We found the parking lot and the doctor's office without any trouble.
The doctor sat down and asked me why I was there to see him.
I pointed to the stack of records we had with us.
"I have to see things for myself," he said.
And we went into another room for a rigid sigmoidoscopy.
I have one word - OUCH!
After getting a good and I thought very long look, he said that the lesion is about 2 inches long - Yikes! And very near the anus muscle.
I am going to see my Marion oncologist today to get chemo and radiation started. That should last about 6 weeks - no telling how I will react. For some people it's nothing for others it is hell on earth.
Then, about six weeks after that is over, I get the operation. While he said that about 25 percent of patients have total disappearance of the cancer with just chemo and radiation, I have no chance to avoid surgery.
During surgery, they will treat the tumor on my kidney. "You are going to be wide open," he said.
We are supposed to get an appointment with another urologist today.
Surgery will put me in the hospital for about a week.
There is a chance that I will wind up with a permanent colostomy, but maybe not.
"Our first goal is to save your life," he said.
"Our second goal is to avoid a stoma."
So, we should know my fate by the end of June. Well, at least part of my fate.
I guess about 60 percent of people with rectal cancer survive. And that includes everybody. Because we are taking action, I assume my odds are better than that.
More on that later, I gotta get to work.
In case you were wondering, Sunny won the mascot race at the ball game
1 comment:
Mascot racing? I thought we as a nation had put this barbarism behind us.
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