So my last post was "Lost in Philly"... on Monday. I wrote and then deleted a post on Tuesday, because I didn't you to be as worried as I was. That would have told you that Lisa had missed yet another flight that morning and had subsequently checked out of her room, but was now offline and completely without communication. I talked with the Marriott desk staff dozens of times, and had the Philadelphia airport page her probably a dozen different times. By Wednesday morning, having not heard from her in almost 24 hours and visualizing her confused and sleeping in the airport, I sent her photo to the Philadelphia airport police and packed a bag to fly to Philadelphia... to go find her and bring her home.
Just as I pull up to the Austin airport, I get a return call from an officer with the Philadelphia airport police. "Mr. Powell, do not get on that plane to Philadelphia. Two days ago your wife tried to board her flight but was highly intoxicated... falling all over the boarding counter... talking about having sex and saying she was raped. A medic was called, and she was taken to Methodist hospital. Somehow she made it back to the airport yesterday, demanded to be put on the plane in a wheelchair, and boarded a Delta flight to Atlanta with an ultimate destination of Fort Meyers, Florida." I pull over to the side of the road and tell him he's talking about a different person; none of this makes sense. I ask if he showed them Lisa's picture, and he says yes. Yes! I make him repeat it all, and take notes, feeling like I'm in a twilight zone episode. So for the next hour, we believe that Lisa has had a three day mental crisis in Philadelphia, and that she's going off grid. And if she's out there with a massive tumor in her head and doesn't know who she is, we might never find her. I circled the airport front loop 3 or 4 times, in a mental haze. I finally park and make my way into the terminal and to the Delta counter. After checking the manifests on every flight that left Philly the previous day for Atlanta, as well as all the flights from Atlanta to Fort Meyers and not finding Lisa's name, the Delta Austin supervisor calls the Delta station master in Philadelphia. "Oh no, no... that was a different woman altogether." Wow. Interesting little detour of mental torture, but now Lisa is back in limbo... lost in the Philly airport, or wandering the streets of Philadelphia. We have no idea. I head back home, and start working the phones again. About three hours later, my phone rings. It's her. She checked out of her room the day before, but then laid back down and slept through the afternoon and night. So no one knew she was there. She's sorry, she had no idea anybody was worried about her. I finally got her home at around midnight on Wednesday. She is fine, and she's very well rested. After the preceding three days, I slept pretty much the whole day on Thursday. Way past my word limit... Sorry! But you should thank me for not taking you along on this part of the ride day by day. It was one hell of a week!
2 Comments
I wrote this yesterday, and waited to post it until Lisa returned home. That still hasn't happened. To the best of my knowledge she is still in the Philadelphia airport after two very restful nights at the airport Marriott, and she has lost her phone. I don't want to worry you, but we did say you're along for the ride! If it gets to be too much, you can quit reading. I think I would consider it if I had the option... So here's what I wrote yesterday: Today brings years of memories flooding back. Over the last 20 years or more… time after time Lisa disappearing – and me thinking that she was dead on the road somewhere. Worrying about her, and then exploding with anger when she showed up hours later than expected and acted like nothing happened. She’d go off to the store for just a few things, and then show up three hours later with groceries that could have been bought in an hour. I would have expected an affair, but her interest in all things physical just didn’t support that theory in the least. Now I understand. But now, she’s not wandering aimlessly around HEB with no clue about the time. She’s in the Philadelphia airport, after spending the night last night in the airport Marriott. Her alarms and the front desk and me all woke her up with plenty of time to make her flight home this morning. I pinged her back twice afterward, and then she went back to sleep until 11:30. Her flight was at 9:20. At last contact, her phone was dying. I was supposed to pick her up at the Austin airport before noon. Now I have no idea when she will fly back to Austin or when she will reestablish contact. This is why I drink. But at least now I know it’s not because she’s avoiding me. It’s because of this large mass in her forehead that is pushing on her brain. I’m a visual person. I think we all are. If we’re praying and working to defeat the enemy, it helps to visualize the enemy. The pictures are sobering. Please keep the prayers coming... both for her return to health and her return to Austin! On the 7th Day, we slept! Not really, but we did fall asleep relative to yesterday's post. Best to do away with any expectations of perfection early in the process! Since the diagnosis, I’ve been thinking a lot about the changes that occurred in Lisa, some quite a long time ago, that are directly attributable to the presence of this tumor. It is interesting and exciting to think that those symptoms will really reverse, and that we will get the original Lisa back. I have also spent time thinking about how incredibly frustrated I got with her. When I got angry, she showed no emotion at all, and that made me even angrier. Now I understand that her lack of emotion and drive and responsibility and sense of smell are all the direct effect of this growing tumor. It makes me wonder how many other people are living through similar transformations, but maybe don’t ever get the correct diagnosis or cure. It is humbling to think that my anger was at a sick person who couldn’t control her actions. Now when she does the same things that used to really stress me out, I can remain loving toward her because I finally understand why. It’s hard to describe the inner peace that comes when 20 plus years of frustration and anger suddenly and unexpectedly get resolved. Based on what the doctors have said and after reflecting about the timing of changes in Lisa, I believe this tumor has been growing for probably 25 years. So removing it should reset her to her early thirties, right? Are my expectations too high, or is it just me? So I need you to step up and be a leader – leave a comment. The others are a little anxious and they’re looking to you to set an example. Not looking for condolences… we are fine and have faith that it will all be good. But tell us what you’re thinking and feeling, how your life is. Brownie points if you make us laugh! P.S. Lisa is feeling well enough that on the spur she bought herself a ticket this morning to fly to Philadelphia with Jake... apparently the only way to prevent him from missing a day at Woodward BMX Bike Camp. He missed his early flight because of American Airlines painfully slow check in service at ABIA. It all happened really fast - not the waiting in line but her buying the ticket. She set her mind on it and got that look in her eye... some things never change! So Lisa and I are both doing it for 33 days… “It” is this:
Things working against us include the fact that the tumor is in her skull, so any treatment has to pass the blood brain barrier. But glucose continuously passes the blood brain barrier to feed both healthy cells and tumors. So we remain prayerfully confident. The second thing working against the alternative cure is, curiously, that Lisa’s benign tumor is not cancer… it’s not as fast growing and will not be affected as quickly by a nutritional approach. But given that as the other option, we’ll happily play the cards we’ve been dealt. Slow growing or not, it has to eat. If we can starve it for 33 days, who knows? Today I found an article from the Journal of Nuclear Medicine that confirms that meningiomas do image well on a PET scan – proving that they do gobble sugar and so are vulnerable to our attack. It seems ludicrous to believe that so simple an approach could let Lisa sidestep a frontal craniotomy to physically remove the tumor, but that is what we’re praying for. This will seem like a discontinuity – an irritating and unrelated shift in the story line. But be patient. It all ties together. Dr. David Fowler was my undergraduate advisor in architectural engineering, my master’s thesis advisor for my graduate degree, and the person most responsible for me going to grad school – where I met Lisa. David has recently retired from the University of Texas after teaching engineering for 44 years. He has since joined the board of LadderBlock, and is spending his working time in his retirement helping to advance LadderBlock. I am very honored. At a business lunch several weeks ago, our conversation turned to cancer. I talked about how, after Dad was diagnosed with lung cancer, I had done a lot of reading about the disease, and in particular about the metabolism and cellular feeding habits of cancers. They thrive in an acidic environment, and starve off and die in a basic environment. They gobble up sugar at a rate that is several times that of a normal cell. In fact, a common test for detecting cancer is a PET (Positive Electron Tomography) scan that specifically tracks where a solution of radioactive glucose – sugar – goes in your body. The cells that gobble up the sugar are the cancer cells. In the course of this conversation, David told me about two different natural cures for cancer that he has personal family experience with. At first, they both seemed counterintuitive to me… because both involve foods that have naturally highly concentrations of sugar. One is a red grape diet, and the other is a mixture of maple syrup and baking soda that is taken orally. The articles David sent me the following day made the mechanism of both cures clear and easy to understand – and both articles used the term “trojan horse” to describe the action of the glucose as it is carried into the cancer cells that consume it. The glucose of the red grape carries with it several phytochemicals that are known cancer killers. And the maple syrup, chemically combined with baking soda by heating it in a sauce pan, delivers a killer punch of baking soda into a cancer cell that renders it so alkaline that it dies. I believe strongly enough in the science behind these cures that I had already decided to fund the production of a “fireside” video that teaches about them. I assumed that at some point I would get a cancer diagnosis and be my own guinea pig. Now Lisa jumps in line in front of me… not with cancer exactly, but with a big tumor pushing on her brain! So today, on Lisa’s birthday, we went to see Dr. Tumu, the neurosurgeon – a good man who has our confidence. He understands that we are actively working to cheat him out of this job, and he is interested to see what our results will be. He will schedule her next scans, both CT and MRI, for July 21 – the day after Day 33. After that birthday fun, Jake and I took Lisa to a nice dinner at Papadeaux’s – her choice, before we came home and accidentally crashed much earlier than planned. Birthday massage and proper celebration to resume tomorrow! I am WAY past Jake’s word limit, but it’s her birthday so screw the rules! (editorial note: Until the sun rises on the next day, it is still her Birthday, and in this case she gets a 1 day extension!). I do promise to give you details about exactly what Lisa and I are doing tomorrow. I invite your comments… it will get a little lonely if it’s just me writing. Let me know if you want more detailed information about these cures, and make sure I have your preferred email address... I will forward you David’s email to me. Thank you for your prayers for Lisa, and God bless!!! A few days before I was scheduled to return from Thailand, Lisa was scheduled for a brain scan. I’m on the other side of the planet. I didn’t ask, and she didn’t tell. I landed at around midnight Wednesday night – a week ago now. At around noon on Thursday, I woke her up and asked. The mystery is solved. Earth shaking news. But Lisa and I, our kids and her parents, all of us that love her so dearly and miss her so much… we all take this as good news. There is now finally a concrete path forward to getting our Lisa back intact, with her old lust for life. Personally, that flooding light of hope feels like a rebirth. I thank God for that. Symptoms of this kind of tumor commonly mirror those of depression, and this also explains her loss of the sense of smell. The recommendation is for a frontal craniotomy (yes, you’ve seen those words in writing from me before – recall that Zac had a frontal craniotomy to repair damage from his bike crash about eight years ago… hopefully there is a two frontal craniotomy per family limit in the rule book) to remove the tumor. Removal of the tumor will relieve the pressure on her brain and should reverse all of her symptoms. The one exception is that the doctors believe her loss of the sense of smell will be permanent. But living with me, that may be a blessing. But there is more to the story… God is always throwing us across one another’s path at seemingly random, but in retrospect at perfectly orchestrated times. He has recently thrown across our path both people and information that now feel fundamental to this story. These all point to an alternative attack on the tumor that Lisa and I believe has a chance of eliminating the need for her skull to be opened. Lisa slept in today and isn’t in a writing mood at the moment, so she’s asked me to do the deed. She just made us a follow up appointment with Dr. Tumu, the neurosurgeon, so that I can meet him and we can discuss Lisa’s options and our questions. The appointment is at 2pm this Thursday June 22 - Lisa’s birthday. Ain’t life funny? So to continue bringing you up to date… Things came to a head a little over a month ago, shortly before I was scheduled to leave for a three and a half week trip to Thailand. After taking a six month sabbatical and then returning to work for a few weeks, Lisa was asked by the management of our engineering firm to take an indefinite medical leave. Her behavior at the office was too erratic, and she was too unreliable, for her to have a continued daily presence there. The news put me into a tailspin on one hand, but also cast a ray of hope. I had become convinced that her infuriating behavior toward me was because I had lost her love; that I was stuck in a dead marriage to which I have committed myself… until death do us part. Those words had started to make death even less scary. But now I was hearing that the problem with Lisa wasn’t just me… something more fundamental was going on. The day I received the call from the firm management, I made an appointment with Dr. Michael Breen, our longtime friend and Lisa’s Ob-Gyn. Michael listened carefully, scheduled additional blood tests and a brain scan, and referred us to two more specialists. One has a practice that focuses on menopause related depression – a common condition and the apparent top candidate for Lisa’s transformation. The other referral was to Dr. Ed Peters, because of his genius and his problem solving skills. Michael assured Lisa and I that we would get to the bottom of this, figure out what is going on, and get back the Lisa we all know and love. A little background: over a period of years, and particularly over the last 12 months, the Lisa that I married, the woman who Elise, Zac and Jake love so dearly, has been all but lost to us. The vibrant, brilliant, energetic, hard working, hard playing Lisa has morphed into another being. She became unresponsive, dull witted, unreliable, sluggish. The woman whose biggest fault had been that she hit the ground running at the crack of dawn now lays in bed all day. I’ve gone into a deepening state of shock over the last few years. David and Lisa, the perfect couple… in a dead end marriage. I never imagined my life turning out like this. I’ve found myself telling Lisa that I didn’t recognize her anymore. I tried and tried to talk with her, but she would never respond. I recently told a very dear friend, one that has recently entered our life but has spent lots of time with Lisa, that she has never met the woman I married. Yesterday I told Lisa that the name of the book about this experience will be “Absent Without Leaving”, and she laughed. When she began her sabbatical, we believed that it was primarily a time needed to get Lisa’s thyroid levels back in balance. After taking synthroid for over twenty years, she had made the ill-formed decision to stop taking her thyroid pills – just to see if she really needed them or not. Turns out she did. Her TSH levels went off the charts. She complained of a mental fog. I drove her to the endocrinologist appointments and to pick up her new prescription. We got her TSH levels in balance, but her symptoms remained. No energy… sleeping all day. Curiously, one of those symptoms is that over the last few years she has lost her sense of smell. Our second editor, Jake was quick to share the lesson he was taught in middle school that blog posts need to be kept short, so more tomorrow... You owe Jake one! Our first editor, Lisa, is scheduled to write tomorrow's post if she feels up to it. Please keep the prayers coming! I have a story to tell you. The story is true, and it’s mine: as in me and my other half, with the emphasis on the better half. The story is much more about Lisa than me. The funny thing about this particular story is that I don’t know yet how it ends. In a way it begins today… Father’s Day – June 18, 2017. Let’s call this Day 1. It will end symbolically on Day 33, but in fact it will continue on in directions and for a duration that we have no way of knowing. I feel like God wants me to write it down as it happens – the result being that you’re now along for the ride. This is not a creative writing exercise; it’s my tool for letting you know what’s going on and for keeping you informed as our story unfolds. I hope that it will keep you reading when I tell you this: Lisa and I are in very real need of your prayers today, and on each day after until the story is fully told. Here is what you need to know: in the frontal lobe of Lisa’s brain there is a massive meningioma – 6 x 5.5 x 4.5 cm – a slow developing and almost surely benign tumor that the doctors believe has been growing for decades. It is putting pressure on her brain. The prognosis is good. Lisa can have a high expectation of a return to life as normal within six months after surgery. The doctors assure us that there is no rush to do the surgery. So today is the first of 33 days of an alternative therapy plan that Lisa and I have discussed and agreed upon with the kids, and that I will describe in detail in a subsequent post. After 33 days, we’ll do another scan, evaluate our results, and pray for guidance. We want you to know what we’re doing and why. We welcome your input, especially if you feel like God wants you to give it. Lisa has just told me that it’s time for my Father’s Day massage, so I’m gone! Until tomorrow, please keep Lisa in your prayers. That is the most important part of the plan. Pray but don't worry... it's all going to be good! |
AuthorWritten by David, with review and approval by Lisa before posting Archives
January 2018
Categories |