Faith

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Monday, April 5 2010
It was February and a routine physical from my new doctor. We’d been with the same doctor for years, but changes had happened and not for the good. I liked my new doc, seemed nice, seemed thorough. He began to talk to me about the fact it had been 8 years since my last colonoscopy. I was a young woman, only 43, but my dad had had colon cancer which made me a candidate for every 5 year colonoscopys to screen for cancer. I remember trying to talk the doctor into letting me wait until summer. I work in the schools, so that would be the most convenient time for me. He looked at me pretty seriously and said, “You could wait until summer, but you and I will both feel pretty bad if you wait and they find something they could have found sooner.” He reminded me that I was already 3 years past due. We decided to take care of it over spring break. I didn’t give it much more thought until the time came and I had to drink that disgusting stuff to clean me out. After the procedure the doctor that did it told me he found something that looked like it could be the beginnings of Crohn’s disease and had biopsied it. He would have results in about a week. Now let me tell you, I was not thrilled about the idea of possibly having Crohn’s. I had known friends with it and had seen their painful episodes. I tried to prepare myself for the phone call. I could never have prepared myself for what was to come. The following Monday I was headed to lunch when I realized I had a voicemail from the gastro doc. I called back and he was back in a procedure and couldn’t talk to me. I left a message and went about my day. On my break in the afternoon, I decided to try back. The connection wasn’t good and with the doctor’s accent, I had trouble following it all. I heard something about a tumor…not what he had thought..he was shocked..then he spelled it out for me c-a-r-c-i-n-o-i-d tumor. I thought he said it wasn’t cancerous. Then he told me I needed a CT scan to look more in depth and there would be more tests but that it would need to be surgically removed. I hung up shocked and confused. When I got home that night, the first thing I did was “google” it. What I saw left me even more shocked and confused. Everything I read said it was cancer. Could I have misunderstood? No, I shouldn’t worry…yeah right!

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