Lost in the sauce is a good way of putting how I have been feeling lately. Well, at least since I read the CT Scan report.
Well actually, it started before my reading the report. It all started with a phone call from the doctor's office. I get a call "Go to the ER, NOW." I ask why. The nurse replies "I don't have that information, the doctor wants you to go to the ER NOW. Which ER are you going to?" I said ok, I'm going to Stafford Hospital ER, now. They actually called the ER and told them I was on my way.
When I got there, I had maybe a 5 minute wait before I was in the back in one of those wonderful hospital gowns. The nurse that walked me back told me the doctor's office called and let them know I would be there, and I would have to wait to talk to the doctor about the CT Scan.
Turned out that my intestine is folding back on itself. Insusseption I believe it is called. Blood is taken, the ER doctor talks to the surgeon that did my Whipple, it comes down to wait and see. If I get any severe pain, or start running a fever, get to the ER because they will have to do surgery. OK I can handle that. So I got to go home. But during the conversation with the ER doctor, he mentioned there were new tumors in my intestine. I thought I heard him say that but was more concernced over the possiblity of having to have emergency surgery and how I was going to have the dogs taken care of and how I was gonig to get home. So I let it go. My mind didn't acknowledge the fact the tumors spread.
Then I finally got the notice that the report for the CT Scan was available. It was one of those good news/bad news type of deals. The good news is that the chemo I am on (Votrient) helped shrink the tumor in my left lung by 2 mm. Actually, that would be great news if that were the only news there was. The bad news, two new tumors in the intestine. Still in the back of my mind I wanted to have misread there were two new tumors.
To be honest, I wasn't all that concerned, I figured I'd see my oncologist and they would change my chemo to see if it would help.
Let me be honest, I was getting anxious over the whole thing. I wanted to see the doctor and get the chemo changed. Somehow I wanted to believe that maybe I read the report wrong.
I mean seriously, how does chemo work on tumors above the waist, but lets tumors grow below the waist? The chemo is in the blood! It goes everywhere.
Well, I finally got to see my doctor, I was in a fairly good mood. All I needed him to do was confirm what my mind wanted to happen, change the chemo.
This time he said the word surgery. That stopped me cold. He wants me to talk to my general surgeon and to an oncology surgeon. What they decided determines what happens next. Right now I am waiting for the offices to call me to set up appointments. They were supposed to be set up for next week, but so far I haven't heard from either one. So I am stuck again in the holding pattern. I saw Dr. VAughn on the third of March.
I am not that crazy about surgery. I've had two abdominal surgeries in the past. I was cut open from above my belly button to just above the pelvic bone so they could access the intestines. They were not easy surgeries. They took a lot out of me.
Part of what is bothering me this happened when I just started to work out and try to get into better shape, funny thing being is that one of the reasons in the back of my head was because of possible surgery. Part is the fact I actually have been taking steps to go back to school for the summer quarter. That is May.
Recovery from surgery can take a long time for me. It isn't as simple as people think. It isn't a snip, snip you are done type of thing. People mistakenly think that.
Add to that if they decide that surgery just isn't an option for me, Doctor Vaughn is talking about adding another drug to the Votrient to see if it will help. Which translates into more side effects. How will that affect school?
On top of that Doc looks at me and says "You've been battling this for a long time. The bag is getting thin." Translation - they are running out of things to try. I'm at the bottom of the barrel scraping it.
I may be running or have run out of options.
I have all this running through my head while waiting for a doctor's office to call with an appointment. No wonder I am depressed.
