Medical Update and House Sale - Alrica

Well, major changes in the past few weeks and we are overdue for an update. If you have been following, about the same time as the house went on the market, I went to see a doctor about swelling in my right foot. This led to a discovery of a "mass" in my right hip region that sits wedged between the bone and the main femoral artery. The compression of the veins was causing the swelling, but 3 CT scans, 3 ultrasounds, and 2 biopsies later, we still don't know for sure what it is, but we want to take it out. Our best guess is that it is an osteochondroma which is basically cartilage that grows abnormally as we grow, so it shouldn't happen to people older than 16, but perhaps the most important thing is that we are reasonably certain that it is non-malignant. So I go in for surgery on July 6 and, until then, I continue to do the twice daily blood thinner injections to reduce my risk of blood clots.

Our expectation is that the surgery will go smoothly and this problem will be completely taken care of. They expect me to be in the hospital for several days (I welcome visitors to take my mind off the boredom!) and then home on pretty serious limitations. No showering, lifting, stairs, etc. for at least two weeks. Then taking it easy. As you may know, our plan had been to be out of Lancaster by mid-July so this is obviously going to delay things - probably by about a month since air travel is forbidden until late August. If I am healing appropriately, we plan to leave Lancaster around July 26 to see friends and family here in the states. We will need to drive slowly so that I can get out and walk every two hours.

Since all of our plans for the order of our trip were based on flying in early August, we are rethinking our route. In order to lighten our load, we don't plan to take winter coats and Prague is getting pretty cold by end of October. We may end up starting in South Africa and hitting Europe later in the trip but a lot depends on how I heal.

In the meantime, we have accepted an offer on the house with a close date of July 31. Since I will be unable to help during those last few weeks, I'm trying to get everything done now. It might mean living without furniture for a bit, but that is better than expecting Erich to carry heavy furniture down the stairs by himself. Wish us luck!