The sprint and the marathon

SO... let me tell you about my day today... Blood pressure is normal, so is the oxygen level and the weight is up 2 pounds from December 21st.

Hematology Oncology docs came in first... the warm up act. Not much to say since their involvement has been relegated to second tier citizens. Blah blah, you are doing so well....blah blah...you look so good.

Then came the radiology group, I really like this doctor and his intern, in a very reserved way, he answers questions clearly and I feel that he gets it. To him the fight with cancer is personal. A few more questions and then the interesting stuff starts to flow... the tumor has been reduced by about 50% (which is a good thing) however, it is currently like a ring around a finger just so happens the finger is the superior vena cava. It is also laying on top of the Aorta (the hope is that there is no invasion on the aorta), and the pulmonary artery. They discuss the fact that the thoracic surgeon who I meet with next has interesting possibilities for me to consider but that if I don't choose any, there is another experimental radiation technique called the cyber-knife or radiation surgery that can be done. Choices are available, but I am not in a good mood, nothing seems promising, and everything seems painful. Prognosis at this point is anywhere between 18 months and 3 years, in other words statistical #'s that need to be beaten.

They leave the room and we wait, and we wait some more; we had to wait 30 minutes for the thoracic surgeons intern to come visit and ask the dumbest questions in the universe... at this point I am cranky and the rest of the gang is getting anxious... we have gotten nowhere in the choice department and we all seem to have different opinions of what has happened so far. Think of it as we met The Riddler from batman and we can't figure out what the fuck they are talking about.

AND THEN 1 hour late ...the guy with the nimble fingers walks in... Dr such and such, thoracic surgery.... he proceeds to explain that a 50% reduction is very good and that IF there was to be surgery there would be a series of steps and tests that I need to pass. However.. the news is that a series of surgical events can occur to take out what it is expected to be all of the tumor. This sounds interesting...

First, it would be a bypass surgical intervention, the ring and that section of the vein would be removed and replaced with a portion of a vein from my leg. Then, they would peel off the section of the tumor that is hopefully just laying on top of the aorta. IF it was not just laying down on it, bypass #2 would occur. And now the part that for whatever reason has me on a tailspin.... a portion (1/3 minimum) of the lung would be removed. Granted you have over capacity, but for whatever reason this just annoys me. The issue being that the tumor is also laying/touching the pulmonary artery and in order to remove it, you would be removing the blood supply of the lung, so you might as well deal with it right there and then.

All of this will occur in a crazy sprint in the next 2 weeks. Next week I have to do 1) a head MRI, it seem that lung cancer tends to spread to the brain 2) a chest MRI, 3) a bronchioscopy ( a biopsy to make sure that nothing has spread to the lymph nodes) 4) and echocardiogram 5) a lung capacity respiration test ( to determine what would happen if they remove one lung) and I could swear there was one more. I have to pass all of them to be able to sit with the surgeon and schedule a date for the surgery...but we all know how I get about tests...a little competitive! and by the way, only 1-2% of lung cancers develop the way mine has... I feel so special!