All Clear

I got the great news on Wednesday night that the lesion is a cyst in my liver...though unlikely, not an immediate concern for cancer. So, it appears that's it for now. 

I haven't received good news over the last 4 months. I'm not quite sure what to do with it. I'm sure each of you will have advice, but I think celebration is one of those things that come laden with your own emotion--nobody can really tell you how to celebrate. Thankfully, I have the moment etched in my head where I told my wife, brother and sister-in-law in my kitchen. I can revisit their faces if I need to.  

I think this is a bit like waking up from a nightmare.  You don't celebrate waking up, and you have a bit of fear in your gut about the nightmare coming back once you close your eyes.  So, I'm not quite celebratory.  However, I am thankful...family, friends, strangers and doctors have been a part of this journey to get Melissa and me to this point. Countless thoughts and prayers said in silence without my ever knowing.  So, I will be thankful for the recovery and hopeful that the cancer doesn't return with each passing month.

I've got a few notes asking me how I found out about the cancer in the first place. I thought now would be a good time to revisit the beginning as I close out the visible battle (cancer is a bit like Iraq, the first few months include a bunch of noise and bloodshed...then you spend years trying to make sure it doesn't come back. While everyone else tires of the story, you still have to follow up on every lead with the possibility an insurgent cell is waiting around the corner).

So, how I found out.  I will cover the surgery and other "early" experiences a bit later. 

I can look back over the months leading up and say there were a few leading signs, none of which raised a red flag, but were odd nonetheless. Keep in mind these may or may not have been symptoms. They could have been something innocent, there's really no way to know.  

Early in the year I started getting night-sweats, I don't mean a bit uncomfortable, I mean hosed-down wet kind of night sweat. Read up on the appropriate sites, they said don't worry, it'll go away in a couple weeks...99% of the time it is nothing. It did go away in a few weeks...so, I assumed (maybe correctly), nothing.  Since then I've heard of many other similar patients having night sweats.

Early in August I got a few bouts of "itching"...maddening, skin crawling, no respite, itching. I could scratch all I wanted, all over my chest & back, and it would stay. Given the locality around my t-shirt, I assume detergent or some other allergy kicked it off. A benedryl later, it calmed enough to let me go back to whatever I was doing. It faded over the days, and went away. Again, nothing assumed. I haven't heard of this symptom in other patients.

Late in August I started getting fleeting pains, the kind only a guy can describe. When a guy gets "hit" in his, um, "parts" the pain is also in the lower abdominals...not just the parts. I started getting very fleeting pains inconsistently when I would sit down. I was fairly dismissive of the pain as I would notice it one day, then go 3-4 days of nothing.  A few weeks later I was coming into the house from working in the yard and got the same pain, a tad longer, but while I was just standing there--no sitting down to "explain it" this time. A point of realization here is that the fear of finding something is a powerful depressant on the activity of checking or acting on illness.  It continues to this day--I have to "force" myself to check regularly, in fear that I might find something. Anyway, as I said, the pain was immediately identifiable as something from "the boys".  I was going to shower anyway, so, very reluctantly, I checked them while in the shower.  

Not Right.  Without description...trust me, as a guy, you'd know something was not right. 

I immediately felt sick that night about what I'd found. I told Melissa, and though she was reassuring me, I knew this was bad. I got a name of a doc from my friend, and scheduled an appointment for Sept 10.  

The doc was good, the experience wasn't too awkward. He asked a lot of background questions then checked the boys. He changed immediately, body stiffened and face flat and emotionless. "Potentially an injury, give me a minute."  I got dressed and a nurse came in a few minutes later asking where I lived and told me to meet them around at the front desk. As I approached, the doc was behind the counter, "just make sure he get's seen today." As my mind raced, the doc came around the counter and said it was important that I was seen immediately.  I stammered the words out "I can't believe I didn't tell you, but my mom had breast cancer just earlier this year." He didn't blink, and said "that's not important right now, let's get you taken care of." He wrote a note in my file. Moments later I had directions to a urologist who was waiting to see me.

I had to cross by my house on the way to the urologist. I stopped in. I opened google on my home computer and typed in "testicular cancer survival rate". 

My urologist was very calming. We immediately struck up conversation on the work I do and his interest in helping the underserved. Sitting uncomfortably while he used an ultrasound to check down below, he continued the conversation easily. What communities, how many kids we'd helped, how we chose communities. He switched "sides" below. The conversation stopped, his back straightened up, his now expressionless face sprang inches closer to the computer screen. I had a moment to study his face. I could tell he knew immediately, he was now sorting out the details. This went on for a few minutes, he left, I got dressed. "I'm very concerned...we don't know yet...there's a possibility of...we have to take blood...no matter whether it is...or it is...we will operate immediately"

I called Melissa, I knew she couldn't pick up her phone in a meeting she was running. She may not even have her phone with her. 

I stood up in the office, by myself, and looked out an 11th story window onto "pill hill"--an amalgamation of hospitals and treatment areas all within a couple square miles, just a few minutes from my house. I told myself I'd have to get used to this place.

I had my blood drawn behind the counter. I heard a front desk lady say "but that's his birthday", the nurse finished drawing my blood and I took a step out from the room. She repeated her concern in front of her new audience. I made eye contact with my urologist, who held the same, calm, unflinching face. I looked at the front office coordinator and said what the urologist was thinking "I don't think that matters." And with that, I was placed on the surgery schedule for 9/12, my 31st birthday.

There was a remote possibility that my problem was an injury, not a tumor. Off to a second radiologist, down an elevator, across a hall. Called Melissa again. Again. Again. Her phone must be off. I text messaged a friend "in hospital, call Melissa and tell her to come home immediately" I stood alone in a corridor underneath the buildings for a minute as the realization of the news sunk in. I started shaking. I knew the next step already, surgery was coming, and I knew folks would want to be here. I called my mom "schedule a flight, surgery Friday morning, probably cancer" "What? How? Are they sure? I'll be there soon, should I call people?" "Don't know, don't know, don't know. Just call Mark for now."  Still shaking, I walked to the radiologist's office.  They admitted me and put on a wrist band. Sitting beside a hundred magazines, I read my wristband over and over, waiting for my appointment.

She assured me she'd done this many times, even a one or two in the last week. It was always an injury, nothing to be concerned about. 15 minutes later she stopped talking, her back straighted up, and her face approached the screen. She left and said she'd talk to my doctor and he'd call me on the phone in the room. 

"It isn't an injury. This doesn't change our plans for surgery." 

Melissa called.  "Remember the worst case scenario? This is it."  She found a way to leave the meeting.

I walked out of the room, the radiologist stood there in near-tears. She apologized for what she had said, she hugged me.  There was no need to say much else as I'm sure she won't make the same mistake again.

I went out to the parking lot and got in my car. The car had to be 100+ degrees. I sat there, shivering.  Eventually, I turned the key and started on the road to recovery.