Scanxiety

I'm feeling a little guilty that I haven't popped in for awhile and now it's scan time so my cancer is really on my mind (even though I don't want it to be). I had my scans on Wednesday.

Funny. They've changed the procedure on the CT scans. They used to do 3 scans: one for chest, one for abdomen, and one for pelvis. It meant holding my breath three times. This time they did all three in one pass. At first I panicked because the last time I only held my breath once, the doctor's order was messed up and they'd forgotten my other scans so I ended up having to run up to the doctor's office and get them to correct the order. I'm so used to the procedure that I realized something was wrong right away. I panicked because the drive to/from the cancer center is a good 1-2 hours each way and I'd already taken off work a day and was worried I was going to have to come back another day. So when I only held my breath once, I thought, Oh no! Not again. But then when I asked, they said that they're trying this to reduce radiation exposure. There was some overlap before and that ended up with extra radiation. I'm glad for that!

The other big news (haha) was that I was offered the contrast for the first time in 4 years (since my nephrectomy). The cutoff is creatinine of 1.5. I had 1.55 this time. I said, no thanks. My kidney doctor has a protocol for them to give me the contrast but radiology and my oncologist aren't interested in her protocol. That's a bit annoying. I think she's a great doctor and I really like her. I've tried to share what she thinks with my oncologist but he's never been very interested in what she thinks.

My anxiety is still pretty high this time. I had a lymph node slightly enlarged (a mediastinal) on the last scan so I'm nervous to find out if it's enlarged again. If so, I may be up for a biopsy, which, I'm not sure how easy that is to do. The lymph node is in a place very hard to reach (near my spine among my heart/lungs). My big worry is progression and what that would mean at this point. They said if it progressed within a year they wouldn't do surgery again. However, it's been well over 1 1/2 years so I'm guessing if that's the only tumor they might remove it or zap it. I'm not too excited about the prospect of taking any of their drugs.

The only health issue I'm having at the moment is an issue with my hands. They swell for no apparent reason and are hard to close. I've had this since my nephrectomy. It gets better and worse. Right now it's more frequent and more bothersome. The doctors have no idea what it is. It causes me a great deal of anxiety because I wonder if it's related to a tumor somewhere. It might be as simple as my age and/or weight. Still struggling with weight. I've put on more. Frustrated about that too.

I'm glad to see familiar faces. I'm going to try and catch up on reading up on the goings on with the new people and the old (no insult intended) people.

I get my results this next Wednesday. I'll post when I know.

Wishing you all well,

Todd