To start, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas season and the New Year is shaping up to be an awesome one for you.
I had a wonderful Christmas. Had my Christmas Eve party again (first time since I moved away) then spent the day with great friends.
Unfortunately my New Year has so far been a roller coaster ride. As I said in my last post, I was to have another CT scan. I had this in the beginning of the month and about an hour after the scan, my Dr. calls me that he wants to see me the next day. Oh Oh, can you see something unpleasant coming? I figured that maybe the NSIP had progressed and he wanted to start me on meds or something.
I was concerned, but not overly but I took my friend with me to the appointment as a 2nd set of ears just in case. It turned out that my NSIP hadn't changed much at all but there is a new kid on the block. I have a 3 to 3.5 cm mass in my lung. The Dr. said he felt pretty certain it is cancer but sent me for a PET scan to get a better idea and to a lung surgeon to discuss the results of that scan. He felt that as it appeared to be a localized mass, then the surgeon could cut out part of my lung and that would be that. Ok, now I'm scared but I can deal with a surgery and maybe some meds or something.
Fast forward 2 weeks and I've now had the scan and am seeing the surgeon for the results. Again I have brought my friend with me for support (who is absolutely amazingly awesome for coming with me when we had to leave home at 6:30 am to get there!). The surgeon (who is a dashingly handsome and very young man) tells me that it is almost 100% certain that it is cancerous. Good news is that the growth seems to be alone and hasn't spread to other areas that were scanned and it is in the upper lobe and my NSIP is mostly in the upper lobes so basically they'd be chopping out the diseased portion and leaving the healthier. Bad news (other than the C word) is that the growth is very, very close to my heart (yes, I do have one) which could mean the option of surgery would be out. There are a couple other options, one being mega radiation directly on the tumour but again because of the location this one might be out as well. That leaves chemotherapy and less intense but more wide spread radiation. Because of the NSIP and the location of the tumour, the surgeon intends to take my case to a multi-disciplinary meeting were a group of specialists will discuss my options. This makes me feel better because it will no longer just be 1 Dr.'s opinion but a group of them.
Now I have to have 3 more tests. An echocardiogram to make sure my heart is functioning properly, a biopsy to rule out the slim chance that it is an infection and not cancer (infection definitely gets my vote!), and another CT scan - this time of my brain to make sure the cancer hasn't spread there. I'm interested in if they actually find anything up there - some days I would swear there is just a starving gerbil running the show.
I'm trying my best to find something positive about all this but am having a hard time doing it. Only thing is that I'm losing weight without trying. Hell of a diet plan, huh!
I should know a lot more in a couple of weeks after all the testing is done. In the meantime, I'll try to keep busy to keep my mind off this huge elephant in the room.
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