It felt very strange walking into Kellogg today. I felt like I’d been away forever (it has been a month). But, that’s not what you want to know about, is it? Ok – here’s the scoop. My PET scan looks exactly the same as it did at the halfway point. It still shows that same little spot of activity at the base of my left lung. But, Alla is not worried. She is fairly confident that it’s scar tissue from the great big mass of cancer cells we killed off. That makes sense, because I keloid (scar) pretty badly on my skin, so it stands to reason that I would inside my body as well. In fact, we know I scar internally, because when I had my C-section, they cleaned up some adhesions (scar tissue) from my previous GI surgieries while they were in there. Besides that, nothing new has grown, including that spot.
So, we will repeat the PET in 3 months (which is normal procedure anyway), and if that’s all clear (or at least unchanged – if it’s scar tissue, it could be there for the rest of my life), I’ll schedule de-installation of my port. In the meantime, I’ll continue to get flushed (with saline and heparin) every 6 weeks to keep it in working order. And, I get to stop taking all my extra meds immediately! Woo hoo!
The below image shows a comparison of the mass (1 slice of the scan) in my left lung between my April (top) PET and the one in June (bottom).
You can see that there’s almost nothing there in June, and that’s how it looks now too. I just don’t have the processed images yet from last week’s scan (I forgot to get them when I was there today). So, that’s the scoop. I carry on with life as normal, grow my hair back (should be interesting), and try not to think about it until after Thanksgiving.
Original Comments from the CaringBridge Blog:
What terrific news!!!
—kay matton, August 24, 2015
Awesome!!! Congrats on kicking cancer’s a$$!! I knew you could do it!!!
—Amy Kingan, August 24, 2015
Fantastic news!! Do happy for you!!
—Staci Daugird, August 24, 2015
Great news!! Congrats Deb!
—Kristin TePas, August 24, 2015
Wow, don’t fully understand the images but less is better, right?! Such great news <3 I think you will miss your henna head a little; it was so pretty! 🙂
—Amber Youngman, August 24, 2015
My Amazing, wonderful girl–Optimism–Humor, Grit–Guts–You are a Power House of Positive–I Thank God for this report and for this Being called DEB!!!
—jo Wilken, August 24, 2015
Great news Deb!
—Felicia Braude, August 24, 2015
Ssuch wonderful news! Now you begin your post cancer life. So happy for you!
—Elaine Fox, August 24, 2015
Best news!!!
—michelle lazar, August 24, 2015
Sounds like a terrific plan!
—Susan Rosenthal, August 24, 2015
Wonderful news!!
—Stacy wachter, August 24, 2015
Why aren’t they removing the port? you may never need it again & 3 mo. Is a long time. —- Good luck, you must be relieved.
—Brenda moskovic, August 24, 2015
That is fantastic! Way to kick cancer’s butt!
—Sarah Alzamora, August 24, 2015
Great news!
—margo barbakow, August 24, 2015
Sounds like great news to me!! Congrats Deb!
—Janet Stich, August 24, 2015
Fantastic news! And who knew your lungs were so photogenic? 🙂
—Barb Lerman, August 24, 2015
The comparison looks good to me!
—Brian Kirshenbaum, August 24, 2015
Great news, Deb!
—Antoinette Corelis, August 24, 2015
This is fantastic. Love this kind of update!
—Miriam Schiffer, August 24, 2015