It Might Get Messy

Jargon being much of the essence of science, biologists call things that have right and left sides “bilaterally symmetrical”. This means that if you cut something longwise, the halves are roughly equivalent. This seems pretty basic. Almost all animal life is bilaterally symmetrical—everything from simple looking earthworms to the complicated shells of crabs and lobsters. Interestingly, human beings are not evolved from the complex bilateral invertebrates. For reasons having to do with embryology, our closest invertebrate relatives are starfish and sea urchins—roundish things that are distinctly not bilaterally symmetrical. This means that chordates (almost, but not all, of which are bilateral) evolved such symmetry independently at least a second time during the history of life on earth. 


I bring up this bit of zoological esoterica because my present medical difficulties have to do with a breakdown in my bilateral symmetry. When Dr. H sliced the lymph nodes out of my shoulders, neck and chest, he did it on both sides. He did note much more radiation damage on the left side in general, and in fact had to deal with it during surgery during some unexpected nontrivial bleeding. But he got everything excavated to the lymph-node-removal level, excised what needed to be excised, stuck a drain in each side to draw off surgical and physiological fluids while things healed up, and shipped me home. 


Now, a month later, the right side is pretty much healed. Drain is mostly empty. The tissue layers sealed up nicely. Left side, not so much. I’m still running liters of fluid per day through the surgical drain, and it ain’t getting’ no better. 


One of the many things I like about Dr. H is that he is young, smart and inquisitive, with no deep ego-driven preconceptions about the single “correct” thing to do. So he brought my case up at the regular Wednesday faculty discussion of patient issues and inquired about some potentially innovative solutions. He said the closest one he got was somebody who suggested drilling a series of holes in the tissue to the level where the healing has gone awry and injecting crazy glue to paste it all back together. I chuckled at that one he, agreed with me. 


So it’s gonna be a bad week. Tuesday, he’s going to re-open my left side, get to the layers that are refusing to match up, and sew ‘em back together. This means another night in the hospital, but I’m pretty sick of dumping disgusting bodily fluids from collection jars in every available pocket, so I’m on board. And maybe, if nothing goes wrong this time, he can get me a photo or two.


The processes of contracting and treating cancer have, oddly, enhanced both my hearing and sense of taste/small. This is odd because the usual outcome of this sort of tumor is the opposite—loss of sensitivity. My empathetic abilities seem to have increased as well. I feel more love and good thoughts from you all every week, and I feel them deep in my emotional well. I cannot thank you all enough, or make it clear how important and healing it is to feel that waves of love. Special thanks this week go to Ginger and MaryEllen for the physical and spiritual CARE packages. You guys are the best, and the best thing is that your message got through loud and clear. I stopped beating myself up so much after I got your stuff. Thanks!


Professionally, I am going to be impaired most of the week by the surgery. This means that the time-critical deep-south project work I’ve been hammering on is going to slow. I do, however, have a lengthy table of staff work (figures, tables, text, research, ideas) that needs to be done and this is the perfect opportunity to catch that up. So for GM and JL, I’ll discuss in detail with AF and we’ll come up with a plan. 


Thanks, all. Remember I love each and every one of you, and cannot wait to see you, live and in the flesh. Given the possible alternatives to that delightful outcome, I’m smilin’ right now!