Imaging Results... Part 1

So I had a marginally frustrating day today. First, I had an appointment with my oncologist, who is at this big health campus on the south side of town. My town isn't huge, but the onc's office is about as far away as you can get. So anyway, I show up at 10:30, and my onc walks in and says, "Did we make a scheduling mistake?" I was a little annoyed because I had called the week before, right before I got on the plane to go to Cali, to make sure the onc wanted to see me before my imaging appointment. And the person I spoke to said yes, she does want to see you before the imaging. So anyway, after I get there, she says I can just go, and I make an appointment for NEXT Monday to discuss the mammogram and ultrasound results, which will determine my next round of treatment.

So I leave and decide to get some breakfast, even though I have to be back at this health campus around 12:30 for my mammo/ultrasound. I head to The Rainbow because I've decided I want to eat their green eggs and ham. The Rainbow is probably about 15-20 minutes away. I get there and order a green tea, and as the waitress goes off to make it, I realize that I have a lunch menu and I've missed breakfast. ARGH! I decide to drink the tea and head elsewhere for food, but the tea is really gross. So I leave $3 and am getting frustrated.

Then I went home, but only got to be there for a few minutes because I had to go to my imaging appointment. And when I got there, there was a lot of waiting time. YARGH.

Enough blah blah blah, I'll get to the good stuff. I didn't get to speak with the radiologist; I guess he tells the tech to tell me stuff. But she told me that he said my tumors had shrunk considerably and that's good. The chemo is working, which we already knew. He also said that there was nothing new on my films, which is really good too, and I hadn't considered that new stuff could be happening. I asked the tech how big the tumors are now, and she said one's about 1.3 cm, and I think she said the other was a little smaller. They were 2.5-ish cm before, so they're about half as big. And according to what I hear, the next drug is one that REALLY smashes cancer.

I was really hoping that the techs wouldn't be able to find any cancer in me, but in the end I don't really know if that was a reasonable, typical, or even possible scenario. I'll know more about that next week. I am glad that they are shrinking though. And I still have a considerable amount of chemo left to do, so hopefully when I'm done there will be hardly anything left.

Speaking of which, tomorrow is my last Taxol infusion! I'm really happy about that, but at the same time a little worried that I'll be missing Taxol once I start the next phase. I think the next drugs are going to be harder. But I'll deal with that when the time comes, no use fretting over it now. It's been so long since I felt "normal" and "good" that I hardly remember what that's like. And that's a good thing because it makes it so I don't really miss it.

So adios Taxol, this is our last week together. Let's make it count!