Friday, February 15, 2008

Rise, Phoenix, Rise!

After a two-month-long hiatus from the world of third-person blogging, I'm making a brief return. With any luck, the once-mighty A Healthy Goodwin will rise from the dustbin of discarded blogs and experience a revival. I can't promise that I'll be posting regularly (not that I was ever all that good about posting in a consistent fashion), but I'll make sure the most essential news makes it to the blog.

Here's what's new: after a relatively solid January, Father Goodwin took a few steps backwards. He was struck by a steep decline in white blood cells, which came with a equally steep decline in energy. There were a few scary days when they weren't really sure what was going on. But just this week, a bone-marrow biopsy revealed no signs of the things they don’t want to see -- namely disease or damaged platelets. To explain the extreme drop in white blood cells -- he was hovering around 0.45 for a few days -- they first suspected CMV (cyto-meglo virus). Now, however, they're hypothesizing that this may all be due to tapering his steroids too quickly. They are in the process of trying to "jump start" his adrenal system. While they work on finding the right sized jumper cables, my dad reports "extreme fatigue" rivaling the "shitty-ness" associated with chemo. Hopefully, with the right combo of horse steroids and 20+ hours of daily sleep, he'll be back (and blogging) shortly.

In the meantime, the Boys Goodwin are experimenting with a new, innovative ways to get news out to ArnieWatchers. Because he lacks the energy to type -- and I don't always have the time -- we're going to give "audio-blogging" a shot. It's actually way less hi-tech than it sounds. But don't just take my word for it. Head to www.drop.io/GoodSpeak and check out our latest creation.

Good stuff,
Zach

3 comments:

Unknown said...

20+ hours of sleep a day? You are now a cat. Sorry you're so low energy, Arn. Hang in there. Oh, and nice audio!

Anonymous said...

Uncle Arnie, Mar and I are back from Florida in time for the cold and flu season apparently. It was our longest time together on vacation in forty years and we did pretty well. We were so relaxed we spent a lot of time snoozing-which is what you have been doing for different reasons I hear. I hope your strength starts kicking in soon and you can be out and about. Tim

Deb Fletcher said...

Hi Arnie, Great to hear your voice! I'm sorry you've had low energy with the drop in blood counts. Been there too and its not fun. Hopefully soon, if not already, this too will pass. I think about you so often. I miss seeing your smiling face on shoots & laughing about everything and nothing. Thanks for doing this blog and now the audio to keep your oh so many fans up to date. Love to you and yours. Deb
ps - Thanks to you too, Zack! You have a wonderful gift with words, just like your dad.