January 2, 2016 - Last year ended on a rather busy and "not fun" time for me. I earlier posted about some health issues starting in October. Well, as expected from the reaction of the doctor at my first meeting the first week of October, I do have cancer. This doctor could tell from looking. She scheduled me for an ultra scan and did biopsies in her office. The result of the follow-up visit was an appointment with an oncologist/gynecologist in Indianapolis because as my Anderson doctor put it, "It's more than I want to deal with." My Indy doctor scheduled me for a cold-knife cone biopsy 11/19/15 which sometimes is all that is needed for cancer caught early. However, following this procedure and a CT Scan done at Indianapolis, I was sent to Anderson to meet with the radiation/chemo team. I have now had another set of ultra sound scans (12/22/15) followed by a Pet/Scan (12/23/15), followed by being sent directly to the hospital for surgery on Christmas Eve Day (12/24/15). The chemo doctor found that my left kidney was blocked by the tumor so he ordered a stent to be put in immediately.
Happily I was home on Christmas Eve by 3:30 and have gotten along well. I didn't take any pain medicine with either of my procedures. But, looming in my 2016 future is six weeks of external radiation combined with "light" chemo on each Monday, combined with internal radiation treatment beginning in week 4 (a 2-hour, under anesthetic procedure given in Indy). Needless to say I am apprehensive of it all! It kicks off with a radiation treatment on January 5, followed by a run over to the emergency room for insertion of a Pic to set me up for my weekly chemo that begins the next day. The thing that amazes me is that they have known since October that I have cancer. It will be over 3 months before I receive my first treatment for the cancer. The rest of the time has been "hello" doctor visits and scans and look sees. Just like when I was pregnant, everybody has a hand in it!
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