Pouting over

Let's be honest, I will probably never be done pouting. It seems to be my thing. 😏 I felt sorry for myself for a while last night and for a while today, but I think I feel it turning around. 

I asked Dr Lee my usual string of probably irritating questions yesterday. What next? When? Why scans, how often? What if I need new drugs? What are they? What if that doesn't work... Is it possible that my cough made it look bigger!? (It isn't) 

My friend Chris compared me to those students we have that after they leave, we just put our head on our desk and are thankful they're gone. That's totally me with Dr Lee.

 She says things like "people do this for 10-20 years and are just fine!" I respond with "I want more than 10-20 years." So so selfish.

I read an article today on immunotherapy. I have heard of it for a while, but haven't read too much. Researching this world is a little scary, so I'm hesitant. Basically they get your own immune system to kill cancer cells. Its still in experimental stages and in clinical trials, but drs are getting excited about it.

 I read about it on cancer.org, which is exciting that it wasn't hippieshealyou.com. I feel like it was fairly reputable. 😬 

I can totally handle chronic conditions.

Anyway, life is getting back to normal today, and ready for spring break! 

Post appt...

I have to admit, I'm not thrilled. Dr. Lee said exactly what I thought she would say, she even said "I'm satisfied." For some reason though, I'm not. I want the antidote. 

I will continue to do what I have been doing and see where we are at in 4 months. More scans and bloodwork then. I don't get why my body has created this. I'm freaking healthy, why won't it just kill it and have it gone?

I know myself well enough to know that my frustration will be short lived. I will feel fine probably by tomorrow, but right now I kind of want to pout. 

Brent said it's not great news, but its definitely not bad news either. It could be much worse. We keep with this plan as long as we can, and then on to the next thing if we have to. I don't want to have to. I want to be the exceptional miracle that doctors wonder why I have magically healed. Is that too much to ask? 

Bottom line, I'm great. I feel great, my family is healthy and happy and all is well. I will pout for a bit tonight and be back to my jolly self in the morning. 

It's Dr Lee day!

Regularly scheduled appointment today with Dr Lee. I usually have some nerves before going to see Dr Lee, and I'm sure today will be no different. I have to remind myself though, I always feel better after having talked to her. She throws out phrases like "is no problem" when we discuss tumor things and helps me keep it in perspective. I think she will probably tell me we'll continue the drugs I'm taking and review things in 6 months. We'll look at pictures of my lungs, and I'll get to see the blurry mass that is my kidney stone buddy. 

I'll let you know how it goes!

Stay the course

The nurse called with the scan results. They're not the greatest results ever, but I feel pretty ok with it.

The size of the tumor has grown "verrrry minimally." It was 9.6 mm and is now 10.4 mm. When this whole gig started it was 11mm, so we're still slightly smaller than it used to be. I meet with Dr. Lee next Thursday to see what she has to say, but the nurse said at this point we're staying the course.

I didn't freak out when the nurse called, which is a nice change. Her news didn't stress me out, however over the last few days I find myself again wondering if I should change my diet again. Should I cut this out, should I do that differently, should I meditate more… blegh. I do strongly dislike how my brain does that. I was finally getting to the point where I felt like I was on a good path, I wasn't thinking about it all the time, I could be "normal" and now that stupid little tiny sucker is slightly bigger. Ugh.

There is a variability in scan results from time to time. For this reason Dr. Lee has told me that millimeter changes don't really concern her. The last change was a millimeter bigger, and now this one is another millimeter… maybe that will cause her stress. There were a couple of other smaller dudes in there also; they are unchanged which is good news.

Sometimes I wish I knew more about how all these technical machines work, and sometimes I'm glad I don't. The kids have had a cough (Cannon had a little pneumonia), and I've had a cough off and on. It's minimal, but a couple of days before the scan I was coughing fairly regularly. I want that to be the reason that it looks bigger. I want her to tell me that it looks bigger because of a virus, but I don't even know if that's likely or possible. The cough is now better by the way, in case you were concerned that I was coughing up a lung. I'm not. It's 99% gone.

In other exciting news my kidney stone is bigger. That painful sucker. I have a referral to go see a urologist to have them possibly zap it with sound waves and break it into pieces. Those pieces then get flushed out in a supposedly less painful manner… yeeeeee!

Overall, I really feel like I got good news. It seems strange, but I feel like I'm in a really good spot. At one point I asked Dr. Lee what if the drug doesn't work. She just said "then we try another one, there are tons of them out there." And more and more are being developed all the time. Even if this news means we try something else, I'm ok with that. Things are still looking pretty good.

Scaaaaaan daaaayyy

Today was scan day. There aren't any results for a while, but this part is over! I had some anxiety going in which is kind of weird considering I don't even learn anything. I just lay there and "take a deep breath and hold it...   Breath normally"

I think Siri also works in medical machines. 

I feel relieved that it's done. I meet with Dr Lee on the 19th and I'm guessing info will come then. It's in my chart that today was just a check up on progress type deal. That made me smile to hear the little injector dude say it. His name was Gavin, and he may be the first medical professional I have ever referred to as a kid. I felt like I wanted to rub his hair and tell him good job when I was done. Ha! So cute that little sucker.

Life is great. My mom reminded me to focus on all the good in my life... There's a lot! 

We have had a few days of playing outside with a big yellow thing in the sky. I could get used to that.