MIA, lung biopsy tomorrow

Apparently I'm collecting biopsies -- hey, it'll be all the rage, just you wait and see. I've had two since my last post, ones I don't even think I mentioned were a possibility -- a simple skin biopsy for a recently suspicious mole on my foot and a biopsy of my reconstructed breast. I discovered some lumps in the breast and had them ultrasounded months ago, but they lit up on one of my many scans so off for a biopsy I went.

Thankfully both of these were benign.

Let's hope that good news wagon keeps on rolling because tomorrow is the BIG ONE, the lung biopsy. It will be done with a needle, and guided by some sort of imaging (more radiation!) -- but there is almost a 50/50 chance of lung collapse which really freaks me out. I'm told it is often not a big deal, that only rarely is a chest tube needed (2%)...but just the idea of it all has me scared out of my wits.

So scared, in fact, that I've been deep, deep in denial about the whole thing. I haven't even given it much of a thought until tonight at the eleventh hour, if you will. I also haven't written a word, poetic, fiction or blog-wise, in ages. Writer's block is a sure sign I'm in pure animal survival mode, off hiding someplace and licking my metaphoric and soon-to-be all too real wounds. I'm not sure silence is good for me so despite the fact that I want to pull the covers up tighter over my head I came here. I need to shed some light into the dark places.

And to that end, this is what I'm hoping: I'm hoping that when I arrive at the hospital tomorrow and they set up all the machines and start scanning me to find that one large nodule that the radiologist thinks he can "get" that it is magically gone. After that they'll keep scanning and all the little nodules will have disappeared, must have been some sort of mysterious inflamation due to the pneumonia I may or may not have had. Nothing to biopsy, sorry to waste your time, you can go home now.

The pulmonary guy I saw at Sloan Kettering last week thinks that is what this is, just some residual inflamation. My oncologist keeps saying this can't be metastasis, it just can't be, as if she is practically willing it not to be. My 47th birthday is in less than two weeks. I really need to have something to celebrate this year.

Keep your fingers crossed for me, 'kay? Oh, and as usual, to all my dear friends new & old, call me bitch for luck ;)