Savor

Alright, finally, some details. I was just too plain exhausted last night to try to explain all this but the most important piece of information is simple and good. In terms of his cancer, in terms of growth or spreading or spots or shadows, we see nothing unusual. There is “no evidence of disease” in his body.

So, that’s the huge news and the very, very good news. Of course, “no evidence” of disease doesn’t guarantee that there’s no disease in there, but at least it’s not anything we can detect. So we are very pleased and very relieved.

Everything else we learned from the many scans he had is related to all the other things that might be going wrong in his poor assaulted body, most of them caused by his cancer or its treatment. The kidney, of course, remains our primary focus of concern. These scans didn’t give us much new information in that department except that we can indeed see the wedge that was removed from his kidney back in December, which is just something of an empty spot lopped off that organ.

We also looked at his chest and neck to figure out what’s going on with his “unique” vascular system as it relates to the placement of his central lines. There is still a clot that shows up, but the blood seems to have found a new route to flow around it so it wouldn’t be a problem unless we continue with chemo and need to place a new line.

The scan also showed that his heart is slightly enlarged since the last time we looked, probably caused by his high blood pressure. He’s having an ECHO this morning to make sure the rest of it is functioning normally.

So, the small picture has lots of fuzzy spots on it but the big picture is bright and clear. We cannot see cancer inside his body and that is good, good, good. Of course, the big decision looms ahead but for today we will take a deep breath and smile and savor this moment. For that is what we do best.