September 11, In the Woods

Today I walked off the trail and into the woods.  Perhaps I had hoped to get lost.  In fact I had hoped to calm down.   There, where things were most green, dark, and wet, and I stood most still, my heart still ached.

The lung specialist had little to say.  He thumped the bottom of his fists over Angela's collar bones and sternum.  He listened to her lungs.  He said he had seen the CT image in question.  He tapped the surface of his iphone entering pertinent variables into an app.  He said that based on Angela's age, and relatively favorable smoking history, the lesion in Angela's right lung has a 42% chance of being malignant.  He acknowledged that Angela's recent history of both cancer and radiation treatment do not figure into this calculation.  He said that his iphone app is proven to be more accurate than a panel of experts so it would be folly for him to speculate on more than the few variables required.   He told us that myeloma does 't usually show up in the lung, so if this is malignant it is likely something else.  He is sending Angela for a CT guided fine needle aspirate biopsy of the lesion.  He has also requested a PET scan for which we will have to go to Ottawa.  This scan will also help differentiate the lesion in her skull.  Both of these investigations will take at least a few of weeks.  Reluctantly, we are waiting.

beavers' pond

Angela sleeps restlessly.  Her appetite is poor.

I am enraged by the very system of which I am a part. These tests should be done already.  This man, preferably, would have gazed into a crystal ball, or read Angela's palm.  I'd prefer a panel of fools at this point to iphone medicine.  The fools, though, are hiding behind their machines.  I have left a number of messages on various phones at the Kingston Cancer Center yesterday.  It seems to me these phones are never answered directly.  I would like some solid dates, and of course I'd like them sooner than later.

The colors around us are changing quickly.  Acorns have been falling on our roof.  Angela, mostly patient, is capturing the changes in photos.  Our morning routines, complete with coffee and foamed milk, remain the same, as does our resolve.  We will keep you posted.