Another Surprise - no immediate surgery

Today was sort of a kicker. Carol and I took separate cars to meet with Dr. Erickson. On the way, I was called by Dr. Weston to advise me that the CT scan had revealed lesions on the liver and that would mean chemotherapy as well as the surgery.

When we met with Dr. Erickson, he advised that he thought chemotherapy should precede any surgery. As a result, I left with two more appointments; one on Monday to have a port put in to facilitate the chemotherapy and one on Tuesday to meet with the oncologist, Dr. Patel.

I had had four straight days of medical appointments and was worried what I might do to fill the time on Friday. I need not have worried. I later learned that I had to go to Morton Plant on Friday for Pre-surgical testing. I was ecstatic! I had something to do on Friday.

I drove off to Countryside - Mease for the stress test.

When I was greeted by the first technician, I said " I have had a colonoscopy, found out I had cancer, had a CT scan, found out the cancer was also in my liver, just found out I was going to have chemotherapy and you want me to have a STRESS TEST!?"

I was taken to a room, got shaved to attach a lot of little nodes to my chest and was introduced to Jeff. He explained that he was going to give me an injection, some water to drink and that in 25 minutes, he would be imaging me. I asked if that would make me more handsome and he said, "Sir, we are technicians, not magicians!"

After the first 20 minutes imaging session, I was introduced to nurse Marianne and the treadmill. It turns out that she was Dr. Navas' revenge for interrupting his lunch the day before. I managed to survive, but barely. I later got a call that I was in good shape.