There’s a point when you think, “Hey, this is it. I’ve had ALL the scans. I’ve hit all the biggies: biopsy, CT, MRI, X-ray, ultrasound, PET… those are all of ’em right?” Then, it’s like some radiologist hyped up on too much caffeine says to a friend, “psst, what would happen if we did combo scans?” And his friend who has been sipping Red Bull through a Red Vine says, “cooooool.” What happens then? A CT-guided biopsy.
So, let’s back up. When we last checked in, we had a PET scan after removing the gland. Nothing lit up except for this spot on my right arm at the humerus bone. We got an x-ray of the arm. A couple hours later, the Dr calls and says, yeah, that was “irregular,” so we’re going to need an MRI.
Now, we’ve had the MRI. We hated the MRI. They aren’t painful, just…. confining. And to get the image of the arm I was all sort of scrunched up and had pillows in the tube with me to keep me propped in place. Confining. 45 minutes and a panic attack later, the MRI is done. The scrunching up? That’s resulted in some lower back unhappiness, but a warm rice sock seems to help. We can handle that. Here’s what I learned at the MRI:
1. Scrubs (they make you wear scrubs) while comfy, they look like prison wear. Just blue, not orange. But they are comfy.
2. MRI’s now have the ability to let you listen to music while you are tubed with these special headphones. You just plug your phone/mp3/ipod in at their console in the little control room. This is cool, and not the way it was my last big MRI, 22 years ago. It’s also brighter inside than the old ones.
3. When you hit *repeat* on your phone’s music app and you don’t have the album or playlist selected (just the song), it’s going to repeat that song for the entire time. Cause once you go in the tube, there is no fixing it. I may never (ever, ever) listen to Billy Joel’s Keeping the Faith ever again. 45 minutes of “ooo hoo, keepin’ the faith, oh yes we are.” Holy crap on a cracker. Just… no. I love Billy Joel, but that’s too much right there.
Here’s what the doctors learned from the MRI:
The bone that looked “irregular” has an “abnormality.” The abnormality is a mass about 2″ x 1″ in the bone. It needs to be biopsied. A CT-guided biopsy. (New test!) This will happen early next week as well as a face-to-face meeting with an Orthopedic doctor who deals with sarcomas and has already reviewed all my other info.
The good news? The Orthopedic Doctor thinks that what he sees in the MRI is “atypical” of Ewings Sarcoma. While, so far, everything to do with me has been odd for Ewings, that’s still what they are thinking. And we still wait for the Dr in Boston to confirm or deny it. But that this appears atypical provides some weird glimmer of maybe-not-as-horrible-as-it-could-be. It’s all perspective, really.
This weekend the to-do list includes buying a planner calendar. I have 4 medical appointments next week. And, I’m finding things out during phone calls when I can’t necessarily get to the calendar app I use. So, this adventure get’s it own calendar. Office supply store = WIN!