Retire Early Lifestyle
Retirement; like your parents, but way cooler

In 1991 Billy and Akaisha Kaderli retired at the age of 38. Now, into their 4th decade of this financially independent lifestyle, they invite you to take advantage of their wisdom and experience.

Mesa  to Chapala - and then the downhill slide

My intimate Journey with Cancer Part 10

 Billy and Akaisha Kaderli

Currency Converter

I had had enough pain in my back and sciatica in my legs that I was “up to here” with it.

Billy was frustrated with my continuous complaints, and my sister was about ready to “rip me a new one”. “Get it fixed! See a ‘real’ doctor! Get a cortizone shot!” she would say with exasperation over the phone.

I didn’t really know what to do. I had gone to massage therapists and Chinese acupuncturists in Thailand. In Mesa I was seeing a chiropractor who helped with my elevated hip (9cm) and got my back and discs into placement. I went to a deep tissue laser therapist – the kind that football teams and Olympic teams use for the healing of injuries.

All promised healing and that I’d be up and running again, and I’d have my life back.

Daily exercise, short walks and yoga would give minimal relief…But nothing long-lasting. I had been standing for meals for over a week now because I could not sit comfortably.

What the heck was going on?

Emergency room hospital in Mesa

Time for leaving Arizona and returning to Chapala, Mexico was getting short, as we were leaving in just a few days.

In order to get me “travel ready” Billy thought maybe we should go ahead and visit the emergency room facilities here in town and try to get that Cortisone shot “or whatever they could do for me” and see if that would help.

Dignity Health Arizona General Hospital Emergency

We ordered an Uber early in the morning and entered Dignity Health Arizona General Hospital Emergency Room that was near our home. We had been told people got good service there, and I would be cared for properly.

No other patients were in the waiting room, which was good and it meant we didn’t have to stay long to see a doctor.

The sweet girl at the desk took my information, insurance card, birth data and so on and I signed a form. Unfortunately, we didn’t know at the time that the young girl had inadvertently transposed my birth day and month, which was going to cause me a bit of a hiccup later.

My name was called shortly thereafter, and Billy and I went into the patient room and another authentic, warm woman took more information to give to the doctor.

All seemed to be going well.

Dr. Irritable

The doctor entered the patient room and asked me several questions to which I responded. Off and on he would interject impatiently “how is this relevant to your situation this morning?” and I would explain, and then Billy might say something and the doc would again say in an agitated manner “how is this relevant to your situation this morning?” He seemed quite exasperated with us, which wasn’t comfortable.

At one point I, myself, got flustered with how this was going and I said “Doctor, I’m trying to explain something to you! You won’t let me finish!”

Two things ran across my mind at these moments.

One, I thought the doctor was over-caffeinated and was just reacting to the situation as any normal person who just had a triple espresso would do.

Two, he must have thought the waiting room was packed and felt the pressure of getting me in-and-out-of-there as soon as possible. --- Except there was no one waiting. It was just us.

Then the doc told me to turn around. (I had been standing because at this point, sitting was not working for me).

I turned around. I might have lifted my tee shirt so he could see my physical spine.

There was no examination, he did not touch my body. There was no “knee to my chest, leg straight up, no knee twisting” to see how or if I was injured.

“Well I can’t do anything for you here. You need an MRI and right now, the waiting period for one of those is over a month,” he said matter-of-factually. “You’ll have to schedule an MRI, and in 6 weeks, you will know what the next thing is for you to do.

Both Billy’s and my mouths were wide open with surprise.

“But we are leaving in a couple of days. Can you give her a shot so she can sit on the airplane getting back to Mexico?” Billy asked.

“No, no, I can’t do that until I see the MRI. But I can give you some muscle relaxers.”

He swiftly left the room (that was the last we saw of him) and the authentic, warm woman led us out to the waiting room, where she eventually gave us the paperwork to get my prescription filled at a local pharmacy.

Editor’s note:  Due to the entry of incorrect data on my birth date, the pharmacy couldn’t find the order for my prescription. It took a moment for Billy to figure out the problem, and transposed the month and date to my real date of birth. Then, presto! I was in the system.

A month later, due to this same transposition of my birth data, my insurance company could not find me in their data base and rejected my claim. Dignity Health sent me a bill for $895USD. So I called them to explain what happened and asked them to resubmit the claim with the correct birth info. I even sent them a copy of a valid ID showing my proper date of birth.

Just to clarify – I received a bill for $900USD for a doctor’s visit where I literally received no care from a doctor who didn’t physically examine me in any way, who was agitated on caffeine, said “No, he couldn’t help me” and gave me a script for muscle relaxers.

I mean, just sayin’ … I have muscle relaxers at home. I could have saved the $900 bucks (Plus Uber costs both ways) but I decided to try a “real doctor” in the States to see what I was missing.

Getting to Chapala, Mexico

Armed with my muscle relaxers and some over-the-counter pain relievers, a couple of days later we took an early flight from Phoenix to Guadalajara.

It was a 3 hour flight, plus taxi rides on both ends. Normally this would be a no-brainer, no-big-deal flight, one we have taken many times. But today, there were different factors in play – like -  could I carry my luggage? Could I sit the 3 hours+ on the plane, and stand the normal boarding time it takes to get on the plane?

Would the pain rise up ugly or would it “play nice” and allow me to get home?

We didn’t know.

As it turned out, all went well with the taxi to Phoenix, the flight itself and the taxi from Guadalajara into the town of Chapala.

Almost there!

We live on the second floor of this gated garden community, and I had to get myself up those stairs.

I had been doing a step or two in Mesa, but now I was staring at a full flight.

One of the indigenous girls from downstairs offered to take my backpack up the steps, and I was most grateful.

But the stairs were still there.

The first 12 steps went ok and there was a landing on which I could rest a bit. I decided to just “gut it through” the last 12 steps and walked as best as I could to my apartment door and headed for the bed.

This was December 4, 2025

Home visits from our GP

I don’t remember much about these next couple of days, except that my incredible husband had called our doctor, Doctor Oscar Ibarra – from Mesa - asking if he would stop by our house and take a look at me. We really needed him.

Maybe a shot? Maybe something? We didn’t know.

Our doctor is very busy and quite popular, so he couldn’t make a home visit on December 4th. But he did come the next day and checked me over.

On the bed with my knee to my chest, then both knees, and then the legs straight up, side to side and every which way. He had me stand up, do some walking and… a squat. (haven’t done one of those for a while due to the back pain) but I was able to pull it off.

Dr. Oscar gave me a shot in my bum, a prescription for some meds and then ordered an MRI.

“We need to see what’s going on.”

So – get this – he gives us a prescription for an MRI at a local hospital – and asked for a discount in price for us. Billy calls the hospital and arranges for an MRI the very next morning.

Ain’t it great? This is Mexico. Home doctor visits, and scheduling an MRI for the very next day. No month+ waiting…

Dr. Oscar stayed at our home for nearly an hour and with the shot and all, his price came to $56USD.

The MRI and some shocking news

The next morning I woke up and I told Billy I hadn’t felt this good for months. I had a spring in my step and since I was literally pain-free I was optimistic about my future and about the healing of my back. I can’t tell you how happy I was.

At this point, I saw a wide-open horizon for myself and I was ecstatic. Maybe things were going to change for me.

In this mood, we took a taxi to Ribera Hospital not far from our home.

Ribera Hospital, Chapala, Mexico

I went to the registration desk immediately, signed some papers, and gave them my ID. Easy peasy.

After changing into my hospital gown, I walked to the MRI machine – and since my previous MRI had been so loud, I thought I’d bring my own ear plugs. “Not to worry” the attendant said. “I have these ear cuffs for you!”

They were massive and soft. It wasn’t like I was shooting off artillery, but wow, these would have done it. They covered my ears completely and were very comfortable. So much so, that I was able to drift off and meditate for the whole half-an-hour that the test took to complete.

Back out again, put on my clothes and went to the registration desk. I gave them my credit card and paid for the MRI – which came to $202USD.

Since today was December 6th, a Saturday, we were told we could expect our results sometime Monday or Tuesday.

From Ribera Hospital we called our friend Arturo, a taxi driver, to take us home. Arturo took a side road with a lot of bumpy cobblestones and construction – and this proved to be a mistake. I felt something shift in my back, and things were not the same again.

Shocking MRI, my oncologist wants more info

In the beginning of the following week we received the results of the MRI and sent them digitally to Dr. Fernando, my oncologist in Guadalajara.

Apparently, there were some dark spots on my spine, and Dr. Fernando wanted more information. A CT scan was ordered and since my back was once again acting up, we decided to wait a couple of weeks so perhaps I could heal in the meanwhile.

Except I didn’t.

In fact, the sciatica in my right leg was so bad that I needed help getting in and out of bed, couldn’t stand much more than a few minutes and at some point I lost the ability to sit on the commode and do my morning business.

The decline was so rapid and obvious that Billy began panicking. “Where’s my wife? What happened to you? What’s going on? Why is this happening?”

Practical Billy, a short emergency stay in the hospital, more difficult news

Billy and I began another series of “those talks” about Life and Death, passwords and codes for our accounts, cremation, death certificates, and how I might want to live out “the rest of my days.”

This was immensely stressful for Billy because the life we knew was being ripped out from under our feet in a matter of a few short weeks. Both of us were completely discombobulated.

Meanwhile, all the “partnership” work I normally do (grocery shopping, making the bed, running the household, getting our clothes to the laundry, doing the dishes, the website, blog posts, and so on) came to an abrupt stop and this load was placed onto Billy’s shoulders also.

Soon, he was running as fast as he could to go nowhere.

As days and nights went by, I was “trying to heal” and then get the CT scan done. Seemingly, more and more of me disappeared.

My appetite was gone and after a few bites I would simply push my food around the plate. Billy started to serve me my meals in bed as it was too painful to get out or to stand. Weight had been rapidly dropping off my body which was a red flag.

Uncontrollable left-side pain

One day I woke up with a pain in my left side. Thinking it would be manageable, I let it slide. But the next morning It was really difficult to ignore and getting worse quickly. Billy got on the phone calling ambulance services and the hospital trying to find out pricing for the ambulance and also if he could move the CT scan up a week since it seemed at this point I should be getting this procedure sooner than later.

As usual, my incredibly talented husband handled it all – ambulance, hospital appointment and then to another hospital to stay for observation and more tests.

He is such a protector and I am God-blessed to have him as my partner.

In the hospital

It was a whirlwind of pain and being ignored, assistants coming in and doing this and that – but not giving me any pain medication. One young assistant blew a vein on my hand trying to get the intravenous dye inserted.

OMG.

Give me some pain medicine.

At this point I am now WAILING and Billy comes in from the waiting room with his face all streaked in tears. His eyes were red and swollen.

 “My poor baby!” I say to him.  

“I can’t stand it that you’re in this pain. I can’t take it,” he says to me.

He holds my hand and we wait it out together. I don’t know why I’m being ignored.

I try being more quiet with my wails because I know it hurts Billy, -  but I’m in pain… Get me outta here. Something, something, something. Help me.

Are you freaking kidding me?

Finally I get wheeled into the area where the CT machine is. I’m on some kind of IV but it’s colorless. (What happened to the dye? Where’s my PAIN medication?!)

The young intern or nurse says something to the effect of “Don’t move. Breathe, hold your breath, then let it go. Follow the audio instructions.”

I’m thinking to myself:

“Listen to ME, Sweet Cheeks. You are lucky I’m not ripping off the front cover of this thing. Screw holding my breath… I can’t even FIND my breath. Get me some pain medicine!”

I am twisting and moving and moaning.

Fer God’s sake. How is this test going to be accurate?

He’s asking me for a few more minutes. I’m asking to get out of here.

Moving to a nearby hospital

Finally, mercy finds its way to me and I’m taken out of the tube and wheeled… somewhere.

All I can see is the ceiling, then sky, then an emergency vehicle, then sky, then another ceiling.

Wheel, wheel, turn, bump, bump.

I arrive in another emergency hospital where a Dr. Ariz takes over. This man is one fine doctor and he asks me questions, takes some blood, runs an EKG test and says he is waiting for the results of the CT from Ribera.

He is fully present, his eyes are clear and he takes Billy outside my curtain-enclosed-bed for a private conversation.

Akaisha's Father's side of the family comes from this village in Faeto, Italy

The long and short of it

With the MRI showing dark spots on my spine, the results of the CT scan and blood tests showing a kidney infection and a mass on my urethra, things are not looking very cheery for me at this moment.

I am told I’ll be staying a night or two in the hospital to get the infection under control and to make sure I am urinating normally.

I wear a diaper for the first time since I was a baby and I say to myself “OMG.” The daily, usual normal morning functions have now become an “ordeal.”

A couple of nights pass, my personal plumbing is all mixed up, and any food they give me, I just push around the plate.

On the 3rd day late in the afternoon, I still hadn’t peed for that day. I was told that as soon as I urinated, I’d be sent home. The emergency (infection) had passed, and they can no longer keep me in the emergency hospital.

Um… yeah.

Well, great. My bladder is full, but nothing is coming out. This is a bit stressful for me as you can imagine. “What if I can’t pee?” I ask the doctor.

A nurse comes in a few moments later, injects something into my IV and about an hour later, the floodgates are open.

The next thing I know, all IVs are taken out of me, and I am being dressed to go home. I direct the nurse about my computer, phone, cords, day pack, change of clothes, shoes… and I give a quick call to Billy to let him know… yes, it’s 7pm and they are bringing me home by ambulance.

The ambulance drives me through the main street of town which is all lit up for Christmas. Tree trunks, store fronts, fountains, palm trees… all in beautiful lights and I try to watch this magic from the ambulance window.

We arrive at the wrought iron gate of our community and the strong young emergency drivers carry me to the bottom of the stairs.

Now what?

“Ok, let’s go” one of them says. I look at him wide-eyed and say “I can’t climb these stairs. No way. No, not possible.”

The ambulance drivers are just as shocked as I am, and Billy has already contacted our neighbor (in case we need help) and has brought down a comfortable plastic chair from our home.

Somehow I get moved from the gurney onto the plastic chair and these two incredible first responders carry me up the flight of steps.

I am disconcerted that I cannot do this myself, I am afraid they might drop me, I have my hands covering my face and my eyes and I hear Billy say “BREEEAATHHEEEEE” they got this!”

These guys get me to our apartment and Billy has my “bed set up” all set up.

I notice that his dinner is getting cold on the dining room table.

And the flood keeps coming

Because of what the hospital doc put in my IV previously, I am still needing to use the commode… except of course, I can’t sit down to relieve myself.

Billy and I quickly design something to use in the moment. This works, except that I “have so much now” that my container overflows, all over my new clean pants and onto the bathroom floor.

I am beyond embarrassment at this point, and the implications of my situation are overpowering.

Our previous contented life and lifestyle continues to crash down and crumble all around us.

Billy cleans me up, puts on my diaper, tells me not to worry and gets me to bed.

He then sits down to eat his cold dinner.

Just one more thing

Billy wakes up the next morning exhausted.

We have made arrangements for a “Pain Doctor” from Guadalajara to come to our home to discuss my pain level… and also, I presume, the future I am facing.

I came home to Chapala the 4th of December, and now it’s the 18th of December. A LOT has happened in just 2 weeks.

Dr. Mirasol comes to our apartment in the early afternoon and we give her the intake and health history information. She is quite thorough and has a calm demeanor.

She looks at me with her big, brown, doe-like eyes and reassures me that she won’t let me suffer. She will take care of my pain because she is a Palliative Care Doctor ----------------

I said “WHAAAT?! A PALLIATIVE CARE DOCTOR!!??”

I wasn’t ready for this, regardless of my symptoms. I know things didn’t look rosy at the moment, but I certainly didn’t think I was dying.

My reaction took the good doctor off guard. Her eyelids fluttered and she took a moment to look at the ceiling. I believe she was trying to find the right words.

In all honesty, there was a cultural and language difference between us, and no doubt, I over reacted. To me “palliative care” meant “Yer dyin’ Bud. We’ll make it easy on ya, best we can.”

In her professional position, “palliative care” meant “You are in pain at this point of your illness. I will keep you comfortable, and we don’t necessarily have to jump to conclusions.”

Again, -- My Dear Readers – things were moving so fast, that for us it was like:

“BAM!!”

Accept.

“RRRIIIPP!!”

Accept.

"CRASH!"

Accept.

We had no choice but to go with the flow, and right now, we were in the rapids.

Billy had a firm hand on the tiller, but we were being tossed from side to side.

We got the pain patch and some other meds, and in between sobs, we kept telling each other: “We got this. We got this. We can do this.”

Talking to the Oncologists – looking for hope - or some kind of answer...

Seriously, things looked pretty dire at this time. Billy spent hours on the phone with my oncologists discussing alternatives:

“Just take the kidney out, then we’ll radiate the area and then chemo therapy.”

“But doctor, first of all, she’s 73 and she might not survive the operation and if she does, the healing time might be weeks. If she’s supposed to die in 3 months, she has just spent 1 month in the hospital for kidney surgery, then healing time.

“Then not only that, but at this time she cannot sit to take a taxi to the hospital or to the radiation clinic. Where is she going to lie down until they finally call her in for treatment… and then how is she going to get back to some apartment that we’ll arrange in Guadalajara? Emergency gurneys each way for 16 days?

“So we have to do this 16 times for the radiation and then again for the chemo? This isn’t going to work, Doc. It’s not practical.”

It went on like this for days and nights – on the phone with 2 of my different oncologists and discussing options.

Billy and I discussed that no matter what, we wanted:

            Me to be comfortable

            Me out of pain, and           

            For the both of us to be together.

I wasn’t going to die in a hospital, I wasn’t going to be moved to an assisted living home, and if we needed to get in-home help and a hospital bed, then that is what we were going to do.

We were not going to be separated.

Five nights later, after these intense conversations and decisions, on December 23, 2025, a friend  of ours came by our home.

In her hand she held a bottle of “something” –  she had discussed this topic with us many times previously. Take this, take this. Just take this. Call this doctor. He’ll come to your house and explain everything.

Honestly?

At this point, we had nothing to lose, so I took the liquid as directed and Billy contacted the doctor for him to come to our home and explain what this “stuff” was.

The strangest, oddest, most curious thing happened the next morning.

My appetite returned.

Cost of Services

Emergency Care Hospital, Dignity Health, Mesa, AZ                                            $895 USD

            10-15 minutes in the health examination room, received

            no examination, no advice except to get an MRI 6 weeks

            later, received prescription for muscle relaxers

Our Personal Doctor came to our home, spent an hour speaking                       $56 USD

            to us, gave me a physical examination, a shot in my bum, a

            prescription for medicine and a prescription for an MRI,

            asking the hospital to give us a discount

MRI at Riberas Hospital, paid out of pocket                                                           $202 USD

CT scan at Lakeside Medical                                                                                  $187 USD

Dr. Mirasol from Guadalajara came to our home and spent 2 hours                   $196 USD

            taking information, and explaining what was next, follow-up

            phone calls

Retire Early Lifestyle appeals to a different kind of person – the person who prizes their independence, values their time, and who doesn’t want to mindlessly follow the crowd.

HOME   Book Store

Retire Early Lifestyle Blog      About Billy & Akaisha Kaderli      Press     Contact     20 Questions     Preferred Links    

Retirement     Country Info     Retiree Interviews      Commentary     REL Videos