CAT and PET Scans!

When I visited with my doctor the next day he said he was concerned with the black mass on my lower intestine. We talked about my family's history with cancer.

This really didn't bother me as most of my family have died of cancer and I have come to grips with this fact of life a long time ago. My mother passed away from Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma, my father died of Leukemia, and my aunt died of breast cancer.

I reconciled a long time ago that it wasn't a matter IF I was going to have cancer, it was only a matter or WHEN.

So I went to a Metro Imaging to get a CAT scan so he could get a better idea of what was going on in my body. I have to say I like Metro Imaging. The waiting room is nice and the shake I had to drink before the exam was not that bad.

What was annoying was the ill-mannered woman who talked on her cell phone the entire time while we all waited out turns. She talked about the most intimate details of her upcoming Thanksgiving dinner and who was making what and how she hated that bitch Shelley who thought she was everything an a bag of chips. Seriously, this woman talked the ENTIRE time in a room crammed full of strangers. RUDE!

After the scan was complete, they kind of rushed me out the door with no real answers. They said my doctor would call me when he had the results. He did call me the next day to tell me that he had a prettier picture of my blob, but still didn't know what it was.

Well that sucks, $300+ for a prettier picture.

He then wanted me to have PET scan where they would inject me with radioactive sugar to see how my lymph nodes reacted to the special sugar. So I went to Barnes Center for Advanced Medicine and let them inject me with this cool sugar.

Unfortunately, I was assured there was no way I was going to turn into a spider. After that initial disappointment, I sat in my examination room and watched the first hour of Erin Brockovich. I had to let the radioactive sugar coarse through my obese body. Then they scanned me for about 15 minutes and afterwards a doctor met with me to tell me they should have some results in a day or two.

Great - more waiting.

He asked me about my diet and was none too happy about the amount of hamburgers I eat. He warned me to cut down on the red meat. Yeah, good luck with that buddy. Heavy J likes his burgers and I am determined to help my local McDonald's make their quarterly goal.

My doctor called me the next day and things started to get serious.