Tests, Tests, and More Tests

So I know it's been a little while, most of you are probably on the edge of your seats just dying to hear how things are going.  Right?  Anyway, so here is where we are as of...now!

The whole month of August was spent without insurance so no progress during that month.  Everything was put on hold as I mentioned before.  Our new insurance started in September so the first week of September was probably one of the busiest, craziest weeks of my life.  On Tuesday the 2nd I had surgery to have the port put in my chest.  Another early morning hospital visit and adventure.  Hospitals are kind of fun.  The staff is really friendly and fun to joke around with.  I can't believe that they trust people to be in their little waiting room by themselves with all those cool gadgets around to play with when they aren't looking.  wink wink.  I always have the urge to go streaking with those backless gowns and funny socks they give you to wear.  I was super sore after the port was put in.  It felt really weird having that in because it's now a huge bump under my skin.  It is fun to show off though.  I now consider myself more and more like Ironman.  Minus all the money and cool stuff.  The port will be super useful come chemo time but it's just strange to have in.  I'll have another gnarly scar from it though.  I'm probably too excited about all these scars.

On Friday the 5th I had the PET Scan which is a full body scan with contrast and color that is pretty cool to look at.  I went into the cancer center early early in the morning.  This time they take you in a little room with a "comfy" chair, it wasn't that comfortable, and put in an IV and they had this tin can that looked like a military canister for bullets and pulled out a shot in a fat metal casing.  Looked pretty freaky, but it has radioactive stuff that they put into the blood stream to make the cancer stand out more.  After they put the radioactive stuff in I had to sit in the tiny little room for exactly one hour relaxing allowing the stuff to spread through out my body and blood stream.  That was boring, I didn't have my phone, ipad, tv, book, nothing.  Just me and a little room for one hour.  I also had this goofy red drink that I had to sip on for the hour.  The guy said that most people say that it tastes pretty good.  Obviously he has never tried it because it was ok, but I wouldn't say that it was good.  The scan itself took about 25 minutes and I was on a long table that moved in and out of this big tube thing.  I couldn't move for 25 minutes I just had to lay back and enjoy the ride and noise of the machine.  When I was at the doctors checking out the results I got to see all the pictures those were pretty cool because you can see everything.  My whole chest and neck was covered in the cancer stuff, and I almost put my hand up to cover my junk when he scrolled down on the picture...because like I said you can see everything.

Then on Monday the 8th I had the bone marrow biopsy.  Another early morning hospital visit.  The bone marrow sucks.  I wouldn't want to do that again.  I was even sedated for it, but you still feel it kind of.  This test took forever, at least the prep did.  The actual bone marrow part took six minutes.  I had about an hour and a half of prep stuff: blood work, cleaning the area, x-ray, getting all ready etc.  I wish I had better eye sight because I couldn't wear my contacts or glasses so I can't see anything hardly but when I got in the room I was trying to look at all the tools laid out for the biopsy.  Oh! in the room that they do it there is also the x-ray thing and I, of course, was wearing the backless gown thing and I had to lay on my stomach with my butt poking up in the air.  I felt sorry for all the doctors and nurses having to stare at that sight.  I'm sure doctors get paid nice, but I saw some of the other people waiting to do the same...you couldn't pay me enough to stare at those butts all day.  So they started to sedate me and said that I would start drifting off in a minute but no drifting happened.  I was still looking around minding my own business when I felt the needle with the local anesthetic, that stung like a b.  Not a bee, but a B.  I winced at that and the doctor said oh, he's still up better give him some more whatever the sedation stuff is.  So they pumped in some more and I'm sure the looking around I was doing was more like an animal going down in slow motion.  Then I felt the metal straw thing that they tap into the bone.  Tap, Tap, Tap, I remember saying "ooo" because I could feel the tapping.  They pumped in a little bit more of the feel good stuff and then I was out.  Afterwards, I had to stay at the hospital recovering for another two hours waiting for the sedation to wear off and so they could keep an eye on how my butt was doing.  Nice thing was I got all the food I wanted so I had steak and eggs and french toast and juice.

The results from all these tests were great for us.  I'm just a stage 2 so it's only in my neck and chest, but since July the lymph nodes and cancer junk has more than doubled in size which is why my chest is sooooo tight and it's difficult to breathe deep.  There is a lot of pressure on my chest and neck.  Sleeping is difficult at night because I can't breathe like normal.  I run out of energy because I can't breathe like normal.  That part of life is tuff but very doable.  We make it work.  Just have to know how to pace yourself and take it easy.  Two things that I have never done.  I work less which is nice, gives me more time to do things that I enjoy.  I play bass guitar in a band now.  Tons of fun.  I start chemo here soon now and we will be saying goodbye to our friend Hodge.  I'm going to start with 8 treatments of chemo and then do some radiation treatments and they think they can do it with that.

You know I still get asked all the time how I'm doing.  Which is great I love that there are people that care about me.  I tell them that I'm doing great and life is good.  I'm really being honest in that.  Life is great!  I ride my motorcycle, I play bass guitar in a band, I play with my dog, I have an awesome wife, I've been having a lot of fun now that I'm working less.  I am doing things that I enjoy.  I'm more positive about life than ever.  Occasionally I still have people ask how I'm doing, I tell them great, and they look at me a little more sternly and ask "no, how are you really doing?"  I'm still doing great.

I hope if you read this that you know that I hope you enjoy life.  Take time to get away from the craziness of life and take a moment to enjoy that moment.  Just breathe and realize that life is good.  Go for a hike quit watching TV for a minute...unless you're watching a Royals or Chiefs game.  But seriously enjoy a day.  Go to the zoo, go feed a duck, skip rocks on water, just get out.  I've done that lately and I can tell you life with cancer is more enjoyable than the life I had before of working, school, and being crazy busy.  I still want to work and do school, but now I have a whole new realization that work is secondary and life comes first.