TheBanyanTree: Surprises

[PJMoney]

First he surprised me when, after a short conversation about why I'd
come, he invited me to go straight into his other room and pop up on the
couch for a quick look with the ultrasound.  In we went, up I got, jelly
was applied and then the probe.  The screen in front of me lit up with
the black, white and grey shapes I have not been trained to interpret
accurately.

He said, "Ah, yes," and invited me to look.  My recumbent position
required me to push my glasses far down my nose so that I could focus
through their distance vision section.  My nostrils got squashed and
breathing became a little difficult as he baldly described what he saw -
the second surprise.

"A large, complex, multiloculated, mucinous cystadenoma or
cystadenocarcinoma."

Who?  Me?

Oddly, the first thought that came to my mind was that now I know what
it's like to be told I might have cancer.  There was no real fear - not
like the first time, 30 odd years ago, when, upon seeing red writing on
my card, I'd mistakenly assumed that a test result had come back
reporting evil news.  I felt perfectly calm.  It's just that my skin was
tingling all over, as though I'd taken a quick bath in iced water.  The
body; how it loves life.  

Next was the bimanual palpation.  He invited me to feel the mass as he
balloted it.  I put my right hand on my belly below the umbilicus and
felt the lump bounce and bounce again against my fingers.  The third
surprise.  That strange hard feeling of pressure that I'd felt over the
last few months when lying on my stomach had not been due to my
bladder's fullness.  I'd needed larger dress sizes not just because I
was getting fat from sitting around too much or having too many glasses
of wine at dinner.  It was, at least in part, because of a tumour that
had been growing for who knows how long.

I could not bring myself to go straight home.  I did not want to face
questioning from my children before I'd told my husband.  So, instead,
for the first time, I went to the golf course.  I had a lemon, lime and
bitters while I waited for him to finish his usual Saturday morning
round.

When he got in I told him the news and that I was unconcerned for
myself.  He said that was his chief worry.  He knows me too well.  And I
know him too well.  I should be concerned for him.  

For me, "to live is Christ and to die is gain".  The thought of having
an end to the stupidities and wickednesses of life in this world is
deeply attractive to me.  But that would mean leaving my husband behind,
alone and lonely.  Like me, he is not the sort of person who makes close
friendships easily.  I can't see him quickly finding someone else with
whom to remake a life of familiarity, peace and contentment.  And he's
only 48.  So I promised that if it does turn out to be cancer I will do
what I can to fight it and stay alive so that we can grow very old
together.

I've had all the standard tests but the final test will be the surgery
which will be this coming Monday.  So far the signs are pretty good.
The blood tests are only slightly abnormal but that could mean nothing
or everything.  The CT scans indicate that, whatever it is, it's not
likely to be a stage III (spread beyond the pelvis) or IV (spread
every-bloody-where).  The Prof says it could very well be benign or just
borderline malignant (which means no chemotherapy).  I can do nothing
but wait and then go under the knife.  It's all good.

Janice