The left vocal chord is still not moving so he scheduled Gator to get the same procedure done (3rd time’s a charm!) on St. Patrick’s Day! The doctor said they were supposed to inject the Symetra in between the vocal chord and the muscle and they got it on the outside of the muscle so the chord slipped down and it stopped working after only a day. He set up the appointment for the procedure right away…..here we go again! We are getting so frustrated with these people; they just don’t seem very competent! Well the procedure is scheduled for a lucky day anyway maybe that’ll help! We need all the help we can get….
3-09-09
We stayed in Tukwila tonight again. I worked on labeling 50 CD’s that a guy wanted done right away and Gator slept!
3-10-09
We arrived at the Seattle VA at 7am. Gator got his pre-op stuff all done and then he went to an appointment at the speech department at 11am. The gal there gave him some exercises to do to strengthen his left vocal chord and that was about it!
Gator with Speach Therapist
We had lunch at the canteen and then went to see Dr. Grim at 1:30. I have been so worried about this appointment because he was going to tell us the results on the CT scan and I had to ask him if the fluid on his lung that they’ve been watching could possibly be cancer. The Doctor said NO! Whew! Just had to ask….we decided to go home instead of staying at the motel. The next time we come up here it will be on St. Patrick’s day and Gator WILL get his voice back! On the way home we stopped by Costco and ran into Mike Palms step sister Karen James. She said she wanted to meet up with us because she has some stuff called “Xango” that she wants Gator to drink. I guess it’s supposed to be some miracle drink. If it doesn’t taste bad he said he’ll try it. At this point we’re willing to try anything within reason, and this drink has mango, strawberry, grape…and a whole bunch of other juices in it and nothing else so why not?
3-16-09
We arrived at the extended stay motel at about 3:30pm. Samuel, the guy at the front desk is from Scotland and seems to have taken a liking to us! He checked us into the deluxe room, he’s done that the last couple of times he was here. That’s pretty cool… We went through 2 snowstorms and 1 traffic jam to get here. I made some BBQ chicken at home and we brought it with us along with some instant taters. Yum Yum….. I brought my face paints with me so I could paint a leprechaun on Gator’s forehead before the surgery.
