Wednesday, August 30, 2006

The Passing of A Friend






Wed Aug 30th, 2006


This afternoon, my friend, and Alex's girlfriend's Mom, Wendy Olson passed away.

Many of you who have been reading this post for many months know I have a close connection to the Lung Transplant Unit at Toronto General Hospital.

Wendy is my reason for this affinity.
On March 1st 2004 Wendy came to live with our family while she awaited her double lung transplant.
After 9 years of suffering from Pulminary Fibrosis, as a result of an allergic reaction to penicillin which had deteriorated her lung function she was qualified for a lung transplant.
She had never smoked or lived or worked in a contaminated area, and she did not have a negative lifestyle.

Wendy represents any one of us who consider ourselves to be living a risk-free life.
One allergic reaction can change your life forever.

On June the 4th, 2004 we got our call from TG transplant team, and lungs were there for Wendy. Funny thing....that morning I had heard a 13 yr old girl was hit by a train in Toronto, and hung on for a while.......
We never knew if this girl was her donor or not.

All I do know is that night we sat in the hospital going through all of the steps and tests to prep for surgery, and we heard the specialists speaking to all the patients in the prep area. The donor had a good liver, two kidneys, good lungs and a heart to give life to at least 5 dying people. Five lives were saved in that 24hr period. One victom did not pass away in vain.

Today I remember Wendy who did not pass away in vain either. Wendy volunteered herself to be a human experiment so future sufferers will have less drama to their recovery.
Wendy was strong. I remember her as a dedicated mother and a great friend. She loved crafts and she loved to read. She was house proud and did alot of work to help her children advance in school. She did alot of reading of text books through the years to help her daughters understand things they may not have picked up in the classroom.

Wendy was so funny. She had a great way of telling a story. She was very high on her trivia scale. Meaning she knew alot of information.

These last couple of years have been up and down for Wendy in her recovery. The auto-immune component to her disease played havoc with her body because of the anti rejection meds she needed to take. It is certain in my mind, that the Dr's learned alot from Wendy's reactions to medication, and it forced them to create new protocols for post operative investigations and treatment.

Alot of good came out of Wendy's transplant too. For quite a few months Wendy felt very well. She didnt have quite the energy she dreamed she would have, but she got to travel, and she worked on helping plan her daughter's wedding. She wanted to see her daughter marry, and she did.

Wendy wanted to see her younger daughter Amber (Alex's girlfriend) graduate highschool. She was in recovery when her daughter graduated highschool, but it was video taped for her to see when she was strong. She got to see Amber receive scholarships in Forensics three years in a row.

Wendy got to travel to BC on a plane and see relatives and tour around our most Western Province, which was a dream.

These last months were not so good.
12 yrs of having to take prednizone for the auto-immune component of her ills played havoc with her body. Wendy was showing signs of renal deterioration. Wendy was still strong. She told me in her last hospital stay at TG that she would do it all again if the opportunity came up. Those extra very well months were worth it all!

Even when Wendy's lung function had a 25% loss she was still strong. She had a deep will to live. Her body faught hard to survive. Pneumonia, and digestive ailments did not deter her from trying to live. She wanted to live to have more experiences with her family.

I have never seen a woman so determined to control life and death than Wendy. She would will her body to make it through a holiday, or recover just enough to get to go home from the hospital at the time the family was starting to fatigue. Wendy was in control. She tried her best to stay with her family this summer to have her last times with everyone around. At a time that would not interfere with school studies, and when University was about to start, Wendy allowed herself to let go, as not to put her youngest daughter through the strain of travel back and forth from an away school, and effect her studies.

In most circumstances a patient would not survive a week after being taken off their support systems, yet Wendy did. Alex feels she did that so Alex could get back from Vigilent Guardian to be with Amber through the end.

This is a remark on the unselfish and thoughtfulness of Wendy.

Wendy You Are Like My Sister.
We Will Miss You Very Much!


Click on the photo of Amber and Wendy to see Slideshow of Wendy Olson's journey from transplant list to surgery.





My Previous Transplant Stories


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The Most Wonderful Hug of Love
(Wordless Wednesday)













Wordless Wednesday












Monday, August 28, 2006

Oh cruddy day!


I am just touching base.
I have had an overwhelming day.

Alex and Carl arrived home on Sunday, from Vigilant Guardian.
Alex planned to go back to Peterborough today.

Sunday night Amber phoned and said her Mom was in a coma. Wendy had been taken off all her meds and her feeding tube last Tuesday. Only for her heart being so strong, has she survived till today.

So Alex had to go crazy today because instead of heading back to his apartment to prepare this week to go back to school, he had to drop off all his stuff at the apartment, plus pick up some clothes for Amber, and then drive to Ottawa.

Carl and I decided to go in our other car to help Alex unload at his apartement only to undertake a second long drive which will be 31/2 hours from Peterborough to Ottawa.

So today Carl, Me and Alex had to cram a weeks worth of stuff into one day.

Here is the rundown:

1)cancel student loan appmt at bank for next Saturday and get it for 10AM this morning.
2)goto Walmart-out of toilet paper
3)Al goes to Futureshop with new student loan to buy laptop computer for course.
4)Pack cars with all Al's computer stuff, army gear, books, clothes, and some cheap food that was on sale at Walmart.
5)drive 2 hrs to Peterborough in two cars.
6)Arrive at Peterborough apartment only to find College did not send orientation package.
7)rush to college to make inquiries, wait in line for 1/2 hr, get orientation package and connection # just in case Al cannot attend first day because of a death
8)go back to apartment in Peterborough to seek out superintendant to deal with two pr0perty issues
9)go eat at Swiss Chalet, phone Amber, and Wendy is still alive
10) we had 2 hrs drive back to Newmarket, Al heads out 3 hrs drive in other direction to go to Ottawa

Al was stressed. Basically his future Mother-in-law will pass away in the next days, and school is unorganized for both he and Amber. And his new job contract requires him to take his laptop to Ottawa so he can work between the funeral arrangements.

No hugs from us are big enough to cope with all this he and Amber will endure.

Sunday, August 27, 2006

Green Thumb Sunday
My Father, Richard Has Contributed For This Page.

He is very proud of his garden this year.
He is not a blogger, but he reads and views, our blogrolls.




















Double Impatience Impatiens glandulifera




Multi-colour Rose of Sharon




Cleome


Saturday, August 26, 2006

Blue
Grumpy Blue after the Icing went to Pot!
No Odds......The cake is beautiful!
" Daaa, Dum, De, Dum, Dum, Dum, dum
Dum, Diddy, Da, Di, Dum"
"Hear Comes the Bride!"





PSHunt
Grab the Scavenger Hunt code.
Photo Theme. Join the blogroll. Visit participants.




(click on any photo to make it larger, and back page to come back to the blog)












I am so proud of myself!






Tuesday, August 22, 2006



See Comments for explanation:

ZOOM!
ZOOM!

ZOOM!

ZOOM!
If you click on the names on the list below you can see their Wordless Wednesday pictures!

Live in Tennessee?









Vigilant Guardian

(All underlined words are links. Backpage out of the link to return to the blog)

This month is the big training exercise for the Canadian Military. The exercise takes place at CFB Petawawa, Ontario.

All of the Canadian Reserve units still located in Canada, a good number of our Regular Forces, and invited International Forces take place in the exercise.











In the past this exercise ( Stalwart Guardian ) has taken a rugged bush, and rough terraine exercise because the troops have been in Bosnia and Afghanistan. Thus matching the terraine.

Now our sights are set to a different terraine. Urban battle and warfare. Now the troops will run simulations (sometimes with live rounds) and set up platoons in the Urban setting and on the perimeter.

Both my Husband Carl, and my Son Alex are in the Queen's York Rangers Reserve unit. This is Alex's third run at this exercise, and his first run as a Corporal.

Carl is having his first run at this exercise as a Private.
Carl is the oldest recruit in the Canadian forces siged up in 2005. Carl is 49.


Here are some web sites to read up on Vigilant Guardian:

False Flag News


Cannon Fire


Let's Roll



Canadian Military
this is the best one



Vigilant Guardian: This Years Stories


The Canadian Reserves are volunteer part-time soldiers.
They can also volunteer, as a reservist, to attach to a Regular Forces Unit and be deployed into battle. August 1st, 2006 six of Alex and Carl's unit were deployed to Afghanistan.

The Canadian Reserve unit is the most highly trained reserve unit in the world. Canadian military must pass an intelligence test and a fitness test, medical examinations, and a psychological profile to join. Sometimes University students can't eve pass the intelligence/knowledge test. Both Carl and Alex scored top level on this test which means they qualify to do any job in the Military.


In World War 2 the Canadian troops fought along side the
Gurhkas, and they learned about silent fighting. From then on Canadian military took on a different approach to warfare.



We have a small military for the size of our country. We are also are in the Nato Peace Keeping Forces. We do not purchase large amount of battle hardware like, Tanks, Planes, Ships, and Submarines. Instead Canada specialized in Guerrilla warfare, Ranger Reconiscence, Intelligence, and Snipers.






Canada goes in before any other troops are on the ground. Their special forces can be in an area 18 months before we hear any battle calls. They will scope out an area and learn everything the commanders need to call to battle.









Our special forces JTF accepts members of the Reserves, as well as the Regular forces, so our Reservists must be hightly trained to qualify.

Besides their battle skills, our Reservists are pro, recovery aid, bridge builders, clean water teams, emergency medical units, and policing guards that can implement on hours notice to go to a country with a natural disaster. Our troops are all over the world in recovery and rebuild aid for countries stricken my drout, hurricanes, sunami, tornadoes, floods, landslides, earthquakes etc.





The Canadian Military, including Reservists have the best MASH units in the world. Our Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals are the best equipped and best supported units of their kind.



(Al showing off his Corporal stripes, on his chest)






So Canada decided to support the experts when they
worked on their military numbers. They knew they would
never have a huge number of recruits, like the USA, so
they could not take on alot of large scale equipment that
requires large numbers of Military just to run them.
Canada decided to make our small Forces, compared to
the USA a more specialized defence.






This way Canada would be a great support team for any other large military country.





Carl and Alex are both Computer Geeks by day. Mild mannered techno wizards. Carl is a senior Manager for CGI, and Alex owns the company Automatic Pixel Production.

Carl directs teams in Mainframe technology, IT development, and Client/Server applications. He is a hightly trained Computer Sciences Graduate that knows 19 different programming languages and applications used today.


Alex is a Web Designer, with Branding development skills. He is still a University/College student. He is proficient in all the programming languages used in Web Development.





Alex has almost 10 yrs experience in his field. He studied all the language manuals on his own when he was in highschool.

These guys are far removed from their daytime persona, to become the trained Superheroes they are at night and on the weekends.