Shrunken Lump

Well it sounds like it could be the name of a 1970's horror film, or kung fu movie, but no it's about my relapsed lymph node.

Saw my oncologist on Monday and he said my lump had reduced to 1.2cm.  To put this in context, it started at 1.8 (when I was diagnosed as relapsing), then grew to 2.4 (by the morning of my first chemo session) and now in my first scan post-chem it's back to 1.2cm.  So for me that's a result and I am very happy with where it is up to.  Hopefully it'll shrink some more and my next scan (6 months time) will show that.

One slight wrinkle is that it is still above the magic threshold of 1cm, and as such my notes have been referred to the surgical team for them to decide whether or not it needs to be removed.  My suspicion is that they'll leave it alone, at least until after my next scan.

So from my naive position I am back on surveillance and that's a result.

Now the only big-C left to worry about (at the moment) is Christmas... :)

Well I've not posted for a while, and that was deliberate. A month-or-so ago I finished my chemotherapy and since then I've been trying to get my life back to normal.  To that end I had a couple of weeks "light duties" working from home, and then it was back into the office (Mon, wed and Fri the first two weeks).  I have to say being back at work has been great, even though they are under a great deal of pressure at the moment (delivery dates rapidly approaching).

And overall I think I, and my family, have managed to achieve a reasonable degree of normality.  As the days turn into weeks, my body is slowly returning to normal (the chemo-poisons are leaving my system) and so now I do want to get back to things like getting fit again...

However there are a couple of wrinkles and they revolve around last Monday and tomorrow, as those are the dates of my post-chemo scan and consultation with my oncologist respectively.  Now, over the past few weeks I've managed to put a lot of this chemo/cancer business behind me; yes it's still fairly prominent in my thoughts, but not as much as it was.  Well that was until last week and now, it's right back up there at the front of everything I do...

I am happy to confess I am nervous about tomorrow, probably the main reason being the little "ache" I had in my left-hand abdominal area that started just before my relapse was diagnosed is still with me.  To me, both are related and therefore if the ache is still there then (regardless of the success of the chemotherapy) the lump on my lymph node is still there and that means an operation.  It could be that these to things are not related, but in my mind they are, so I am expecting the news "Well the lump is still there, when would you like to be operated on..." and the fallout, in terms of telling family and work colleagues that there is another twist in my cancerous tail.

So I'll sign off, go to bed and await tomorrow's meeting...