As part of the preparation for my PET scan, I could not eat any carbs, sugar, or drink caffeinated drinks. That was yesterday...for 24 hours. Fun.
PET scan this morning: I arrived at 6:15 AM. After the usual paperwork, I was escorted to a quiet, small room where the technician first pricked my finger for a glucose test like diabetic patients must do. He then started an IV and pushed some sort of glucose mixture into it, then took the IV out of my arm. I told him that I have had bad experiences with IVs in the hospital, but he did a great job, barely felt it.
Next, he reclined the chair, gave me a pillow and blanket and said that I needed to stay still for an hour while the glucose traveled throughout my body. I promptly went to sleep.
After an hour, he woke me, and I went to the scanner next for another hour of lying completely still. I slept more, luckily.
And that's it....rather uneventful. Back home around 9:15. But exhausted...and hungry.
Hungry, because, you see, I had to take my radioactive tracer dose at 12:30 in Alexandria and could not have anything to eat prior to it. So I continued in my hunger, waiting to go to Alexandria.
While in Alexandria getting my tracer dose, I met a man also getting his tracer dose in follow up for thyroid cancer. He has been a patient of Dr. Pun (new endocrinologist, remember?) since the mid-90s for other issues and then Dr. Pun found the thyroid cancer too. He told me how much he likes and trusts Dr. Pun. It was nice to get a good endorsement from someone else.
What's next? 8:00 AM tomorrow is the whole body scan.
On top of it all, I am still fighting this cold. Feel worse today than yesterday. It is settling in my chest as a cough, and I am so tired of it. Morgan is home today from school with the same symptoms. Ugh.
The mental part of the scans and tests, I think, is worse than the physical. Even when I have a positive attitude about it all, which I do, there are still thoughts that creep in like...
"It will be great to finally be cancer free...but what if I'm not."
"What if this is the start of "round three" with cancer."
That definitely all came back walking into the hospital today. When the technician was talking with me about the arm band and how everyone would keep asking me my name and birthday, I assured him I was an old pro at this as I had been admitted to that hospital twice in the last year for thyroid cancer surgery.
Sometimes I step back and think about statements like that....I'm an old pro at cancer surgery? Really? Or my comment to the PET scan technician talking about IVs and how I'm used to getting stuck for IVs, blood tests, etc. Am I really used to it?
I've come a long way in a year, down a road and back with cancer. Ready to take a fork in it, and take a different direction.
OK, whinning over...for now.
PET scan this morning: I arrived at 6:15 AM. After the usual paperwork, I was escorted to a quiet, small room where the technician first pricked my finger for a glucose test like diabetic patients must do. He then started an IV and pushed some sort of glucose mixture into it, then took the IV out of my arm. I told him that I have had bad experiences with IVs in the hospital, but he did a great job, barely felt it.
Next, he reclined the chair, gave me a pillow and blanket and said that I needed to stay still for an hour while the glucose traveled throughout my body. I promptly went to sleep.
After an hour, he woke me, and I went to the scanner next for another hour of lying completely still. I slept more, luckily.
And that's it....rather uneventful. Back home around 9:15. But exhausted...and hungry.
Hungry, because, you see, I had to take my radioactive tracer dose at 12:30 in Alexandria and could not have anything to eat prior to it. So I continued in my hunger, waiting to go to Alexandria.
While in Alexandria getting my tracer dose, I met a man also getting his tracer dose in follow up for thyroid cancer. He has been a patient of Dr. Pun (new endocrinologist, remember?) since the mid-90s for other issues and then Dr. Pun found the thyroid cancer too. He told me how much he likes and trusts Dr. Pun. It was nice to get a good endorsement from someone else.
What's next? 8:00 AM tomorrow is the whole body scan.
On top of it all, I am still fighting this cold. Feel worse today than yesterday. It is settling in my chest as a cough, and I am so tired of it. Morgan is home today from school with the same symptoms. Ugh.
The mental part of the scans and tests, I think, is worse than the physical. Even when I have a positive attitude about it all, which I do, there are still thoughts that creep in like...
"It will be great to finally be cancer free...but what if I'm not."
"What if this is the start of "round three" with cancer."
That definitely all came back walking into the hospital today. When the technician was talking with me about the arm band and how everyone would keep asking me my name and birthday, I assured him I was an old pro at this as I had been admitted to that hospital twice in the last year for thyroid cancer surgery.
Sometimes I step back and think about statements like that....I'm an old pro at cancer surgery? Really? Or my comment to the PET scan technician talking about IVs and how I'm used to getting stuck for IVs, blood tests, etc. Am I really used to it?
I've come a long way in a year, down a road and back with cancer. Ready to take a fork in it, and take a different direction.
OK, whinning over...for now.
I so feel for you. I had my ultrasound on my "suspicious" neck lumps and liver today. Ive felt all day like ive been here before. I feel like its the nightmare starting all over again.
ReplyDeleteMy answers tomorrow.
*hugs*
"When you come to a fork in the road, take it..."
ReplyDeleteYou call that whiny? You need to work on your whining. If I had cancer, I could do much better whining than that. I would call that merely mild and deserved weariness. Stay the course, you can do it. Glad you have a new doc--Dr. Pun? I would make a pun but that would be too easy...
ReplyDelete