Good morning,
Thanks for the support. The story as written in my diary......................
"So the trip to Edmonton. Well I managed to be leaving the acreage at 6:06 am. The trip in was pretty easy. One interesting occurrence was when I was coming up behind a semi on a divided two lane. I was in the left lane and the semi was in the right about 100 m ahead of me. I’d always seem the remains of large truck tires after they blew on the road but in all my years I’d never actually seen one blow. This time I did. The noise at first shocked me, I thought at the moment that I’d blown a tire or had a tire all off or the engine or transmission failed in a big way. I was glad that I wasn’t any closer too as there were flying chunks of tire all over the place. While a rear trailer tire the whole truck swayed from side to side really making me glad that I have as a habit not following large trucks. Although this is usually due to not wanting to be close to them when the rocks and chunks of dirt come flying off at every bump in the road!
So I arrived in Edmonton at about 11:15, Spruce Grove really. Being a Value Village junkie I wanted to pop into the most recently opened store (7 now in the Edmonton area) to take a look around. I didn’t get much, a black MEC top, a d-ring binder and two Running Room water bottle belt carriers (sans bottle but any water bottle does I’ve found out). Of course I don’t manage to find the store on my first effort and while going around the block at the stop sign was a yellow C5 convertible – I took this to be a good sign! Then off to MEC to get a new battery for my Black Diamond head light. It is dark in the morning and it helps me to see and be seen. The battery pack only lasted two or three winters which I was disappointed about and you can’t actually buy just the battery itself, I had to get the whole charging kit as well which I didn’t need a spare of.
Then off to the Kaye Building where my appointment was. I arrived over an hour early (ya I could have slept in more) but decided this time to get a nice walk in. Edmonton in the fall I always find nice and I enjoy walking around the university campus. Classes just started about a week ago and I always find it so uplifting to see all the young and happy faces, they just have no idea how badly life really sucks at this stage of their lives. Students out running and going to and from classes. I walked past the student residences and up at my old floor and the windows of my old dorm room. I really was very happy at that time in my life.
Then off to register and find the waiting room and to do some crossword puzzles while I waited.
Only 10 or so minutes behind schedule it starts. First with a nurse who told me what would be happening that day, then having three doctors come and see and look me over. Very thorough I must admit. I don’t think that there was a single square inch of my external body that they did not go over repeatedly.
The first doctor was an interesting fellow. I told him my cancer story, even brought my spare copy of the Z06 license plate and told him I sure hoped that I wouldn’t have to get a different one! Turns out that he was diagnosed with cancer a bit over a year ago and subsequently bought himself a BMW M5 afterward – a kindred spirit! Then this rather tall lithe lady doctor from Yugoslavia checked me over next. I liked her a lot too. She gave special attention to all the moles, especially on my back, which I was happy about. The 3rd doctor was a bit cocky for me but was also the one with the most experience in melanoma.
So the outcome. Based on the stage of the melanoma and the fact that I had Hodgkin’s Lymphoma 10 years ago, about a 30, probably closer to 40% chance that within 5 years I’m going to get cancer again. The trick is to catch it earlier. So checkups every 4 months for the next two years, then every 6 months for the next 3 years and then yearly after that. I’m good with that.
The news that they could look for cancer in the lymph nodes by ultrasound but the 3rd doctor said that he had no trouble feeling the areas where my lymph nodes are and there doesn’t appear to be any signs of swelling.
One thing that was sort of funny. I learned that the tumor I had was stage 2 so it was caught earlier than my Hodgkin’s was stage 3. They have this super, crazy effective treatment for melanoma, but can only give it to stage 3 or 4 patients! It apparently costs like $100,000 to do and as the study for registration was only done on stage 3 and 4 patients Health Canada won’t let it be given to patients whose cancer is not at that stage yet! And the company won’t do the studies/testing necessary to get it registered. Now how sick is that I ask you??!! A kick ass treatment but I can’t get it as my cancer isn’t advanced enough yet. Isn’t that when it should be done??
Then in 45 minutes it was all done and I was on my way home, arriving back at 9 pm exactly.
So in the end I have to say I am feeling upbeat. No signs of any more moles that could be cancerous, no swollen lymph nodes and a schedule of regular checkups by the expert melanoma team at the Kaye Building in place.
I guess about as good an outcome as I could hope for outside of them having been able to find the sentinel lymph node and that peace of mind that would have given me."
Thanks everyone so much.
I'd say this must quality for my first burnout - after harvest is over I'll be tending to that event!!!!!!!! Don't let me forget please................
Cheers,
Garry
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