No wonder it's tough to love doctors!

Well, I wrote a post earlier this evening, and went to officially put it on the blog, and it totally disappeared. It was not a nice post, not upbeat, not encouraging, and I think God wanted me to meditate on Him a bit longer before I wrote anything for public consumption!

Today was, to be blunt, a bad day. The whole point of the day, medically, was to do an endoscopy and obtain a biopsy of the lymph node via the esophagus (we were wrong yesterday when we both thought it was via the trachea). We arrived at Duke at 9:15 this morning, they started at 10:30, called me back at noon. She began coming out of anesthesia at 12:15, doc came in at 12:30 or so. "We did the endoscopy, but despite all our efforts were unable to obtain a biopsy." I was shocked, did not know how to react, decided against anger (barely). They advised going home and waiting for Dr. Pappas to call sometime this week with the next, as yet undetermined, procedure time. So, my heart hurt for my wife who had undergone this procedure that while not painful, is uncomfortable and leaves her feeling pretty lousy for a day or so, to no real benefit.

I insisted that they page Pappas before we left. So, we left Dee Dee's I.V. in, etc., in the hope of doing the next thing while we were already there. He called back, and said to hustle over to try to get the octreatide scan today. We went to that area, waited 2 hours, then were told that it could not be done at all today, and that in fact it couldn't be done for a bit over 2 weeks!

Driving home, there was not a lot of conversation. We were both sort of empty, very disappointed. Dee Dee handled it best, and reminded me several times that our times are His, that the courses of our days are in His hands. I called Pappas, and he returned the call a bit after we arrived home. He said he was not shocked that the procedure did not work, and that the node was just too far from the esophagus to reach it safely via that route. He is going to have the pulmonary specialists look at the CAT scan to determine which route will work, and hopefully get that done this week. The options are an incision in her neck, or a larger incision between two ribs.

He also still wants to get the octreatide scan, and will try to get it scheduled sooner than 10/18. By the way, we found out today that this is a 2-day scan. No hospital stay, but back to Duke two days in a row for scanning.

I then called the doc at Mayo who will actually be taking care of us while in Minnesota. This was the first time I have talked with him (he called me back during Caleb's baseball game, while I was coaching and Caleb was pitching!). His name is Geoff Thompson. He wants us to go ahead with lymph biopsy here, agreeing that a 4 cm lymph is unusual, and must be evaluated. He reiterated that he doubts it is carcinoid, but that the size mandates attention. After talking, we agreed upon travel dates, and I have booked flights and hotel for Rochester, MN. Thank God for many things, including Priceline.com! Tickets were all listing for over $1000 per person, and we got them on priceline for $300 a person. Whew! I had to remind Dee Dee that just like our time is His, so is our money. If He chooses to have us spend it on plane tix and hotels in MN, that is His prerogative.

The other significant news from my conversation with Thompson is that he basically said that he was going to absolutely disagree with Pappas. He said that he NEVER takes out any part of a woman's stomach unless it is completely unavoidable. "There is no possible way that I would allow this procedure to be done on my wife. Period." He said that we would be taking a woman who is essentially without symptoms, and "sentencing her to a life of daily symptoms, where she would never again feel normal and good." He wants to look at everything himself, and repeat a few tests (octreatide scan, endoscopy, remove the larger tumors in their entirety), but if all the info we have been given so far is correct, he will simply advocate lifelong monitoring, choosing to leave the cancer in place.

This, my friends, has been the weirdest day of the whole event. We had things done that produced no knowledge, and now have two docs from the #1 cancer center in the US (Mayo) and #4 cancer center in the US (Duke) completely disagreeing. To be honest, I have no idea what to think, how to process this information. I appreciate your prayers for wisdom and discernment at this point. We will not do the octreatide scan here and at Mayo, so we will just do it at Mayo. We fly to MN on Sunday 10/15, and return on Thursday 10/19. That gives them 3 full days to test/poke/prod and talk. As I learn more about his reasons for non-surgical treatment, I will let you know. Also, when we know the time of the biopsy round #2, I will post that.

Tough day, and not a lot of medical progress. Difficult day emotionally for us both. Certainly it was a day that we were glad to see end. Actually it ends two tough days. Yesterday we had two different families that had memorial services for their sweet boys; one lost their son during pregnancy, and another lost their son one day shy of his 9th birthday. A family member/friend of ours had lumpectomy today. Lots of opportunities for God's grace! The good news? His mercies are new EVERY morning, and tomorrow morning is never more than a few hours away.

Tony