Limboland sucks.

I hate to be so negative, but let's get real, limbo can and does suck.

Then again, maybe I am just being a bit extreme and a lot melodramatic. Wouldn't be the first time in my life that's happened. Spazzing out mildly over a new lump I felt near my deeper groin node dissection scar going on a couple of weeks ago. Lord.
I did ask my surgeon at the follow up appointment this past Monday what he thought of it, all the while chanting a mantra in my skull "PleaseSayItsScarTissuePleasesSayItsScarTissue."

He said it was quite possible it could be scar tissue, but if it grows, to call right away. Then he asked if the oncologist that I am seeing for my vaccine trial is planning on ordering a CT scan soon. I replied that he was, and I would get that Rx form on the 28th. He said, okay, good....Guess he figures that if this little stinker of a lump is anything either a) it will show up on the CT scan, or b) it will grow (no brainer there).

Let me just say once again, inside I am majorly freaking out this time around as far as the CT scan goes....There is this dread building up in anticipation of this batch of scans. I could list a whole sh*tload of fairly rational yet slightly neurotic reasons that would justify my level of insanity, but to be truthful, I could also list a few equally good yet possibly less valid arguments for the CT coming back clear. I won't rattle any of those off here though. Ultimately, it comes down to pure luck. Nothing more...and that's what stinks.

Whenever scan time rolls around, I always think of this guy that used to post on MPIP a while back who always referred to melanoma and all that goes with it as a "Chinese Execution" (or maybe it was death sentence, not totally sure there). When asked by a couple of fellow MPIP'ers why he always referred to it that way, his explanation (not an exact quote) was a fitting one: over in China, when a person is given the death sentence, it isn't carried out the same way as it is here in the U.S. Instead, the people set to be executed are all brought out and lined up. Then one is randomly chosen. That is their day to die. None of them ever know which one of them it will be. None of them know when.
Now, I never checked to see if this statement was factual, but I did get his comparison and his point.

I do believe that just about every person with melanoma out there, myself included, would agree on this one: It's the not knowing, the huge and overwhelming unknown, that sucks....it is the hardest thing to deal with. You just never know.

Anything is possible, and the possibilities aren't always the best ones.

New lumps, bumps, aches, pains, wierd sensations, waiting on scan or test results, etc. These are the things that can drive you into a state of anxiety worthy of a hefty dose of Xanax and make a padded cell seem like an inviting place to sleep, that is until you hear the words "all clear" "it was nothing serious" "benign"....basically, anything other than cancer, or more specifically, not melanoma.

We want answers. Now isn't fast enough.

I hate to admit this, but as a stage I patient (going on two years ago now), I would literally comb through all the stage I patnets on MPIP to seek out others who had similar disease characteristics and breathe a HUGE sigh of relief if they were still stage I. Worse yet, I would comb through the stage III's to look for that same thing: people who had melanomas similar to mine, started out as stage I and progressed (can you say glutton for punishment and self torment?). I would look tirelessly, research constantly, always looking for a clue as to what to expect....Looking for answers that no one can give me.

As if any amount of preparing myself for the "worst" could lessen the blow if and when that worst actually happened.

Scan time always makes me nutz.

On the flip side I do know that with each scan that comes back clear, it gets infinitely easier to face the next one....Well, maybe not infinitely. But quite a bit, anyway. I do know that there are few things in this new life of mine, aside from my kids and husband, that can make me as purely ecstatic as a clean CT scan. Lots of things make me happy, but not to that extreme. And while it is very possible this CT could be every bit the shitty picture I have built it up to be in the darkest corners of my mind and my nightmares, it is also just as likely that it will tell me exactly what I want it to. Clear. NED.

And NED is always worth celebrating.

Now I just have to convince myself. ;)