IN REMISSION!!!!!!

Today I was told that my post chemo CT scan came back clear!  No indications of cancer!  While I knew, logically, there probably wouldn't be anything on the scan, the past few weeks have been stressful!  I either tried not to think about it or, as it got closer to getting the results, I kept telling myself over and over again that everything was going to be ok.  Half of me believed it but the other half of me just couldn't bring itself to agree!

From the beginning of all of this back in April I have managed to hit the minority reaction to almost everything!!  And I also heard the word "but" more than I wanted to as well!  Before my first procedure, the doctor told me that while there was a small chance of cancer being found that the percentage was something like 5%.  Pretty good odds right?  A 95% chance I wouldn't have cancer.  Hello 5%!!  Then came the question of having a partial or whole hysterectomy.  Again, the chances of the cancer spreading beyond the uterus was very small.  But I decided to have the whole hysterectomy.  That was God having my angel whisper in my ear.  I thought I was going to only have to worry about it moving to the lymph nodes.  Those were clear (thank God!).  That was when I heard the word "but".  It only went 3/4 of the way through the uterine wall...thats good!  BUT, it moved to make a small tumor on an ovary.  Because it moved,  chemo was strongly recommend.  Six treatments of pretty nasty chemo followed.  An experience I NEVER want to go through again and wouldn't wish on the worst person in the world!

So when I pulled out of the delirium and haze of my last chemo (and that took about 6 weeks before I felt like I could maybe do every day things without collapsing!) I had this CT scan to look forward to.  The logical side of my brain was agreeing with everyone around me...that there shouldn't be anything on the scan.  But the emotional side of my brain was still very whiplashed from being smacked down physically and emotionally over and over again since April!  I just couldn't believe it was going to be over!  I kept seeing myself hitting that 5% of people who end up with cancer from Endometriosis and the random movement of the cancer!

I will admit that up until this morning, my brain was refusing to calm down and just believe it would be ok.  My mom managed to get me out of bed to go to 8 am Mass at St. Joe's though and I think that was the push I needed to get over that unbelievable fear I couldn't ignore.  I'm not saying I was suddenly filled with peace...but more like a slow acceptance that God was in charge and had everyone from the Blessed Mother to my patron saints, guardian angel and older brother as well as everyone else all my friends where begging for intercession, asking Him to bring me out of this!  It's not that I doubted He would bring me out where He wanted me...it was how much longer I was going to have to go through this!  I know God never gives us more than we can handle and I think He was letting me know just how much I can handle!  Maybe not always gracefully but He knows.

Because of this, as the day progressed and I found myself in the car with my parents heading up to Saginaw, the panic was reseeding and a sense of almost calm was winning.  I say almost calm because I am a worrier by nature so it would have been a complete miracle if that worry had been totally pushed aside!  As soon as the doctor walked in and asked me how I was doing I told him I would be doing so much better if he told me that the scan was clear.  He said it was clear!  No evidence of cancer!!  On top of that, he didn't see any reason that there would be anything to worry about in the near future.  No doctor will ever say the cancer will never come back...but they will let you know if they were concerned or not and he wasn't!

I go in for exams every three months and another CT scan in 6 months.  This is going to be a regular routine for the rest of my life but I can handle that!  It means that every three months I am reassured that I am ok!!  So now I sit here and look around me and ask God;  Whats next?