Scanxiety

I went through one PET scan prior to starting treatment, and that, along with some biopsies, confirmed the spread to my lymph nodes under my left arm, and to one spot in my liver. I was metastatic from diagnosis, and I started chemotherapy almost immediately. From December 10 to May 13, I never missed a single three-week-on, one-week-off chemo infusion. I had several CT scans during my weeks off, and they all said the same thing: each scan revealed the tumors had been reduced since the last scan. The chemotherapy was very effective in obliterating the tumor in my  breast and under my arm, and almost wiped out what was in my liver.

But I was starting to show the strain from cytotoxic treatment, I was becoming more wan, growing weaker, more bad days than good. It was time, my oncologist decided, to give me a break from chemo and try a different approach.

I'd like to take a moment to underline something here. He decided to give me a break from chemotherapy. Not end. I was not finished with chemotherapy. I would have to resume it someday in the future, but for now, he wanted to try to maintain it with anti-hormonal medication and keep it stable.

If it worked.

For several months, I received a once-monthly Zoladex injection to the abdomen, and every night without fail, took a Femara pill. Their purpose was to block all estrogen in my body, to put me in a chemical menopause, to starve the ER/PR positive cancer cells and keep them from growing. The question was if it would work at all.

Because it's not a matter of if it fails. It's a matter of when. We could only hope that it would work for a long while, and we didn't know if it would, or how well it would work.

August 19th was my first CT scan since then. It was early Tuesday morning. I had until Friday afternoon to get the results. Those hours in between became agony as I logged into my patient portal, only to find the results weren't posted yet. In the past, they were usually up in a day or two. Why weren't they up yet? Was it because there were bad results and they wanted to wait until my oncologist had a chance to break the news? What was going on? Would I have progression? Was the cancer growing despite the drugs? Would I have to go back on chemo? Maybe I just needed an increase in dosage of my current drugs. Would I have to have another biopsy to find out if I was still ER/PR positive? I know that sometimes tumor cells can change on you, and what's positive can become negative. What was going on?

I tried to sleep and would end up staring at the wall, holding my pillow in a death grip, my heart racing. I took maybe one or two Ativan more than I should, just to keep the anxiety from becoming a full-blown panic attack. Friday came and I logged back into the patient portal, expecting to see the results now. Still nothing. The hours crawled by until it was time to go to the appointment.

I popped another Ativan.

I was going to stop at the in-clinic pharmacy to have my Femara refilled while I was in my appointment, but my partner stopped me, pointing out that we didn't know what we'd find when we went in there, if he'd even keep me on the same medications at all.

Finally we were back in the exam room and my oncologist walked in. I stepped in with a few idle chatter comments, asking him how he was, that sort of thing, in an effort to not appear too anxious. He saw right through it, and I blurted it out less than a minute in. What were my results?

I was stable. No sign of progression. The Femara and Zoladex were working.

"I'm doing fine, then?" I asked him.

"No," he replied. "You're doing great. Fine is just average. You're doing better than average."

I told him I was glad to hear that, because I wanted to be around when Mars One puts the first humans on Mars in 2025.

I'm stable. It's working. Maybe it's just for now, but for now, damnitall, it's working. And it's brilliant.

The relief meant the Ativan no longer had to work to keep me calm, so when I got home, I went to bed and actually slept.