Bone Scan

I didn't end up getting lectured by my doctor last week. He actually thought it was a good idea to get rid of as much of the outside stress as possible before starting chemotherapy. We discussed a schedule and decided I will start the 4 1/2 month chemotherapy treatment on June 23. It will be 6 rounds - one every 3 weeks. Before then there are a few tests I need to do. The first was a bone scan which I did today. I went to the radiology department at Thornton Hospital at noon and received an injection of some kind of dye in my arm. I didn't feel a thing! The needle guy and I got along since his birthday was the same as mine and we both expressed disappointment that the only famous person we share our day with is Ricky Schroeder. After the injection I was dismissed for 3 hours, so I came home and worked on golf tournament stuff. Then it was back to the hospital for the scan. I laid on my back on a very skinny table (I got to keep my clothes on). My birthday buddy strapped me to the table with a long velcro belt and rubber banded my feet together so I couldn't move. I had to stay perfectly still for 20 minutes. Well the more I thought about staying still the more I wanted to move. I developed a itch on my nose that got worse the more I thought about it. But I was a good girl and didn't move. The table I was on moved inside a big cylinder. I was just laying there wishing there was something to look at when I realized I was moving out of the machine very slowly. At first I wasn't even sure I was moving, but then slowly I noticed the lines on the top of the machine were in different places and eventually my head came out of the machine. There were photos of clouds on the ceiling so I spent the next 15 minutes visualizing shapes in the clouds. There was one shaped like a heart and another like a mean hippo with his mouth wide open to eat another cloud.

Tomorrow I have an echocardiogram. On Wednesday I have my second post-surgery appointment. On Friday I will learn about the port placement which will happen next week (basically they'll cut open my neck and insert a catheter into one of my veins, then cut open my chest and implant a chemo port and connect it to the vein catheter and then send me home to pretend like everything's fine) But that's a week away, so I'll worry about that later. I'm also going wig shopping on Friday! I already bought a few hats, a sequined scarf and extra long hat hair (a wig without a top that straps across your head that you wear under a hat). It's been fun playing so far, but it's not real yet...

On the foob front, I wore a bathing suit top in my backyard and it hid most of my scabbing/scarring. There is really no hiding the scars from the drains on my side in any bathing suit. I disobeyed doctor's orders and walked up the Torrey Pines hill and did the beach trail. I got my heart rate up and was all sweaty and was so happy to finally be moving! The doctor said to wait 6 weeks and I waited 5 weeks and 2 days. So sue me. I never claimed to be a good patient!