Expect The Worst, and Hope For The Best |4-21-16|

When you're fighting cancer, you hear a lot of clichés. You "expect the worst, and hope for the best." We are always practicing to "Expect the Unexpected."

Yesterday was Mike's PET/CT scans and then today we went back to discuss the results. It took about 2 hours to do all of the scans, and I admit, I wasn't so excited about sitting in the waiting room by myself that whole time. Luckily, my girl, Leslie came out and was able to keep me company for most of that time. It's amazing how long I could talk about home design and the gorgeousness that is a classic white farmhouse. I love you, Leslie, for being my distraction and my friend during that time.

We went home and tried really hard to not think about what the scan results would bring. The doctors have all sounded very confident that after 4 rounds of the D-A R-Epoch chemo that the cancer would be gone and then we'll just have 2 more rounds to "clean up" whatever cells might not have been detected on the scan. They told us that there is a very good chance that Mike will be declared cancer free and in remission! I'm not going to lie. High Hopes over here! They did reassure us that even if it isn't completely gone, that there are still plenty of other options of chemo regimens that they can try. I'm thinking, "Not going there. The cancer is gone. We are 6 weeks away from starting to get back to our normal life!!"

Today, my expectation was that we walk into the room and we are presented with his results as well as either a high five, or "Here's the plan, here are your options" type of conversation. Let me not drag this out and say that, that is not even close to how it went. There had been some mix up with getting Mike's prior PET scan images loaded into their system so the Radiologist only had the PET report to compare this one to. The nurse practitioner came in, talked about how his labs are doing, and then says, "You had a scan yesterday, right? Let's look and see if we can find the results." Red Flag. I needed the doctor or NP to come into that room PREPARED to deliver these results to us. This might not have felt like a big deal to them. Something they do everyday. But to US- this is our FUTURE. Our LIFE. I got a little close to  "crazy" end of the spectrum. Whoops. I was irritated. I still feel like it was justified.

Moving on. The Results.

GOOD NEWS!! and not so good news. The good news is that the lymphoma was not apparent in his neck or abdomen any longer. So the chemo is working! The not so good news is that the bulk of the disease, in his mediastinum (chest- think around heart, and around his windpipe) is still housing this damn cancer.

The NP told us that they were going to get in contact with Dr. Bennani, Mike's oncologist at Mayo. Also, Dr. Sirridge was going to contact a few other hematologist/oncolgists to discuss what they should do now. Do they increase the dose? Change chemo regimens? We left with a lot more questions than answers.

As soon as we got in the car, Mike was on the phone with Dr. Bennani's office. When you have been treated so well by an office, a doctor, you just don't feel satisfied until you've talked with them. When Mike talked to the secretary & requested to have Dr. Bennani paged, the secretary told him that another secretary was on the phone with the NP from the office we just walked out of. They were already getting in contact with Mayo, so that was a nice sign.

In less than 2 hours, Dr. Bennani was calling Mike back and she had a plan. She already had his recent PET/CT reports, but is waiting on the images. Based on the report, she is suggesting that they go back in to biopsy the cancer in his chest. She thinks that the Non-Hodgkin's part of the lymphoma has responded to the chemo, but the Hodgkin's hasn't, but that she won't really know what we are working with, with the mediastinum disease until they biopsy it.

We will know more tomorrow, but she talked like they are going to try to get him on the schedule next week up at Mayo for this biopsy.

We have went through so many emotions today. I started the day feeling so confident. I thought we were |..| this close to getting our life back. Then I was angry, and shocked. And then scared. And now I'm feeling good. We are going to get this thing behind us, eventually. It might not happen as easily or quickly as we thought, but we will get there. I know we have a lot of amazing doctors on our side. We are so thankful for everything that ALL of the doctors and NP's, and nurses have done for us.

End Note:

We are making progress. We did get some good news today! The cancer isn't spreading. It is GONE in some areas.

We are NOT done fighting.

We knew we were facing a bump in the road, or two. But we've got good shocks. We'll just keep expecting the worst and hoping for the best.

We'll keep our heads up.

Keep our chins up.

Keep our spirits up.

Hang in there.

And all of those other things we are reminded to do. We've Got This!

XOXO

Robin