Thank you everyone for your prayers, thoughts, and love these last few days. I can truly say that these have been the hardest two days of my life, and I have a new appreciation for all that I thought I might lose. Matthew, Mike and Kami, Michelle and the rest of Matthews family, Aimee (and family - and extended family!) , Sarah (and family), Jessica (and family), Tanya, and everyone else who has known and has been praying for us, thank you from the bottom of my heart. I know that your love has made the difference.
I got my results from the biopsy around 10:00am on Tuesday the 3rd. The doctor said he was expecting to find a infection, but that instead...I have lung cancer. He said he was shocked, that I have no business having lung cancer, and he didn't understand it. He said it was possible that it had come from another part of my body, or that it had already started to spread from my lung. He said he was going to try to get authorization from my insurance to get a PET scan done and that he was referring me to a lung surgeon. He said that we needed to hope that the PET scan would show that the cancer was only in my lung, because if it was anywhere else, things would get much more complicated. I didn't cry, I think I was in complete shock. Nobody expected this. I called Matthew and told him, we were both totally devastated. I am only 30 years old, and I don't even smoke! How could this be happening to me? I broke the news to everyone else, and asked for prayers and good thoughts that the cancer would be confined to my lung. The doctors office called later that day, and said not to expect the insurance approval until Wednesday. Then they called back an hour later and said it was approved, and the nuclear medicine department of St. V's got me an appointment for 7:45 on Thursday morning to get the scan done. This scan was really important, because it would show us if the cancer had spread.
Tuesday night was so hard, and I broke down in Matthews arms. I cried and hollered that it wasn't fair, I was only 30, why me, I didn't deserve this! I have two small children to take care of, I couldn't leave my family. We have too many plans, too many things we want to do, too many things to see and experience together. I felt like my world had cracked in half, and I was about crawling out of my skin, feeling emotions ranging from really positive to absolute devastation. I knew how important it was to keep a good attitude, but how do you do that when your world has just fallen apart? I didn't know how I was going to make it until the next week (when they told us we would have the PET results) to find out if it had spread. I knew that my chances of surviving this were much lower if it had. I tried to think of all the positive things that I knew - in my 1st CT scan they did my abdomen also, and there hadn't been cancer there, that none of my lymph nodes in my lung had shown up on any of the CT scans as inflamed, that the tumor was in a "good" place (bottom of my lung), instead of at the top or middle of my lung where it would be harder to remove, that I was young and healthy. But every time I was riding the wave of positive thoughts, a bad one would sneak in and knock me to me knees again. It was hard to do anything else than think about living and dying.
On Wednesday morning, I talked to the surgeons office, they said they couldn't get me in until the 18th of this month. I started crying, and said "oh, okay" and the sweet receptionist said "Hold on, I have to talk to the doctor about something else, so I will call you back". She called me back with the great news that they could get me in this Friday at 9:30! I was worried that I wouldn't have the PET scan results back before then, because they told me it would take 2-5 days to get them back. I wasn't sure if it would be a waste of time to see him before we knew what we were dealing with or not. But I was grateful to have the appointment and figured we could at least ask questions.
Thursday morning I went for the PET scan. I was taken to a room and given an IV, and then the nurse came back with a small metal container. As she was hooking it up to my IV, she said "Now, because this is radioactive material, you are now going to be radioactive and you should try to stay 3 feet away from your kids today, and use a different bathroom than them, don't hug them or snuggle with them". I immediately started to tear up....here I was having to have radioactive crap injected in my vein, I had just learned I have cancer at 30, a kind of cancer that has a very low survival rate, I am having to undergo all these scary tests, and now I cant even cuddle with my babies? That was a very low moment for me, and she quickly reassured me that it was just a precaution, and that the medicine had a 90 minute 1/2 life, meaning that every 90 minutes, half of it would leave my body. So I felt better, but still....scary stuff. I then had to lay in that room by myself for 1 hour, to give the injection time to work. Basically how a PET scan works is that they inject you with this radioactive glucose stuff, and since cancer cells love sugar, they absorb more than regular cells. So after waiting an hour, they took me into the CT scan machine, and I laid there for 30 minutes while the machine scanned me head to mid thigh. I asked her if there was any way that we could get the results rushed, because I had an appointment with the surgeon the next day. She said "Sure, I can have it read this morning and at your Doctors office by noon". I was so happy, I almost cried again...understandably, I have been very emotional the last few days, and crying at just about everything.
I went home and told Matthew that today was going to be the day we would find out. I was excited, but now more nervous than ever. What if it was bad news? How would I do what I needed to do - to pick myself up again and fight? I was trying so hard to stay positive, but its so hard when you don't even know what is going on. Aimee and the kids came over and (staying 3 feet away from me) provided me with the distraction and support that I most needed. I am so grateful to have such a beautiful friend to help me through this! They left when I went to pick Killian and his friend Patrick up from school, we had scheduled the play date earlier in the week, and I didn't want to cancel. Shortly after arriving home, I called the doctors because I hadn't heard back from them...I left another message. About 15 minutes later, the phone rang, and my heart felt stopped....it was the Doctor. He told me....
That the cancer was only in my lung! Yahooo! He said they couldn't find any evidence of it anywhere else in my body, not in my lymph nodes or anywhere. I almost fell over I was so happy. He said that everything looked really positive, that the kind of cancer I have is very slow to grow and spread, and that the placement (bottom of my lung) made it much "harder" for it to spread around. This was the very best news we could have hoped for in a situation like this, and I know that everyone's prayers and good thoughts really helped get us to this point. I called Matthew, and then everyone else, to give them the great news. I think everyone was high on happiness that day!
Today Matthew and I met with the lung surgeon. He is actually a senior cardiothoratic surgeon, and a very cool guy. He introduced himself with his first name, took the time to really listen to us and talk with us, and even showed us the PET scan pictures, and some of my other Xrays. I have 100% complete faith in him. Here is what he said would happen on surgery day. He will make the incision along my right side, spread open my ribs to get access to the lung, and then he would remove the bottom lobe of my right lung. Luckily the right side has 3 lobes to work with, instead of just 2 like the left side! Then he would biopsy all the surrounding lymph nodes in my lung, to be tested to make sure the cancer really hasn't spread. He said he would also run some tests on the cancer mass once they removed it, and we will determine from those results if I need to meet with an Oncologist about more treatment. He will stitch me up, and put in a chest tube, and then I will be moved the the critical care unit until I am stable enough to get a room. The surgery is supposed to take about 4 hours total. Then I will stay in the hospital until the chest tube can come out, usually 5-14 days. We are hoping for sooner rather than later! I wont be able to drive for a week or so after I get home, because I will be on pain pills. I cant lift anything over 20 pounds for 6-8 weeks, and he said that after about 8 weeks I should be back to normal! This was all really positive news, but the best was yet to come! He checked his calendar, and said he could get me into surgery the following Friday, February 13th! I think its almost unheard of to get your cancer diagnosed and then have surgery to remove it within 10 days. Pretty amazing, I am so thankful to the doctor, and his secretary for getting me in sooner....I cant imagine having had to wait for that February 18th appointment!
So I go this coming Monday for a lung function test at the the hospital, and the Thursday afternoon I go for an xray (I have now lost track of how many of these I have had!) and then a couple hours of pre-admittance stuff. Blood tests, paperwork, and meeting with the surgical team. I have to say...I never ever thought I would be so excited to be having a major surgery done! I am just beside myself with relief that the cancer hasn't spread, that we have a great chance of this being the last time I have to experience it, and that we can get in and get it out so quickly. I actually feel like a very fortunate person, and blessed beyond belief.
People always say a near death experience changes the way that you look at your life. While this isn't exactly in that same category, it has changed my life completely, 100%. I feel like I have been given a second chance, a life to live that I might have lost, and the time to make sure that I live it with no regrets. The laughter of my children is something I will never take for grated again, the sound is so sweet to me. I linger longer in my husbands embrace, cherishing the moment I have with him. I will be forever changed by this cancer, and I cant help but think its a good thing. I have known for some time that we needed to get in better shape, to treat our bodies better, to eat more organic, homegrown, and homemade food. To educate ourselves about our environment, and most important of all....the enjoy each day we have to the absolute fullest. This was the push (alright - shove) that we needed to get ourselves in gear.
None of us are guaranteed our time here, but its seems so often that we busy ourselves with so many things that don't really matter, that we forget that each day is special. Each day we have with people we love, the time we get to spend with them, and the memories made...that's what life is about. Not the cell phones, the big TVs, the fancy dinners, the new car...it all pales in comparison the the hug of a child, or the laughs over coffee with your best friend. I am seeing the world in a new light, and I hope that my experience shines a little bit of that light on everyone around me.
I got my results from the biopsy around 10:00am on Tuesday the 3rd. The doctor said he was expecting to find a infection, but that instead...I have lung cancer. He said he was shocked, that I have no business having lung cancer, and he didn't understand it. He said it was possible that it had come from another part of my body, or that it had already started to spread from my lung. He said he was going to try to get authorization from my insurance to get a PET scan done and that he was referring me to a lung surgeon. He said that we needed to hope that the PET scan would show that the cancer was only in my lung, because if it was anywhere else, things would get much more complicated. I didn't cry, I think I was in complete shock. Nobody expected this. I called Matthew and told him, we were both totally devastated. I am only 30 years old, and I don't even smoke! How could this be happening to me? I broke the news to everyone else, and asked for prayers and good thoughts that the cancer would be confined to my lung. The doctors office called later that day, and said not to expect the insurance approval until Wednesday. Then they called back an hour later and said it was approved, and the nuclear medicine department of St. V's got me an appointment for 7:45 on Thursday morning to get the scan done. This scan was really important, because it would show us if the cancer had spread.
Tuesday night was so hard, and I broke down in Matthews arms. I cried and hollered that it wasn't fair, I was only 30, why me, I didn't deserve this! I have two small children to take care of, I couldn't leave my family. We have too many plans, too many things we want to do, too many things to see and experience together. I felt like my world had cracked in half, and I was about crawling out of my skin, feeling emotions ranging from really positive to absolute devastation. I knew how important it was to keep a good attitude, but how do you do that when your world has just fallen apart? I didn't know how I was going to make it until the next week (when they told us we would have the PET results) to find out if it had spread. I knew that my chances of surviving this were much lower if it had. I tried to think of all the positive things that I knew - in my 1st CT scan they did my abdomen also, and there hadn't been cancer there, that none of my lymph nodes in my lung had shown up on any of the CT scans as inflamed, that the tumor was in a "good" place (bottom of my lung), instead of at the top or middle of my lung where it would be harder to remove, that I was young and healthy. But every time I was riding the wave of positive thoughts, a bad one would sneak in and knock me to me knees again. It was hard to do anything else than think about living and dying.
On Wednesday morning, I talked to the surgeons office, they said they couldn't get me in until the 18th of this month. I started crying, and said "oh, okay" and the sweet receptionist said "Hold on, I have to talk to the doctor about something else, so I will call you back". She called me back with the great news that they could get me in this Friday at 9:30! I was worried that I wouldn't have the PET scan results back before then, because they told me it would take 2-5 days to get them back. I wasn't sure if it would be a waste of time to see him before we knew what we were dealing with or not. But I was grateful to have the appointment and figured we could at least ask questions.
Thursday morning I went for the PET scan. I was taken to a room and given an IV, and then the nurse came back with a small metal container. As she was hooking it up to my IV, she said "Now, because this is radioactive material, you are now going to be radioactive and you should try to stay 3 feet away from your kids today, and use a different bathroom than them, don't hug them or snuggle with them". I immediately started to tear up....here I was having to have radioactive crap injected in my vein, I had just learned I have cancer at 30, a kind of cancer that has a very low survival rate, I am having to undergo all these scary tests, and now I cant even cuddle with my babies? That was a very low moment for me, and she quickly reassured me that it was just a precaution, and that the medicine had a 90 minute 1/2 life, meaning that every 90 minutes, half of it would leave my body. So I felt better, but still....scary stuff. I then had to lay in that room by myself for 1 hour, to give the injection time to work. Basically how a PET scan works is that they inject you with this radioactive glucose stuff, and since cancer cells love sugar, they absorb more than regular cells. So after waiting an hour, they took me into the CT scan machine, and I laid there for 30 minutes while the machine scanned me head to mid thigh. I asked her if there was any way that we could get the results rushed, because I had an appointment with the surgeon the next day. She said "Sure, I can have it read this morning and at your Doctors office by noon". I was so happy, I almost cried again...understandably, I have been very emotional the last few days, and crying at just about everything.
I went home and told Matthew that today was going to be the day we would find out. I was excited, but now more nervous than ever. What if it was bad news? How would I do what I needed to do - to pick myself up again and fight? I was trying so hard to stay positive, but its so hard when you don't even know what is going on. Aimee and the kids came over and (staying 3 feet away from me) provided me with the distraction and support that I most needed. I am so grateful to have such a beautiful friend to help me through this! They left when I went to pick Killian and his friend Patrick up from school, we had scheduled the play date earlier in the week, and I didn't want to cancel. Shortly after arriving home, I called the doctors because I hadn't heard back from them...I left another message. About 15 minutes later, the phone rang, and my heart felt stopped....it was the Doctor. He told me....
That the cancer was only in my lung! Yahooo! He said they couldn't find any evidence of it anywhere else in my body, not in my lymph nodes or anywhere. I almost fell over I was so happy. He said that everything looked really positive, that the kind of cancer I have is very slow to grow and spread, and that the placement (bottom of my lung) made it much "harder" for it to spread around. This was the very best news we could have hoped for in a situation like this, and I know that everyone's prayers and good thoughts really helped get us to this point. I called Matthew, and then everyone else, to give them the great news. I think everyone was high on happiness that day!
Today Matthew and I met with the lung surgeon. He is actually a senior cardiothoratic surgeon, and a very cool guy. He introduced himself with his first name, took the time to really listen to us and talk with us, and even showed us the PET scan pictures, and some of my other Xrays. I have 100% complete faith in him. Here is what he said would happen on surgery day. He will make the incision along my right side, spread open my ribs to get access to the lung, and then he would remove the bottom lobe of my right lung. Luckily the right side has 3 lobes to work with, instead of just 2 like the left side! Then he would biopsy all the surrounding lymph nodes in my lung, to be tested to make sure the cancer really hasn't spread. He said he would also run some tests on the cancer mass once they removed it, and we will determine from those results if I need to meet with an Oncologist about more treatment. He will stitch me up, and put in a chest tube, and then I will be moved the the critical care unit until I am stable enough to get a room. The surgery is supposed to take about 4 hours total. Then I will stay in the hospital until the chest tube can come out, usually 5-14 days. We are hoping for sooner rather than later! I wont be able to drive for a week or so after I get home, because I will be on pain pills. I cant lift anything over 20 pounds for 6-8 weeks, and he said that after about 8 weeks I should be back to normal! This was all really positive news, but the best was yet to come! He checked his calendar, and said he could get me into surgery the following Friday, February 13th! I think its almost unheard of to get your cancer diagnosed and then have surgery to remove it within 10 days. Pretty amazing, I am so thankful to the doctor, and his secretary for getting me in sooner....I cant imagine having had to wait for that February 18th appointment!
So I go this coming Monday for a lung function test at the the hospital, and the Thursday afternoon I go for an xray (I have now lost track of how many of these I have had!) and then a couple hours of pre-admittance stuff. Blood tests, paperwork, and meeting with the surgical team. I have to say...I never ever thought I would be so excited to be having a major surgery done! I am just beside myself with relief that the cancer hasn't spread, that we have a great chance of this being the last time I have to experience it, and that we can get in and get it out so quickly. I actually feel like a very fortunate person, and blessed beyond belief.
People always say a near death experience changes the way that you look at your life. While this isn't exactly in that same category, it has changed my life completely, 100%. I feel like I have been given a second chance, a life to live that I might have lost, and the time to make sure that I live it with no regrets. The laughter of my children is something I will never take for grated again, the sound is so sweet to me. I linger longer in my husbands embrace, cherishing the moment I have with him. I will be forever changed by this cancer, and I cant help but think its a good thing. I have known for some time that we needed to get in better shape, to treat our bodies better, to eat more organic, homegrown, and homemade food. To educate ourselves about our environment, and most important of all....the enjoy each day we have to the absolute fullest. This was the push (alright - shove) that we needed to get ourselves in gear.
None of us are guaranteed our time here, but its seems so often that we busy ourselves with so many things that don't really matter, that we forget that each day is special. Each day we have with people we love, the time we get to spend with them, and the memories made...that's what life is about. Not the cell phones, the big TVs, the fancy dinners, the new car...it all pales in comparison the the hug of a child, or the laughs over coffee with your best friend. I am seeing the world in a new light, and I hope that my experience shines a little bit of that light on everyone around me.