not so good news

Not that it is so surprising these days... I'm not really sure what we were hoping for today. I guess that it was something along the lines of what we heard when this rib spot was first noticed which was, "let's just wait until after surgery". However, that was not the case today. Dr. Puhalla was very thorough and is clearly very good at what she does. In this case that means that I am scheduled for a PET/CT on Monday and she is following up with specialists at Presbyterian Hospital to determine whether it is worthwhile to attempt to biopsy the rib (which, apparently, is historically unreliable making Dr. Puhalla's gut feeling that they will say, "don't bother") or go straight to surgery to extract the rib itself for testing. Apparently this is a somewhat involved surgery, but I guess that we'll just see what is recommended. We're not exactly sure what this does for the breast surgery, which remains - as of yet - unscheduled.

Personally, I got the feeling that Dr. Puhalla thinks that there is a good chance that this is metastatic breast cancer, but we are praying that it is some other random fluke of nature. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of good, random explanations that seem even a little bit plausible... (no car accidents that I somehow "forgot" about, no serious colds with extensive, deep coughing that I just don't remember, etc. etc.) She did say that it would be unusual to have only one rib involved and no enlarged lymph nodes, but isn't it just kind of unusual to have this large tumor at 36??

Please pray for some good news here. Finding a distant malignant site would immediately move me from somewhere in stage II cancer (curable) to stage IV (incurable... although manageable). It's a scary prospect and as I sit here typing while looking at a smiling picture of my little Neely... it is an almost unbearable thought. I don't have time for this cancer crap, I have a whole family to take care of!! A husband who needs his wife and three little children who need a mother - their mother. Today it feels so sad and so lonely. Is there a bottom to this bad news? When is the part where I get to start to do something about all of this? And... when did I go from being such a healthy, young mom to... this... whatever I am today? It was so hard to sit in the medical oncology waiting room filled with much older women in hats, scarfs and other headgear today. One of the nurses even tried to direct me to a visitor's bathroom because she didn't realize that I was the patient...

so... no words of wisdom or strength or courage today... today I am praying that the Holy Spirit is translating my groanings to the Father in words that only He has. Thank you for all of your prayers and your constant support.