Archive for "Health"
West YMCA and Zumba Update
Posted on August 25, 2025 by Ching under Health, Zumba.
It’s been a while since I posted about Zumba. I’m still teaching classes. Currently in my 13th year in the Zumba Instructor Network (ZIN). However, I’m only teaching one class a week right now. It’s at West YMCA on Wednesdays at 6:30 PM. The time slot works perfectly for me because Wednesday night is when beginner open play is at West YMCA so I can invite my friends who are new to pickleball to come for beginner open play at 5:00 PM and join me for Zumba at 6:30 PM. When I rejoined the YMCA group exercise team a couple of years ago (because I quit the Y for a while – well, technically I didn’t quit – when they laid everyone off during COVID, I didn’t didn’t return like many others did because I was super into pickleball at that time and I didn’t want to be too busy to play), that was the time slot that was available. Things just kind of lined up with the pickleball schedule because it was meant to be. LOL.
Incidentally, I get a break from my Zumba class this week because they are refinishing the studio floors. Our Group Ex Coordinator at West, Sheila, offered to let me teach in the Pickle Center (old basketball gym that is now being used for full-time pickleball) or the turf, but I passed. The pickleball floors in the Pickle Center and the turf are not idea for all the twisting and turning that happens in Zumba so I decided to the much-needed break.
Here’s the group exercise schedule at the West YMCA this week for those who, unlike me, DO NOT want to take a break:
Speaking of West YMCA, I actually have the best parking this year. I had the winning bid for it in the silent auction last year so I get to enjoy this awesome parking until June 30, 2026. I didn’t realize they put my sign up until I went back to teach class after our cruise. Since I’m really only at the West YMCA on Wednesday evenings, I told my friends they could use my parking on the other days. Although, I don’t really know that anyone has taken me up on this offer.
I extended the same offer to anyone subbing my class, on days that I can’t teach. Obviously, I’m not going to be there and won’t need my parking spot. LOL.
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April Was a Big Month
Posted on June 15, 2025 by Ching under Health, Things to Do.
In addition to all the things that happened in April, the biggest of them all being Brian finally getting his feeding tube removed, we also got to do some fun things like check out the new Glass in Flight 2 exhibit at Botanica.
The Glass in Flight 2 exhibit ends July 30 so be sure to stop by Botanica before it leaves. The exhibit is included with your park admission which is just $12 for adults. Brian and I plan to go back next month after we return from our trip. If you’ve been, let us know what you think in the comments.
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The Trips You Don’t Plan On Taking
Posted on January 23, 2025 by Ching under Health, Life.
We had two exciting trips to the ER this week. About 10-15 years ago we made a few trips to the ER because of my health issues. This time it was Brian’s turn. Kansas Medical Center (KMC) is our “go to” ER hospital. My first experience with KMC was when I fainted while enjoying our anniversary dinner at YaYa’s in 2011. That’s where the ambulance took me. We’ve been going there ever since.
Now that I know it’s there, that’s where we go any time we have some kind of health emergency because it’s relatively close to our house and it’s on the East side (our preferred side of town).
Since Monday was a holiday, I took advantage of my day off to go with Brian to his IV hydration appointment. We had a nice leisurely day and we just hung out at home and watched a movie the rest of the afternoon. After watching Back In Action together, Brian decided he would go lay down in the bedroom because he was tired and not feeling great. Before he went to the bedroom, I asked him several times if we should call the doctor and ask for advice. He told me no and that he was just going to lay down and try to sleep it off. It was still early so I decided to watch Emilia Perez. About the time my movie is over, he comes back out and he’s still not feeling good. It’s around 8-ish so probably too late to call the doctor. I don’t know what to do so I suggest we go to the ER and get him checked out.
We arrived at the ER around 8:30 pm on Monday evening. He explained everything to the ER doctor (Rundell-Little). They do a CT scan of his abdomen and we had to wait a long time for the results. The tech who can read these leaves at 5 pm so they have to send it to another location for review. Depending on how busy the hospital is, it could take a while to get results back. Anyway, we finally got the results back and there was nothing wrong with his abdomen. Feeding tube area looked good. Doctor did note that he had stool that he needed to move (read: poop out) and that was likely causing the discomfort. While we were there waiting, Brian hacked up a bunch of mucus build up and expelling that stuff seemed to make him feel better. The congestion was probably contributing to the pain he was feeling so, not thinking anything more of it, we were released from the ER (with instructions for Brian to have a bowel movement) and got home around midnight.
Honestly, I don’t think I would have been as insistent about going to the ER if not for Brian’s blood clot that was diagnosed last week. He’s on Eliquis for it but blood clots can cause all sorts of problems including a stroke. I didn’t want to go to bed and wake up to something bad happening to Brian. He was in a lot of pain so he wasn’t going to be able to sleep either. We had to go to the ER to get a professional opinion. If anything, it gave me piece of mind that there was nothing seriously wrong with him so I could at least sleep easier (albeit not as long because we were up until midnight and I had work the next day).
Brian has been working from home a lot so he worked from home on Tuesday. I normally work in the office Tuesday through Thursday so I went to work as normal on Tuesday but checked on him throughout the day. On the way home I picked up some more Pedialyte for him because the doctor recommended he drink it instead of just plain water. I guess he still didn’t have a bowel movement on Tuesday. At this point it’s been over a month, nearly two, since his last poop.
Wednesday I go to work as normal. Called him around 10 am to make sure he was up and feeding and taking his medication. Here’s the how the rest of that morning went according to Brian. Around noon, he starts to get around because he was going to drop off a package for me at the post office. As he is leaving, he feels the urge to poop. So then he goes to the bathroom but he has been super constipated because of the chemo so he can’t poop. He tries for two hours and he didn’t call me because he didn’t want to bother me at work. Around 2-ish he sends me the following text: I’m sorry to bother. I’m in trouble.
I immediately call him to figure out what’s going on. He tells me he is in so much pain from trying to poop and he is cramping so bad that his right hand is in a fist and he cannot open it. He is afraid he is going to pass out. Not wanting an Elvis situation, I tell him I’m coming home to take him to the ER. I rush home and we make it to the ER around 2:45 pm. I contacted Sheila Hodson (my group exercise coordinator at the West YMCA) to tell her I put my 6:30 pm Zumba class on the sub board because I wasn’t sure how long we would be there. I tried to look for someone to sub and posted in the Zumba messenger chat but its too short notice and everyone teaches classes at different locations at the same time. Anyway, my thought was I did bring my Zumba clothes to work that day so I had them with me. Worst case scenario, I would drive from KMC to the West Y, teach my class, and then come back. If Brian got released before I got back, then he could get a ride home from his cousin Zach Hyatt who lives down the street. Sheila was super understanding and encouraged me to stay with Brian. She reassured me that, if we could not find a sub, we could just cancel class. I really appreciated it because, while I would have done it, that was a lot of driving back and forth from Andover to the West side of town. And, there’s no way I could have taught class last night because we did not get released until almost 9 pm.
At the ER, they did an x-ray of Brian’s stomach and confirmed fecal impaction. I have heard of this happening to people but have never experienced it personally. Well, we can now cross this off the list because I now have almost first hand knowledge of what this is like. Brian said many times, he felt like he was going to die. He felt so much pain every time he tried to poop and he had really bad cramping all over his body (including his legs and his right fist not wanting to open). The was no way he could move this stool without assistance.
I only took one photo last night (the one below) because I felt so bad for him. He was writhing in pain.
First the nurse gave him an enema and let it sit for 30-40 minutes to see if it would trigger some pooping action. Brian tried but only expelled the enema liquid and no poop. A little bit later, she have him a bigger enema — 1 whole liter of soapy water solution. She let that sit for a while and then had Brian try to poop again. Once again, Brian expelled the enema liquid but no poop. In the meantime, it smelled god-awful in that exam room. I was like, “Are you sure there is no poop coming out because it sure smells like it?”
Anyway, since the enemas were not working, the nurse decided it was time to go “digital” — yes, friends, she was going to dig it out of him. OMG. I cannot imagine. She was probably wondering how she got the short straw and hoping that she had called in sick to work that day. She was a good sport thought. At one point, we rang for her and another nurse came. We thought she gave up and ran away but she was just busy with other patients. The doc on duty (Tucker) did warn us that they are a very busy emergency room.
Nurse Shawna came back to check on us and asked Brian why he didn’t want X (I can’t remember the other nurse’s name) to do “the thing” (read: dig the poop out of his ass). Brian was like, “She has big fingers.” I could not stop laughing. As tiny as nurse Shawna’s fingers are, it was still super painful for Brian. He screamed every time. She would get some of it out before he couldn’t take anymore and they’d have to take a break. She would leave, come back, and they would try again. This pattern repeated 2-3 times and she would get little bits out each time. And then around 7 pm, I had to go home and take care of Saki. She had not been fed as we’d been at the ER since 3 pm that afternoon.
When I returned, it was pretty much done. Brian said I missed the most horrible and gross parts. They gave him another enema (third time’s the charm) while I was gone. I guess whatever the nurse was doing loosened it up enough to where the enema actually worked. Shit was gushing out of him. The nurse asked him if he wanted to move to the toilet but he couldn’t stop it. She could barely keep up with replacing one poop pad after another. It sounded disgusting and I’m glad I wasn’t in the room for that part. By the time I got back, they had him mostly cleaned up. He said his stomach was feeling burbly. I encouraged him to try and poop before we leave. I really didn’t want him feeling like has to poop on the drive home or, worse, poop in the car. This last attempt was a success. He managed to poop the rest of the nearly two months worth of shit in his colon out. I could tell that he felt better after that. Imagine having two months worth of poop in your belly. I actually think he’s down to 130 pounds after. It was a crap ton – literally.
We were discharged at 8:40 pm and home by 9-ish. I helped him get in the shower – he needed it! Anyway, we are going to have to stay on top of this poop thing, in additional to all the other things. This whole cancer journey has been quite a ride. For the first time ever we actually completely tapped out our HSA account. As in, there’s no more money in it. Not sure if it will have been replenished in time for when these ER bills come due but we will cross that bridge when we get there. I’m just really grateful that Brian is okay and we are finally past this poop thing.
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Hurrah for Modern Medicine and Great Friends
Posted on January 5, 2025 by Ching under Health, Life.
With Cindy and Ed Egan, and Lou and Kory Parkhurst at Deano’s East.
When we first got Brian’s diagnosis, our friend Cindy told us that she has another friend who went through the exact same thing about ten years ago. We both agreed that it would be great to meet this couple and kind of hear about their experience, etc. Cindy arranged the dinner and we were actually supposed to meet at Wine Dive, closer to where the Parkhursts’ live, but Cindy had a crazy busy weekend (both she and Ed had pickleball tournaments that day) and so we had a last minute location change to Deano’s to be closer to the Egans’.
The funny part is we were just at Deano’s West the night before with some friends because I wanted to check out the fancy new location. Everything is the same food/drink menu-wise, the only difference because the new West side location is on a lake so if you’re out on the patio then you have better views. Nonetheless, the food didn’t matter to us. We were anxious to meet Kory and Lou and hear about their journey, how they got through it, and get their advice.
It was super helpful meeting Kory and Lou. Seeing Kory, looking happy and healthy 10 years later, really lifted our spirits. All the doctors were very positive that Brian would get through this okay but you don’t really know. Meeting someone who has gone through the very thing that you’re suffering from, and getting their insights was completely invaluable. I am beyond grateful to Cindy for making this dinner happen, which was the night before Brian’s first radiation treatment.
Kory’s cancer was nearly identical to Brian’s. His was further along and he also had his feeding tube installed before treatments began. Because he is a slender guy to begin with, their doctors determined that he couldn’t afford to lose any weight at all. Whereas with Brian, we were hopeful that he wouldn’t need a feeding tube at all. Wishful thinking on our part because once Brian hit 150 lbs, we were like, okay now we need to do something because he can’t lose anymore weight. In hindsight, we should have listened to Dr. Chris Dakhil and had the feeding tube installed early. You may or may not need it but it’s there if you do. It’ll help keep your nutrition up which is important because it’s hard to fight the good fight when you have zero energy. Which is what Brian’s going through now. He has zero energy to do anything. He is fatigued and tired all the time and all he wants to do is sleep.
We thought that we would not have any problems getting the feeding tube installed halfway through but we failed to take the holidays into account. By the time we decided to pull the trigger on the feeding tube, we had run into Christmas and New Year, and Dr. Imad Nassif only does these surgeries on Wednesdays so the first available date was January 8. You live and you learn. We know now but hoping we don’t have to use this knowledge ever again.
Anyway, it’s amazing to me how far we’ve come. It used to be getting diagnosed with cancer was a death sentence. I suppose a lot of it depends on the kind of cancer you have and how far along it has progressed unchecked. But, as unfortunate as it is for Brian to have gotten cancer, he is at least fortunate enough to have the kind that can be treated. We are meeting more and more cancer survivors which makes me think modern medicine has advanced enough that more and more people are winning the battle. We are hopeful that Brian will get through this just as Kory has and this will all be a faint memory a decade from now.
Here’s a picture of the two Deano’s locations for comparison:
This is a picture of the front of the OG Deano’s where we had dinner with the Parkhursts and Egans on Sunday night. It’s located at Cambridge Market, which is actually around the corner from Quarters at Cambridge where Brian and I used to live over 10 years ago.
This is a picture of the front of the new West location where we had dinner with other friends the previous night.
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Brian’s Health Journey
Posted on December 4, 2024 by Ching under Health.
Where to begin? I guess let’s start from the very beginning. Earlier this year Brian was having some dental issues. These issues were partly because of poor dental hygiene and taking things for granted. After at least three root canals, the endodontist decided Brian needed to see an oral surgeon to get a cyst removed from the front of his mouth. He originally had oral surgery scheduled shortly after our Colorado trip but the week that he was to have surgery he was suffering sore throat due to some kind of tonsil infection.
Brian’s oral surgeon, Dr. Christopher Harris, determined that the oral surgery should be postponed until Brian had his throat and tonsil issues looked at. The concern was that if they were to proceed with surgery the infection from the tonsil could infect the surgery area. So then Brian went to see Dr. Aaron Thiessen, an ear, nose, and throat specialist, about his issues. Brian ended up taking antibiotics which didn’t really do much so he and Dr. Thiessen agreed that the best course of action would be to simply remove his tonsils. Brian’s tonsillectomy was then scheduled for Thursday, October 3. However, the doctor noticed that Brian’s lymph node was swollen so, as a precautionary measure, he also scheduled a lymph node biopsy on September 30. This was the Monday before the tonsil surgery.
Brian’s lymph node biopsy revealed cancer. The ENT doc theorized that the cancer in Brian’s lymph node probably came from his infected tonsil but needed to confirm this. Instead of doing a tonsillectomy that following Thursday, Dr. Thiessen changed the procedure to a laryngoscopy and tonsil biopsy.
The biggest reason for not moving forward with the tonsillectomy being that, if the cancer needed to be treated, the doctor did not want treatment to be delayed by the post-tonsillectomy recovery. At the point, the greater priority would be to treat the cancer as quickly as possible.
Here are some pics of Brian I took during surgery day — actually it was laryngoscopy and tonsil biopsy day.
The following week it was confirmed that Brian did in fact have cancer in his tonsil which has spread to his lymph node. The next step was to complete a PET scan to find if the cancer had spread to other parts of his body. In the meantime, there was the matter of the cyst in his mouth that still needed to be removed. There was a delay in PET scans and he couldn’t get an appointment until October 24 and he couldn’t start any cancer treatments until the PET scan was done so we figured that he would have enough time to go through the oral surgery and recover from it before cancer treatments would begin. Otherwise, then he would have to wait until sometime the following year to do oral surgery because it wouldn’t be idea to do it in the middle of cancer treatments. It basically had to be done now or it would have to wait until the following year.
We chose the NOW option and, thankfully, one of our friends just happens to be the godmother of Brian’s oral surgeon. She pulled some strings and they were able to get him in right away. Speaking of which, what we thought was a cyst was actually not a cyst. It turned out to be a massive dental infection that had gotten so bad that it started to form a cyst-like substance in Brian’s mouth.
Because of Brian’s cancer diagnosis, we thought he would be in the middle cancer treatments (radiation and chemo) during the Mexico trip so we ended up canceling his flight (more on this later). However, due to delays with insurance approvals, Brian’s cancer treatments actually didn’t begin until a couple of week ago — after I got back from Mexico — so he totally could have gone on the trip.
Brian’s treatment consists of 35 days of daily (Monday through Friday) radiation treatments spread over 8 weeks and weekly chemotherapy over 6 weeks. Radiation would only have been 7 weeks but due to skipping treatments on the holidays — Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Christmas, and New Year’s Day — it comes out to 8 weeks total. His last radiation treatment is on January 9 and his last chemo treatment is on January 2.
I went with Brian to his first radiation appointment and got this video:
So far, to date, Brian has completed two chemo treatments (just four left to go) and is two and a half weeks into radiation. He is doing well so far but the radiation is definitely starting to take a toll. We have been posting updates on our Flip + Ching Facebook page so feel free to follow us there if you want to keep up with his progess.
In the meantime, we are super grateful for everyone’s support and prayers. Brian is lucky to have such wonderful people who care about him wishing him well and praying for his recovery. Thank you all!
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