"Rocks inside me"

This is Lisa. I'm writing this from the hospital on a sunny Sunday afternoon - but that's not where it all started...

Our plans for this weekend have changed four times. I won't be tedious by recording all the iteneraries we went through. The third rendition of the plans was basically this: Ben and Lisa stay in Denver for the weekend then Lisa goes skiing with friends on Monday.

The fourth rendition is how it actually happened. Our friends the Roarks were able to go with us on Saturday, and we drove up into the mountains West of Denver. We explored Idaho Springs, ate at Beau-jos, then headed back towards Golden. The drives were beautiful, our friend's dog behaved and we laughed much. As we were starting to walk around Golden, Ben's energy ran out. We said goodbye to Chris and LaChanda and headed towards our hotel.

This is where things got strange. We went out to eat at an anonymus restaurant in downtown Denver. It was packed, but the service was fairly good and I enjoyed my entry. However, Ben didn't receive chicken on his caesar salad, and when a chickened version came it didn't have dressing. Then as I was munching on my last tostada, I discovered that half the chicken strips on that piece were raw. Pink and squishy. Well... dinner was on the house that night :)

At the hotel, Ben's gut was hurting. It kept getting worse. At 9:30pm we decided to go to the ER. In Colorado Springs. And The Brown Palace Hotel was amazing - no charge for our room, even though Ben had already showered and I had drank the tea. What a blessing! Poor Ben having to ride an hour in pain, but I'm glad we didn't stay in Denver.

After the typical 5 hours in the North Memorial ER, we learned that Ben has a large gallstone. The doctor there told us that Ben would most likely have a minor surgery to remove the gall bladder in the next couple days and sent us to Memorial Central (where Ben receives his chemo) to be checked in. As LaChanda said "Ben can't catch a break, can he?"

I went home to sleep from 5:45am-12:45pm (and check on a peevish bird) and returned to find out that there might not be an operation. For Ben's condition, the laproscopic procedure wouldn't work - he'll need a full-scale incision, which would necessitate some recovery time. Sometimes gallstones will shrink on their own, so possibly we could just keep an eye on it.

Right now Ben is severely sleep-deprived, but other than that he's really feeling okay. We're praying for a wise decision - it would be great if the gallstone shrinks on its own! By the way, it's definitely not a tumor. If it were, it would have showed up on the PET scan from earlier this week, glowing as it consumed sugar. My guess is Ben developed the gallstone because of quick weight loss - that's one of the potential causes.

And no skiing for me this year. I've been trying to go since we moved to Colorado but something always comes up. I'm beginning to appreciate the irony of being a skiier, living in Colorado, who has not hit the slopes yet.

More when we hear it.

"This message has been approved by Ben"