So there I am exhaling in delight and suddenly he started talking about my needing radiotherapy!
This was a shock because right from almost the start it had been evident that my whole breast would have to come off, with nothing left to radiate.
Off he went to check and kept coming back in to ask if we had any questions, but we hadn't. When he returned to confirm I wouldn't need radiotherapy, I had two questions which get gave me very short thrift with. My first question concerned the repeat prescription for tamoxifen and whether I had to pay for it. He snapped back that he didn't know about such things, but fortunately his registrar got the paperwork that I need to complete to avoid paying for tamoxifen for ten years. My second question was what to do if I experience serious side effects with the tamoxifen, and should I call his secretary or go to my GP? - and he said that the side effects were not compulsory. He really did seem so offhand and distracted this time, as if he was so weighed down with his own problems, which of course may be the case. He explained that my cancer has a 7% chance of spreading, but as I said! I would rather have the 7% chance that I know about than the many more percentages that I may not know about.
But in any case. The lightness of our step as we left the Arden Centre! Coupled with trying not to look too delighted, to all the people there whose news or outlook had not been so good. Once again, I feel so, so lucky.
Friday, September 4, 2015
The Watershed
So, everyone has been asking me for weeks now if I've heard anything back from America, from the oncologist about the Oncotype DX test. And I haven't chased it because deep down I feel that it's going to be ok, that I won't need chemotherapy, but also because I don't want to hear if I do!
The rose-tinted glow of my ignorance vanished when I saw several missed calls on my mobile phone and heard a message left by the oncologist's secretary, telling me I had an appointment on the third.
I knew that this was going to be it. The appointment was for quarter to twelve in the Arden Cancer Centre. I asked my inner spirit guide if I was going to need chemotherapy and the answer kept coming back, "No." Months ago I'd asked my inner guide if I had cancer and there was no resistance.
I didn't even take a diazepam tablet the night before the appointment, and slept well. The following morning I had butterflies, but again, didn't take anything to calm me as I had in the previous occasion.
This time the Arden Centre wasn't as jolly as it had been the first time. Perhaps on the first occasion, when I'd thought I was going to get some direction on my need to have chemotherapy, I had been imagining it as one of the circles of hell, and was pleasantly surprised by the pink and purple chairs and pretty lighting: the patients didn't look like cancer patients and the oncologist had been witty and charming.
This time it was different. The patients in the siting room looked much sicker, though to my satisfaction I could see them striding through into the secret area purposefully when the bell pinged and their names appeared on the big screen. Some had no or little hair. Some in wheelchairs. Some looking very, very sick.
And this time, the wait was far longer. On the previous occasion we had waited an hour, but this was approaching two hours when the oncologist finally stood at the clinic door and called my name. He apologised and bundled us into a small examination room, and had to sit on the examining couch while he ran through my notes, painstakingly. He clearly had no recollection of me as a person and spoke to me quite impersonally, and seemed preoccupied. Going over the same ground as last time was frustrating and then he seemed perturbed: he had two sets of graph results and I could see that one result was better than the other. Suddenly he realised that one set of results was not mine and he announced, quickly and concisely, that there was no benefit to my having chemotherapy.
The rose-tinted glow of my ignorance vanished when I saw several missed calls on my mobile phone and heard a message left by the oncologist's secretary, telling me I had an appointment on the third.
I knew that this was going to be it. The appointment was for quarter to twelve in the Arden Cancer Centre. I asked my inner spirit guide if I was going to need chemotherapy and the answer kept coming back, "No." Months ago I'd asked my inner guide if I had cancer and there was no resistance.
I didn't even take a diazepam tablet the night before the appointment, and slept well. The following morning I had butterflies, but again, didn't take anything to calm me as I had in the previous occasion.
This time the Arden Centre wasn't as jolly as it had been the first time. Perhaps on the first occasion, when I'd thought I was going to get some direction on my need to have chemotherapy, I had been imagining it as one of the circles of hell, and was pleasantly surprised by the pink and purple chairs and pretty lighting: the patients didn't look like cancer patients and the oncologist had been witty and charming.
This time it was different. The patients in the siting room looked much sicker, though to my satisfaction I could see them striding through into the secret area purposefully when the bell pinged and their names appeared on the big screen. Some had no or little hair. Some in wheelchairs. Some looking very, very sick.
And this time, the wait was far longer. On the previous occasion we had waited an hour, but this was approaching two hours when the oncologist finally stood at the clinic door and called my name. He apologised and bundled us into a small examination room, and had to sit on the examining couch while he ran through my notes, painstakingly. He clearly had no recollection of me as a person and spoke to me quite impersonally, and seemed preoccupied. Going over the same ground as last time was frustrating and then he seemed perturbed: he had two sets of graph results and I could see that one result was better than the other. Suddenly he realised that one set of results was not mine and he announced, quickly and concisely, that there was no benefit to my having chemotherapy.
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