Visit with Dr F.

Today we met with Dr. F to discuss based on the PET and CT scans what needs to be done to have a biopsy that will give us an actual diagnosis of something. This something is nothing that can be derived from any prior information that the doctors have, so we are not assuming what diagnosis will come from this procedure, but that they are going to do panels for everything and something should be found.

The VATS Picture from The Mayo Clinic

Thursday, February 10th, I'll be having the biopsy done via a Video Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery aka VATS at Emory. The VATS procedure is similar to a knee scope where they will make 3 incisions to complete the procedure. In my VATS they will go in on my left side and in one slit a camera will go to guide them, with the two other slits they will go the instruments to remove the node that is the easiest and seal it up. Dr. F is pretty confident that no matter what something will be found from VATS. The reason why the needle aspirations haven't been able to find something is that there is a lot of scar tissue around my nodes and so it's kind of like Pin the Tail on the Donkey, you just take a few stabs but that doesn't mean you win the game. While on the other hand taking out a node will give us an answer and won't just come back "non diagnostic."

Also yesterday I had to get a hard flush from Dr. D to make sure my port would flow the correct direction and let me say I did not puke when they accessed it. That was probably the first time that has happened since I got it and I had no idea what was going on. Yay Me! As Katie said "It was the brinner" So thank you Praline French Toast for not making me puke.

Rebecca

Things I Wish I Didn't Have To Deal With Because Of Cancer/Chemo

I often am amused by my quirks and randomness one of which I love bullet points and lists. I wish I could share some of my college notes because then I feel it would give a great insight into how my brain works as my bullet points often went insane and if I did share my notes y'all would probably go insane. Anyway I guess I am introducing another aspect and label of my blog: lists. These lists will be of a great variety of things but today's are based on my #1 because of recently having them done.

Things I Wish I Didn't Have To Deal With Because Of Cancer/Chemo

1. Weird skin reactions to getting my eye brows done (I had them done Saturday and now my skin's irritated and it never has done that for the past 5 years)
2. Weird skin reactions to certain lotions-stuff that worked before chemo didn't work during chemo which now does work after chemo and stuff that worked during chemo irritates my skin now. If you followed that I'm impressed
3. The fear of never having kids
4. Smelling everything: good, bad, or ugly. Let me say I never really had hardcore scent senses before chemo but now it seems as if everything that has a scent I can smell and they linger so bad smells are terrible. I can also smell lemon hand sanitizer from across the room (which I hate the lemon so much and Mama kept using I threw away the almost full bottle)
5. Being a 23 year old bum with a college degree living with my parents (I love y'all but really...)
6. Having to miss camp last summer
7. Not being able to really schedule much in advance because there just has been too much up in the air to do so because I want to be at camp this summer but I have no idea whether I can or not
8. Living in Georgia and not in Alabama where I would prefer (no offense GA readers)
9. Being on a first name basis with like everyone at Emory, Sunday during church Brian our preacher was talking about seeing a doctor for more than 5 minutes and my first thought was A) I see my doctor too much and I'm such a "primadonna" as Ken my PA says they end up spending a lot of time with me B) I answer caller ID the phone calls from my nurse as "What's up Christina" she laughs but it's what happens when at this point I've memorized phone numbers from Emory
10. Weird hair stuff, honestly some times it just doesn't make sense last week I had a chunk of hair that just stuck out like Alfalfa but on the side of my head...it was really attractive...
11. Having too much time on my hands
12. Seeing everyone else's life move on and forward and I'm just in a holding pattern, this is so hard to have to cope with because being in college you just keep moving on and doing things and you're life is just going so fast there are so many check lists to complete then you graduate and are diagnosed with cancer and it's just all halted and then you finish treatment then it's starting to accelerate then you have a bad scan then you have more tests and then you get sick and then you're just still in this holding pattern
13. Weird germaphobe issues that I formed during chemo that now are hard to break. I haven't had a Jersey Mike sub in over 7 months and let me say that is a record. 
14. Overly emotional at times my cancer friend in Miles told me about this but I didn't quite believe him until more recently. Let's just say during Christmas I cried at a Folgers commercial...yea I have turned into that girl
15. I'm now grossed out by touching raw meat, I have never been scared or fearful of things in the kitchen but I'm working to get over my disgust of raw meats I think I washed my hands 4 times during dinner prep earlier because I cracked a few eggs. 
16. Conquering my fear of needles-I used to be afraid and would end up passing out, now I don't even flinch and I feel at this point I could put in my own IV and do my own blood work if need be 
17. Being woken up at 7:30am by Emory with phone calls 
18. My port

Speaking of dinner I'll post later tonight about my experience with Praline Pecan French Toast. Yep you heard right we're having breakfast for dinner tonight at The Little House.

Also tomorrow I get to go back to Emory to see Dr. D about my port and a PET scan and Wednesday I'm meeting with Dr. F about what my scan says and whether or not there will be a biopsy.

Happy Monday
Rebecca

Dr. Visit 1/6: Not the Best Day of My Life

Well I don't even know where on Earth to start at the moment. First off Mama and Daddy are sick, so sick that yesterday I was kicked out of the house but by the time Daddy called to say I should leave because he was sick I already felt it was too late. Well by the middle of the night I knew for fact that it was too late that I left, so this morning when I couldn't sleep I started working on figuring out what Dr. L wanted to do, well since my main complaint was my lungs she wanted me to see Dr. B but the downfall is he was not in the office until next Monday. So Dr. L went to work trying to figure out what was going on, pretty much what was figured out in respect to what I(we) have is inconclusive so tomorrow I having another bronch to see if Dr. B can find something for conclusive so we can come up with a plan of action to try to get me better. So pretty much what it boils down to is we won't know anything conclusive until next Wednesday.

Prayers would be highly appreciated right now while my Drs figure out what's going on.

Thanks, Rebecca