Thursday December 14

We had been debating to leave early Thursday morning about 4:30/5 and just making everything in one day. But we sure were grateful after spending the night at the Ogden's house as it made the trip to Salt Lake very quick in the morning, and the day ended up being much longer than we had planned and would have needed to spend that night up north if we had left early in the morning.

So we got up to the University of Utah campus and kept driving on through to get to "Hope Circle" I believe the Huntsman Cancer Institute is located on. You also drive past Primary Children's Hospital where many of the specialties are for children. It's just a very special area you are in and you could feel the intense focus on the health of others. With the U having a medical program, there was a student that was in the room with us for the morning. We got there for the 9:30 appointment and had the surgeon, a fellow and a student in the room with us. One was following the surgeon, and the other was with the oncologist that asked to be in the room so I wouldn't have to keep repeating myself on everything.

It was interesting to have the student and fellow with us (no real idea how far along a fellow is, but yeah...) and they asked me to give a brief history. The two would then say something like, "and how did the PET scan go on this date..." so it was nice to know they had studied my scans and files and were prepared to be there in the room. I had wanted a second opinion because it just felt good to have more eyes overlooking my case and making sure everything was in order. They also wanted to examine my tumor and by this point I just felt like having the whole center just have a feel. All my dignity seems to have been scraped away by now. (And I thought having children stripped it all away, but there was some left. Now not too much.) Checked out Tumie (not sure what else to call it) and then we went into a separate room for the surgeon to explain what she would do, how to best go about things, and just a few added extras that we honestly haven't had any time to think about in the past 31 days since we were told I had cancer.

One thing she wanted was to get a biopsy of the lymph nodes under my right arm to see if any contained cancer. This made sense to me. But I was not too pleased with this idea. ANOTHER biopsy? Awake? Again? When I felt like crawling under a pillow and hiding out for a few days after the first one? But the points made were valid and as the deductible has been hit ten times over by now...sure. Let's do it. Then the agony of waiting in anticipation. I JUST HAD CHEMO TWO DAYS AGO!! Chayse and I looked at each other and just knew it needed to be done. So then the anxiety started coming when someone said they would get right on it. Great. I'll need to buy some clothes for another day, blah blah...and then they came back and said I could get it done in 3 hours and to go get lunch before coming back. Okay. I can do that.

This whole time we were listening to the surgeon, we felt she had great information, insights, comments, but realized I did not want to go through surgery 4 hours from home and then have to travel back to recover. I am pleased with the surgeon we have down here right now and think he is a very capable doctor. I have heard wonderful things about Dr Myers and as for now, will be planning on using him as my surgeon when the time comes. I also know that he will have a plastic surgeon there at the same time, but that bridge will be crossed around April/May and has nothing to do with right now.

After meeting with her, we met with the oncologist for 15-20 minutes. He was pleased with Dr Reese's plan and only mentioned that if the tumor doesn't respond as well as they would like the the 4 AC Chemo rounds, he would suggest to add another drug to the last 4 round with the T drug. Dr Reese had worked with this dr prior to moving to St George and working at the cancer center here. That was neat to know they were acquainted and were on the same wavelength. He also said if it were him, he would stay close to home and not travel up to SLC for each treatment. Needless to say, I am pleased with how well everything has been going so far.

Once we had met with both doctors we booked it to the car. We were so hungry!! The only food we had was a bowl of cereal that morning around 8 and I have just been so worried about puking that I really wasn't eating that much. By 1 I was starving. We planned on meeting Chayse's grandparents about 30 minutes south of SLC and about 5 minutes from their house at Firehouse Subs. Chayse's sister Shay was also going to meet us. Shay had ordered our food and was ready for us when we arrived. Apparently I was extremely hungry as I ate the entire sub and bag of chips in 5 minutes flat. It felt so good to eat delicious, healthy food. I loved every bite. It was a lot of fun to chat with Shay and catch up, but we never did see his grandparents. On the phone they said they went to the wrong location and an hour later after they didn't show, we had to head back to Huntsman for the biopsy.

It didn't really hit me what was going to happen until they had me change and sit in the mammography waiting area. I just lost it. Chayse couldn't come back and it was not where I wanted to be. I was so upset. Then they brought me to a side room where Chayse was able to come and another social worker found me to chat instead of letting me read my book. Then at 3 they took me to the ultrasound room to scan the lymph nodes and map out the attack plan. Well. Attack they did. I got my headphones on and transported else where. Chayse said that there were 3 people working on me. The PA was doing the work, the tech was on the ultrasound pinpointing the locations they needed, and the the doctor that was there to supervise the PAs work. (I had no idea the Dr wasn't doing the work until the ride home.) I was told it would take 15 minutes. I am coming up on my 5th song on the phone and I am starting to worry. I can just tell we are waiting, but I have no idea why. Chayse said the PA had to fetch the doctor and that's when they deployed the dang clip. Worst feeling. Well, there are many bad feelings, but at this point I can just hear the clip "ping" open and just grab hold of my tendons/muscles/whatever and tearing into them. In my mind the clip is about a centimeter, but I have no idea how big they are. I let out a big groan and they wanted to check up on me and take me out of my zone. Chayse told them to plow forward and keep going. PING! There goes the next clip. I am on the verge of tears....and then it's all over. THANK GOODNESS!! Just so much going on. I just did my first round of chemo. Now a biopsy. And I am still stressed over puking. My anxiety had just hit its limit and I was so glad to be done and changing back into my clothes. Another side note. My music is apparently too loud for these ultra quiet hospital rooms. The PA had to tell the tech to speak up when she was taking images throughout the biopsy because "all she could hear was 'Sugar' (by Maroon 5) playing." Sorry folks. At least it's decent music. I'll remember to steer clear of too many obscenities. Ha.

Thankfully we were on the road around 4:30 to head home. We did decide to swing by Uncle Mark's office to bring a few things back down here to their new house. It was nice to be forced to walk around a little bit before getting back into the car again for Saint George. Chayse let me pick the food for dinner (ZUPAS!!) and we got it to go. I popped the necessary pills before leaving town and chowed down on my delicious berry salad (always solid), chocolate dipped strawberry and roll. It just was so delicious I couldn't believe how deprived my body had been from food after really enjoying those two meals in one day. It was about 6 by the time we had picked up the food and by 6:30 I was passed out in the passenger seat curled up in my blanket and pillow. I did feel a bit bad because I woke up as we pulled into the driveway. Poor Chayse had no one to help make the drive go by, but I was completely wiped out from everything. There are days that I am so thankful to be in my own bed and home...and then there was today when I just never wanted to leave my bed again. It was so good to be home!!!