The gauntlet run

Most anyone who has read this blog for any period of time knows that I had a smallish run-in with thyroid cancer, back in 2001. Most cautiously agree that I'm cured – except the life insurance providers, of course – but ensuring that I stay that way demands a certain level of vigilance. What that means is that I must periodically submit myself to a week-long protocol of injections, followed by the ceremonial swallowing of a radioactive iodine capsule, culminating in an hour-long full-body scan.

It's all fairly routine by this point, but the week was not without its notable moments.

First off…

Since you've stayed with me this far, it's only fair to come right out with the good news (there is no bad news in this posting, so please… relax). After yesterday's scan, I received a phone call from the radiologist informing me that my scan was clear of any glowy bits. Glowy bits would have been bad, indicating thyroid cells that had absorbed the radioactive iodine. Since I no longer have a thyroid, thyroid cells could only mean cancer. So no glowy bits is a Good Thing™.

I thank God for granting me a continuation of my nearly eight years cancer free.

But there was a moment

The full body scan is actually done in stages, kind of like a series of x-rays. While the technician was repositioning equipment between scans, I happened to look over at the monitor where an image of the just-completed scan was displayed. It showed a bright blob of light (the aforementioned “glowy bit”), and I was filled with unease while lying there through the rest of the series.

As I gathered my things to leave, I commented on this to the technician.

“Oh, that's just a marker,” she said. “Remember when I was touching your neck? We place a radioactive marker on the [somethingorother] notch – where your collarbones meet – because it's right below where your thyroid used to be. It gives the doctor a reference point for that big dark area right above the notch.”

Big dark areas = Good Thing™, but I'd spooked myself. That's what I get for knowing just enough to be dangerous.

There Will Be Blood

After the scan in Dallas, I had to drive up to Baylor, in Plano, to have my blood drawn. I usually do this sort of thing at first light, at an hour that most people don't have the stomach for, but not this time. The waiting room at the lab was packed, and I carefully picked a chair that would observe the social nicety of preserving an empty chair between mine and that of any other occupied chair.

This honoring of personal space was especially important, because the occupant of one of those chairs was actually overflowing into the empty chair buffer zone. A short woman, her feet barely reaching the floor, she was very… colorful in her attire, hair color, and makeup selections. As I sat down, she lay slumped in her chair with the topmost of her three chins nestled in the others, snoring.

Her purse, which appeared to have been fashioned from the remainders of her dress, suddenly slid off her lap on to the floor. I spent a few moments in internal debate before deciding that, while the gentlemanly thing would be to pick it up and hand it back to her, it might be best to let sleeping potential litigants lie. Shortly, the question was made moot when one of the technicians came in to the waiting room, calling the name of someone who didn't answer. Several of us tentatively pointed to the sleeping woman.

Waking her was no simple matter, and getting her up and moving toward the lab was less so; but the technician managed, carefully leading her still-groggy, muttering patient by the elbow. As they left the waiting room, those of us who remained shot each other looks that said, Whoa, dude. That was, like, kinda weird.

I, of course, couldn't just return to examining the multimedia prints from Target that filled the empty space on the walls and leave well enough alone.

“I saw her purse fall and felt like I should pick it up,” I said, speaking more or less directly to a fellow patient who had smiled at me. “But then I sort of had this premonition of myself in handcuffs, trying to call my wife from a pay phone.”

For a moment, the waiting room was filled with tension-dispelling laughter before we all returned to the serious business of disacknowledging one another's existence.

Luck of the draw

After a while, I was called to have my blood drawn. My previous experience at this lab had been less than satisfactory, with the technician clumsily tapping two different veins before getting his sample. I drew a young woman, this time, and crossed my fingers as I sat down in the bloodletting chair.

“This is usually a good producer,” I said, indicating a favorite vein in my left arm. “But the last guy I had here didn't have much luck.”

“Oh, I'm sorry. You must have had Peter,” she said, glancing at the technician working at another station.

“Um… that's him. I'm sure he was just having an off day.”

“Oh no,” she said. “Peter sucks. He knows he sucks. Just this morning, one of the patients accused him of being the janitor, he made such a bloody mess of the guy's draw.”

Just an unfortunate choice of words, I hope.

For the record, my technician was so smooth, I barely felt the needle and today show only the very smallest of bruises.