Lots of pictures to post tonight and many thoughts. First of all the good news. I had my repeat total body scan after my RAI today. I’ve been so nervous all this week it’s almost made me physically ill…even though the first scan was negative this one is done with 150 mCi on board vs. 5mCi so it is a much more definitive scan in looking for distant metastases. The first two scans showed nothing too unexpected but my nuke med doctor said being a woman I had a lot of uptake into the chest so they wanted to repeat with lateral images to totally rule out the possibility of any lung mets. I think I about died right there I was so nervous.

Try and picture any test taking anxiety you might have an multiply by 1,000, with this being a test that can determine whether you will live or die except that you have no control over it. That’s maybe a fraction of what it feels like to wait for a cancer scan.

They did two additional lateral views and about 15 min. later called me back. Here’s where I have to put a plug in for Navy medicine…in the civilian world they probably would have done the two initial scans and called it quits. However this being military medicine, since the scan adds no additional radiation and I had the time they were willing to go the extra mile to DEFINITIVELY prove to myself and nuclear medicine that I have NO LUNGS METS. On the lateral views you can clearly see the breast tissue overlaying the chest wall. Breast tissue- scattered uptake throughout. Chest- per nuke med completely clear! I was squeezing Todd’s hand so tightly when we got the news.

And just because my nuke med team is so thorough I am going back Monday to get one more abdominal image done to prove the one remaining bright spot is stool in the large intestine vs. a bone metastasis. One big step to being a patient with “No evidence of disease”. The next step will be negative thyroglubulin levels at 6 weeks and 6 months.

Now the sad news. Please say a prayer for my cousin Tiffany and her family this weekend. She needs all the good thoughts she can get this weekend since she is in intensive care and on a ventilator. Until her body heals up some more they can not go forward with the bone marrow transplant she so desperately needs.

And now some of my life in pictures:

The boys

The family

Grandma

Annie