Tag Archives: Dr. Rex Hoffman

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Schedule: Week of October 29-November 2, 2012

Monday [Times after 8:30am approximate – I was out of my routine & not keeping strict track] [Radiation Therapy – Day 1]:

7:30am-8:30am Drive from Home to Disney Family Cancer Center to straighten this out before my appointment at 11:30am [Meet Hubby and Mom to back me up/help me out]
8:30am-9:00am Find the CEO of St. Joseph’s Hospital – Request meeting with same – Get escorted to his office

9:00am-9:10am Throw Dr. Rex Hoffman under the bus with the CEO of the hospital at which he works
9:15am-10:15am Eat breffast w/ Mom & Hubby in the hospital cafeteria – nearly free with coupons from the hospital CEO [wasn’t that nice of him?]
10:30am-11:15am Visit with Nurse Navigator [to make sure I was still welcome in her office, since I bcc’d her on the email in this post – and I was  🙂 – nice chance to catch up] [As I’m walking across the way to the other building I see Dad driving up to join my backup posse]
11:15am-11:45am Wait for my 11:30am first radiation therapy appointment to begin [Dr. Hoffman being the only ROnc in the office today, my care will be changed to another doctor tomorrow]
11:45am-12:30pm First Radiation Therapy appt [w/ Mom, Dad and Hubby as backup]
12:30pm-2:30pm Drive Hubby to his truck [parked and left at a local Starbucks this am to save 1 parking fee at doctor’s appointment] – went w/ Hubby in his truck to a vape store so he could test some flavors [leaving my car in the very same Starbucks parking lot ‘cuz it had already been a tough day and I just wanted to be with him for now] – going back to pick up my car
2:30pm-3:30pm Drive from Starbucks to Home [with 1 stop at a local deli for chicken noodle soup w/ a dry matzo ball on the side – my soul needed it]

Awake in the middle of the night from about 2:15am-4:00am.

Tuesday [Radiation Therapy – Day 2]:

7:00am-8:00am Drive from Home to ROnc
8:00am-8:15am RTher [with Mom in tow since I was seeing the new doc this morning – I try Always to have an extra pair of ears around during doctor’s visits – countless times already someone else has heard something I did not because I get stuck on something and check out of the conversation for some period of time]
8:15am-8:35am Wait for appointment with new ROnc
8:35am-8:55am Appointment with new ROnc
9:00am-9:15am Drive from ROnc to Work
9:15am-1:00pm Work
1:00pm-2:00pm Lunch [a whole hour!  two weeks in a row!  got a couple errands done.  :)]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:50pm Drive from Work to Home [with 1 stop to pick up last minute stuff for work pot luck lunch tomorrow and to have a bowl of candy for kids trick-or-treating in the office, and 1 stop to pick up more meds]

Wednesday [Radiation Therapy – Day 3]:

7:00am-8:05am Drive from Home to RTher
8:05am-8:15am RTher
8:15am-8:35am Waiting to see ROnc [to discuss noticeable side effects Nobody led me to expect I’d have so soon – after Two treatments?!]
8:35am-8:55am ROnc appointment
9:00am-9:15am Drive from ROnc to Work
9:15am-12:30pm Work
12:30pm-2:00pm Halloween Pot Luck Lunch @ Work [& visiting with my work friend’s 18-month-old granddaughter dressed as the cutest pirate ever!]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-7:00pm Drive from Work to Home [With 3 stops on the way: (1) put gas in the car; (2) Costco – this is a kamikaze run to grab a sweater I’d already bought 2 of (in different colors) in yet a Third color! – Hm, parking lot very empty, what’s up with that?  Oh, right, Halloween – score on the empty Costco!; and (3) the pharmacy Again to pick up the Rx I dropped off last night, and drop off 2 more I got this morning to help deal with side effects of RTher.]

Woke up enough to look at the clock at 3:25am, but managed to get back to sleep without peeing, eating, reading, turning on a light, or even getting out of bed (I think)

Thursday [Radiation Therapy – Day 4]:

7:00am-7:55am Drive from Home to RTher [I actually decided to go all by myself this morning, just like a big girl – and one of my RThers asks where my Mom is and gives me grief about not bringing her with me, for her sake!  (This comes from his understandable perspective of a father with an only child.  Tomorrow I’ll gently remind him that the person at the center of our joint drama isn’t my Mom, it’s me.)  But I did tell him he’d get to see my Mom on Mondays, since Mom will join me on doctor appointment days.]
7:55am-8:05am RTher
8:05am-8:15am Did the PTher I have to do myself to deal with my side effects, and hyper-moisturize the area we’re charring each weekday to hopefully help prevent, well, peeling, weeping, and sloughing of the skin.  🙂
8:20am-8:35am Drive from RTher to Work
8:35am-1:00pm Work
1:00pm-2:00pm Lunch

So, with the start of RTher, apparently comes a new lunch schedule.  Whereas before, I was taking short lunches to make up time taken by randomly-occurring doctor’s appointments, I deliberately made the RTher appointments early enough so that most days (even if slightly delayed by traffic or some other time issue), they would Not interfere with work (I didn’t schedule them so they wouldn’t interfere with work only if timing were perfect every day – this is traffic in greater Southern California I’m dealing with after all).  But that means that most (non-ROnc/non-PTher days) I’ll get to work Early.  Therefore, most days I’ll not only get the hour lunch that used to be my norm, but even after counting the ROnc and/or PTher days when I’ll still be in late, I may even get extra-long lunches on Fridays from getting to work early and storing up some extra work time other days of the week!  We’ll have to see how that works out – or am I just being overly-optimistic now?

2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Home

Friday [Radiation Therapy – Day 5]:

7:10am-8:05am Drive from Home to RTher [With 1 stop @ Starbucks for the weekly coffee treat – yeah, it’s not my only one this week either, I know]
8:10am-8:20am Rather
8:25-8:40 Drive from RTher to Work
9:45am-1:00pm Work
1:00pm-2:00pm Lunch
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Home

Additional Tasks Accomplished This Week:

– walked at least 20 minutes each day (um, except Monday)
– blogged
– managed to carve out a whole hour for lunch at least one day
– threw my doctor under the bus and replaced him with a new her doctor
– used my hasn’t-happened-in-several-months one-hour lunch to practice some minor retail therapy
– rearranged physical therapy appointments to conform with my new doctor’s schedule, shared same with Hubby, Mom, Dad and work
– actually participated in a Holiday Party – the Halloween Pot Luck Lunch at work

Copyright Ridingthebcrollercoaster.com 2012 All Rights Reserved.

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Daily Prompt – “When was the last time you felt really, truly lonely?”

Okay, I’ll ‘fess up right away – some might think this is cheating.

And I will apologize and ask forgiveness (as I’m very new to this blogging thing and don’t yet know all the ‘rules’) if I am Completely breaking a Cardinal Rule in the name of recycling for the sake of sharing with more people.

The answer to this challenge can be found in my recent post “Dr. Rex Hoffman – Office Visit – October 22, 2012.”

I’m (re-)posting because, although I would not have described the word “lonely” when characterizing my feelings from this experience – that occurrence flashed visually through my mind the minute I read today’s Daily Prompt.  Funny how one thing doesn’t always lead to another, but the second can lead directly back to the first, eh?

Copyright Ridingthebcrollercoaster.com 2012 All rights Reserved.

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Schedule: Week of October 22-26, 2012

Monday:

7:00am-8:00am Drive from Home to ROnc
8:20am-9:10am CT Simulation for Radiation Therapy, including getting tattoos
9:10am-915am Drive from ROnc to Starbucks to get coffee
9:25am-9:40am Drive from Starbucks to Work
9:40am-1:30pm Work
1:30pm-2:00pm Lunch [Short – to make up work time stolen by medical appointments]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Home

Tuesday:

8:05am-9:15am Drive from Home to Work [With 1 stop to get gas for the car]
9:15am-1:00pm Work
1:00pm-2:00pm Lunch [Shopping at H&M – got a few good lightweight t-shirts for winter layering & 1 scarf] [Oh, and the first time I’ve taken an hour for lunch maybe since I came back to work after my surgeries on September 10, 2012.]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:50pm Drive from Work to Support Group [Jack in the Box dinner & Starbucks coffee in the car on the way]
7:00pm-8:30pm Attend Support Group
8:30pm-9:10pm Drive from Support Group to Home

Wednesday:

8:25am-9:25am Drive from Home to Work [I actually made a conscious decision this morning to accept being late to work so I could clean up my bedroom (clothes needed putting away, my bag needed to be fully unpacked from my overnight stay at Mom’s last week) – to take some time all for myself to do something I wanted to do, even if I could only steal a few minutes.]
9:00am-1:30pm Work
1:30pm-2:00pm Lunch [Short – to make up work time stolen by a few minutes of ‘me time’ this morning]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Home

Thursday:

7:10am-8:20am Drive from Home to Physical Therapy [Why can I not get my ass out of the house on time to make it to physical therapy on time?]
8:20am-9:00am Physical Therapy
9:00am-9:20am Drive from Physical Therapy to Work [Driving through Jack in the Box on the way to pick up a Platter for breakfast – OK, I’m aware I’ve now gotten fast food twice already this week, and it’s only midday Thursday.  Apparently, I’m wearing down a bit this week (well, no wonder, see “Dr. Rex Hoffman – Office Visit – October 22, 2012“) and putting healthy food in my face is something that is suffering for it.  Hopefully, I can find some energy somewhere to fix that.]
9:20am-1:30pm Work
1:30pm-2:00pm Lunch [Short – to make up work time stolen by medical appointments]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Home

Friday:

8:10am-9:15am Drive from Work to Home [With 1 stop @ Starbucks for the weekly coffee treat – don’t tell anybody it’s my third Starbucks this week!]
9:15am-1:30pm Work
1:30pm-2:00pm Lunch [Short – to make up work time stolen by medical appointments]
2:00pm-5:30pm Work
5:30pm-6:30pm Drive from Work to Costco
6:30pm-7:15pm Shopping at Costco [Including a 2nd phone call from Dr. Rex Hoffman which, after starting to feel better after posting last night and therefore looking forward to an actually relaxing weekend unlike the last one, ruined this one too, See “Dr. Rex Hoffman – Phone Call – October 26, 2012”]
7:15pm-7:30pm Drive from Costco to Home

Additional Tasks Accomplished This Week:

– walked at least 20 minutes each day
– blogged
– managed to carve out a whole hour for lunch at least one day
– used my hasn’t-happened-in-several-months one-hour lunch to practice some minor retail therapy
– cleaned up the bedroom
– wrote a scathingly honest email to Dr. Raul Mena, Medical Director of Cancer Services at Disney Family Cancer Center at Providence St. Joseph Hospital in Burbank [Hm, after going anonymously under the radar and promising pseudonyms, I’m blatantly and completely naming names all of a sudden – Please See Rule -1 and Rule 0 and “Dr. Rex Hoffman – Office Visit – October 22, 2012“]
– remembered to write & leave a check for our every-other-week housecleaners

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Dr. Rex Hoffman – Office Visit – October 22, 2012

First things first, I have No qualms at all about the level and quality of medical care Dr. Rex Hoffman of the Disney Family Cancer Center at Providence St. Joseph’s Hospital in Burbank, California provides.

But medical care and patient care are not the same thing.

Also, this is my own personal opinion of my own personal experience including quotations from conversations I, myself, participated in (which, in accordance with California law – were Not recorded, so my quotations are recollections to the best of my ability).

I absolutely allow for the fact that other people may have other experiences with this doctor, and in fact, fervently hope they do!

And now on to my visit with Dr. Rex Hoffman at 8:00am this past Monday October 22, 2012, which has so far (midday Thursday as I begin this blog post and finished it Friday midday) colored my Entire week, as told through my email to the Medical Director for Cancer Services of the same medical facility:

Dr. Mena Attachment A:

“What Part of ‘I Work For a Living – Because I Have To’ is Unclear?“

Dr. Mena Attachment B:

Dr. Mena Attachment C:

So, after finally finishing writing, and sending, the email to Dr. Mena – I felt better.

It wasn’t just the writing, but the actual sending, that let me release at least some of what I had been holding on to all week.

We’ll see what this weekend feels like and what I decide to do on Monday – show up for treatment (of course it just so happens that Dr. Hoffman will be at a national conference in Boston when I begin my treatment on Monday – and I would not have known this if I hadn’t made a stink this week – but it’s a bit tough to be there to enforce the policy when he’s 3000 miles away – hehehe), or punt and start from scratch to find somewhere else to have the treatment.  I’ll let you know next week.