Thank (insert whom you worship here) It's FRIDAY!

Yeah, Friday.....today we finally have no appointments and nobody to call and "harrass" about my treatment. What is a girl with cancer to do on a day off??? LAUNDRY! Seriously, we have a lot of laundry....and I have now been averaging 3 t-shirt changes per night due to my continued sweating out of my fevers.

Yesterday, I apologize to everyone for not posting anything....I was so exhausted from my not 3-hour as I was told PET scan but my 5-hour PET scan. It is a wonderful exam for cancer patients because it is designed to detect any "abnormal", "pre-cancerous", "anarchist", "*&%$#@^@?" cells that want to form a tumor in my body. First, I was only allowed to eat meat, cheese, nuts and water the day before....basically Atkins stage 1 and couldn't eat anything 6 hours before the test. So Mark and I had to wake up at 6:30am just to eat a plate of eggs....yes, we went back to bed. By the time 1pm came around (my test time), I was absolutely starving!! Please don't starve the girl with cancer...she gets cranky and tired. Oh, but you can have 2 cans of "contrast"....basically white goop that tastes like orange-flavored chalk. Yuck. But, it makes for great PET pictures so I was a good patient. I also had to have an IV of Saline and a few milliliters of a radioactive isotope that is designed to "light up" any of those nasty, beasty, crabby cancer cells that may show up anywhere in my body. Yes, "radioactive material"!!! I was in the "radioactive medicine" department. I was a little nervous when they brought in this heavy lead canister with a syringe in it. The idea is that the isotope acts as sugar and since cancer cells feed off of sugar, it will light up all of the cells that react to the sugar.

Then, I had to lie there with my IV and radioactive isotype for 90 minutes to go through my body. I was able to sit in one of those pimped out Lazy Boy's so it wasn't too bad. Then, I was in an MRI-type machine (not for the clausterphobic-type) where I couldn't move at all for about 30 minutes. It is more difficult than it sounds.....just try to not move anything for 30 minutes....it is not that easy. Then, to top it all off, I was done with the scan but then had to wait in the waiting area, staring at the food I could not eat for another 40 minutes until the doctor could make sure that I took good enough pictures. I did and was able to leave but was so exhausted, had no energy and hadn't eaten at this point for 10 hours! I was not happy and my fever had started!

The results of the test will be known and analyzed by my radiation oncologist on Monday. If there are any cancer cells that think they can band together and squat in this body........they will be in for a big surprise as we will fry them too with radiation!

Love, Hugs and Good Health!