a little post

i have 15 minutes before i have to leave.  someone recently suggested perhaps i could do a 'teaser' post, as i keep saying (with absolutely no evidence to back it up) that i'm going to write a post again soon.  so here is the teaser so you know i haven't fallen off a cliff somewhere... maybe on that mountain you had to keep reading about.  the lion seems to have retreated somewhat since that last post.  or at least i don't see much of it.  i will today.  i'll just get a glimpse of it, as i go in for a 'routine' (?) CT scan.  that's why i leave in 15 minutes.

to explain, since i last left you, i had a PET/CT scan... why???... was it simply because i kept complaining about my lungs... crazy that i can't even remember why they ordered it.  i think it was to just look inside me and see how it all looked after all my treatment.  was the cancer in fact gone?  so... the answer to that PET scan was, 'yes.'  it's all gone... well, yes... except... there are a couple spots on your lungs that lit up and we don't know what they are.  which is how i came to be introduced to modern medicine's torture device #37, the bronchoscopy.  where they stick a camera down your lungs and your body hates it so much that it fights against it despite the fact that it has been drugged and you're supposed to be relaxed.  they did a biopsy of a lymph node and a lavage, where, as part of the torture that will hopefully work to save your life if it comes to that, they squirt liquid into your lungs and then suck it back out to get samples of whatever they can i guess, to biopsy.  and those came back normal.  hallelujah!  i seriously had not been so happy at any stage of this process than i was when my oncologist called to tell me that piece of news.  because finally, it felt like i was given a clean slate... for however long i'm destined to keep it.  it's what i've been hoping for, ever since i could see clearly that this is what every cancer patient wants.  but... of course, things are never truly over when it comes to breast cancer.  so i go in today for one of my 3 or 4 future CT scans in this next year.  just to keep an eye on those spots, since they were PET positive after all, to see if they grow.  because if they grow and if they're still PET positive then they will not take any chances and they take out that part of my lung... because well... i've got two after all... i guess... but seriously, apparently they have seen good outcomes on young people who have a metastasis in one place and they surgically remove it.  so my doctors are keeping a close eye on things for the first year or two while my chances of a spread are the highest.  until we learn to live with the risks.  not that having 4 CT scans a year doesn't come with its own risks, but those consequences won't reveal themselves for another 30 years or so.  well... 3 minutes left.  i'm going to end this teaser post so i can go get x-rayed.   goodbye and thank you for reading!  (and despite all my complaints, i really am truly appreciative of what modern medicine can do for me and do to this cancer.)