How Do You Spend Your Holidays? (Part two: Christmas 2014)

I had the bone scan and it ultimately didn’t reveal a whole lot. The end result of this scan was that I was assigned to an oncologist who recommended a CT scan and an MRI. Lou was at the appointment and was a bit tense. In typical fashion, I kept things light, but serious and we digested the information as it was delivered by the Dr. K and his nurse. The doctor wasn’t going to commit to “cancer”, but he suspected that it was Multiple Myeloma, a blood cancer, he explained. He told us that it was incurable, but it was manageable and that he didn’t really want to get into too much detail because he wasn’t going to put the cart before the horse. That seemed reasonable.

We scheduled the CT and the MRI and guess what-- the appointments book-ended Christmas! Who’s a lucky guy? ME!!!

Not having more than just Christmas day off from work, I considered these appointments a way to at least pretend that I had a little more time off for the holidays. The CT scan was a boring and painless process that took up a couple hours of my morning. I, in typical fashion, joked with and made friends with the imaging staff. I hate to say that we had a good time, but we did.

Lou and I went to the annual Christmas Eve gathering at our Uncle Lou’s and Aunt Linda’s house that evening. This was the first opportunity for us to deliver the news about my tentative diagnosis and where we were with the process. I wasn’t too bothered by all the questions and looked at this as an opportunity to start rallying the troops and gain some support. I’m really lucky to have such an incredible extended family and not a single one of them let me down. Thank you.

We spent Christmas day with our mothers and ended the day with some close friends. This was exactly the type of day I needed and set me up for the day to follow.

I was back at hospital and ready for my MRI. Like the CT scan, the MRI was boring and mostly painless. It is fortunate that I do not suffer from claustrophobia, but rather enjoy confined spaces. I think that I spent the duration of the process imagining myself as Han Solo entombed in his block of carbonite at the end of “The Empire Strikes Back”. This could’ve been an entirely enjoyable experience for me, but whatever was wrong with me was causing the right side of my back and my right arm to cramp. I blame the hard surface on which I was laying.

Being the workhorse that I am, I went directly from hospital back to work. It was a typical workday and nothing much out of the ordinary happened until around 3:40 that afternoon. I received a call from my Dr. K and was told that they had read my MRI and found a mass on my spine. They were concerned that the mass could do permanent damage and that they would like to start radiation immediately. I asked how immediate “immediately” was and the doctor said “as soon as possible”. I don’t like to wait, so I asked if “as soon as possible” could mean “today” and he said that would be optimal. I thanked him for his call and told him I would be right down. My next call was to my boss who was off-site that day. He knew that I was going through all these tests and that my tentative diagnosis was a form of cancer, so he was very understanding about needing to leave early-- even if it was only 20 minutes earlier than my usual 4:00 dismissal. In usual form, I was calm and didn’t really feel panicked in any way, shape or form. I called Lou and delivered the news and he was also calm. I later found out that he was a disaster upon hanging up the phone. I had suspected as much, but appreciated his cool during our call.

I got into my car and headed to the cancer center not knowing whether Lou or I would arrive first. I did not rush and remained focused. I made several phone calls to those closest to us to let them know that things had escalated, but told them not to worry and said everything would be handled by those who knew what needed to be done.

My entrance to the cancer center was not met by the staff rushing around shouting orders to each other as I was strapped to a gurney and rushed away. I sauntered in and had a jovial exchange with the folks at the desk, telling them who I was and that I was expecting someone to meet me there. They opened the door for me and said that Lou was already there. I saw him looking visibly shaken in the consultation room and I certainly couldn’t blame him. The nurse asked me if I needed anything and did I understand what they would be doing to me that evening. I made some jokes, asked them make sure Lou was okay and prompted them to get the show on the road.

I won’t get into the details about my first day in radiation because it was more scanning and laying on hard surfaces and more discomfort. What I will tell you is that these folks were absolute angels-- they exist and they are here on earth. They worked late into the evening, staying hours later than they were expected and they were doing this for me. They were all in good humor, worked efficiently and kept asking if I needed anything. By this point some dinner would be good. Could someone get me dinner? No? Okay.

I let them know how much I appreciated all they were doing for me and thanked them through each step of the process. They finally delivered my first dose radiation around 7:45 that evening and once that was done, they released me back to Lou.

I must tell you that everyone from the doctors down to the maintenance workers know where they are working and these people are rightly placed here. Lou told me that the worker emptying the trash cans saw him kneeling on the floor, leaning into a chair with his face in his hands. The maintenance worker came over to Lou, gently rubbed his back and assured him that everything was going to be fine and that he would put us in his prayers if that was all right. Absolutely!

The next day was Saturday and the radiation department isn’t usually open. On this particular Saturday the radiation oncologist and one of the techs came in so I could have an immediate follow up dose so I didn’t go the whole weekend without another session.

I could complain about being sick and to have all of this come down during the Christmas holiday, but I see this as a gift. I got to meet some fine, fine people and I was able to get the process started so that I would soon feel better. The better days were definitely ahead and I couldn’t have been happier.