Quite a day yesterday.

How’s everyone?

I went to get my scan yesterday. I guess is went well, but I can’t have any caffeine until 12 pm today as a result. At 1201 I’m having a big cup of coffee. I love coffee. The whole PET Scan process was very lonely.

When you first get to the Graham Center, they make you fill out paperwork with info that’s probably already in the computer system. Everyone has a process.

I know this is stupid, but I was taken aback at how sick everyone was. I guess they look at me the same way … who knows?

The call your name and you go back to this small room with a locker, change into your PJs or a hospital gown. I chose the blue elephant PJs. Then they take you to this other room where there is a single hospital phlebotomy chair and they hook you up to an IV and with machine gun rat-a-tat speed tell you the whole sequence of events for the visit. If you can keep up it’s good info, if you can’t it really doesn’t matter.

After they check your blood sugar and kidney functions they call in the radiation lady. Okay a couple of points, apparently cancer looks high concentrations of sugar in your body once all the dies and contrast chemicals hit it. That’s why the blood sugar thing is important and your kidneys have to process all the dyes; that’s why the kidney function thing is important.

Anyway the radiation nurse comes in carrying a small, gray, heavy lead box that looks like if could hold a small loaf of bread. Inside is a gray syringe containing radioactive goop they pump in the IV. It doesn’t hurt or anything, but it all seems very ominous and science fiction like. After the goop is in your IV you have to sit for about an hour so the radiation dye can go through your entire body.

After an hour they take you into the scan room. 

It looks like the picture I stole this morning from http://images.wikia.com/psychology/images/b/b8/ECAT-Exact-HR--PET-Scanner.jpg. Even though I’ve lost some weight, at 225, I am still a pretty big guy so I was skeptical that I’d fit in this thing. Not to worry.

When I get to the scan room they lay me out with my arms above my head on the little table leading into the machine. Then they wrapped me up in toasty warm hospital blankets – it was actually pretty nice. For the next 40 minutes or so I go in and out the scanner holding my breath, not holding my breath, and having contrast dye pumped in at different time. The contrast dye, by the way, makes you feel warm inside; it’s not unpleasant.

The whole thing took about two hours and I was able to drive home. BTW it’s the first time I’ve been able to drive in two weeks. They will marry the results of this with the bone marrow test I have set for Friday. That will tell the doctors and I what’s what and the course of treatment will be locked in at that point.

It’s most likely a flavor of chemo next week or so.