine with me. It ended up being a fairly redemptive day actually. Yesterday was our 24th anniversary. Colleen had to work in the evening and I wasn’t feeling too well, so we didn’t do much. Today turned out to be our “hang” day together.

After checking in at the 2 hour mark, I was free to roam until 4:00 pm. We walked over to the Beverly Center mall. Pretty ritzy place. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many clothes and shoe stores sin one mall. No bookstores, which seemed a bit odd to me.

We also took in the new movie “The Ghost Writer”. One of my favorite and most fun things to do is to see movies in the theater. One of my quirks I guess. Every once in a while, Colleen lovingly obliges me and we enjoy it together.

Though I consider myself a movie buff, I do not consider myself a movie critic. I appreciate a plot that’ s hard to figure out and twists and turns along the way, just because the ride is fun.

I’m not one that generally notices bad acting, unless it’s really bad. And once I’ve seen a movie, I can generally remember it, but don’t have a memory for the unique lines, music, or scenes. Part of the fun of movies to me is enjoying the ride and then letting it go, not dwelling on it or in it.

Anyway, we headed back to the Medical Center arriving a few moments before the appointed time. They disconnected me, and toward home we went.

Throughout these 9+ weeks, I haven’t had much other than a liquid and soft food diet. Every few days, I attempt some real food to see if I can handle it, and haven’t really been able to tolerate much without significantly increasing pain or nausea, or both.

One of the results of this is not having much pleasant taste in my mouth. There was a Starbucks in the Medical Center, and as you can imagine, my heart has longed for not just the taste, but I also enjoy the environment quite a bit. However, the only thing I can really have from there is decaf tea or a non-coffee frappucino, and non-dairy at that.

I’m usually good with substituting soy for milk, so after 24 hours of clear liquids for this test, and 16 hours of almost nothing at all, I was quite looking forward to trying a soy-based Strawberries and Creme Frappucino.

When I placed the order, the barista said, “It’s not gonna taste the same, just to let you know.” I really wasn’t thinking that at the time she said it. I was just looking forward to something wet from Starbucks. Turned out she was right. It really wasn’t worth it.

On top of it, I became quite nauseous pretty quickly on the ride home. While we enjoyed little to no traffic on the way in this morning, the streets and freeways were jam packed this afternoon.

We made it home at 6:00 pm, at which time I went straight to bed to try to sleep of this round of nausea. The only real disappointment of the test is that it will take them 2-3 weeks to read it and write the report for my doctor. In the mean time, my doctor won’t prescribe treatment until he has seen the results. So, here we wait ….. for now.