Weekend Recap: July 25-27

A couple of liver related items before we get to the photo show from the weekend.

Derek had labs done last week on Monday and Wednesday because of a little miscommunication. On Wednesday, you may recall, his bilirubin was 4.2 and they told us to chill out about it, plus upped his ursodiol to see if that would get the ‘sludge’ in his bile ducts to make their way out. On Friday he got the results from the lab that drew blood in Manchester on Monday and his bilirubin was 2.5. The lesson here is that Bill & Rubin are indeed constantly in flux, and maybe we really should just chill out about it.

Also on Friday, I got a call from my nurse who had the results of my liver volume scan from my MRI last Wednesday. Prior to having 60% of my liver lopped off, my liver volume was: 1132. After about 3 months of growth, my liver is now: 981.99! That means that my little liver is back up to 86.7% of its optimal size. Pretty good! That’s at the high end of the scale according to the doctor. Here’s the super crazy thing about livers: they know when to stop growing. For example, if they do a live donor transplant in a kid and they end up giving him/her a bit too much liver to start out with, say somewhere in the neighborhood of 120% of their original volume, the 20% that isn’t needed will shrink down and THEN, grow as the kid grows. We had this conversation because Derek asked if anyone’s liver has ever grown back to more than 100% and the answer is no. It is pre-programmed or hard-wired to be what it needs to be. The doctor said if we could figure out how it works we’d win the Nobel prize.

The liver continues to delight and amaze me.

Now then, the weekend. Derek figured out that Sunapee was opening its summit chair for the weekend and one way trips were only $5, so we headed north. We debated whether we should hike up and ride down or vice versa. Ever the voice of reason, I said we should ride up and hike down. We’re both pretty glad I made that choice. The trip down was still a good workout and the woman we saw hoofing it up the mountain looked pretty miserable.

Sunday I was a lazy slug and Derek did some yard work. I went out to check on our flower garden and went a little crazy with the photo taking. Usually we plant a tomato garden, but what with Livernalia happening smack dab in the middle of planting season, we decided to plant some wild flowers and see what would come up. Derek’s mom kindly helped us plant some bulbs too which are definitely chugging along, but this last week all the wildflowers have been popping. Enjoy!