Friday the 13th, In Your Face!

Friday the 13th my wife and I were escorted by a nurse to exam room #13. “Is the universe trying to tell me something”, I thought. It’s Friday the 13th and I am in room #13 about to here from my oncologist about my recent PET scan results. The nurse did ask if I wanted to change rooms, but I figured if there was such a thing as fate, it was already sealed for that day and changing rooms wouldn’t suddenly change the outcome of my visit. Honestly, I don’t believe in superstition and fate. Well, in your face Friday the 13th, my PET scan came back perfect – absolutely no cancer. Of course, my great results were not just random luck, I had a little influence.

So far two of my PET scans came back positive for cancer activity, but later proved out to be just inflammation of scar tissue where I had surgery. It’s not a good day when your oncologist says, “Your scan has shown in uptake, it is probably nothing, but it does indicate that the cancer is coming back and we need to watch it very closely and have you come back in a few weeks for another scan”. I reason, for good reasons, my active lifestyle with long distance running is causing my hernia surgery site to be inflamed and not to worry about it, but it still can rest heavy on the mind. So I found a way to combat it, with ice!

I figure if ice is good for reducing swelling and inflammation of sports injuries, then why not old hernia surgery sites. So about 3 days before my PET scan I start applying an ice pack to my groin each night, and oh that’s cold. That doesn’t sound like much fun does it? It beats the alternative, going through weeks of anxiety until another PET scan shows that the cancer is not coming back. Every time I have used ice packs before a scan my scan results have come back negative. Earlier this year I got lazy one time and didn’t use ice packs and sure enough, the PET scan came back positive. Now I’ll do anything to make sure I use the ice treatment.

This last week I got lazy again, waiting to the last night before my scan before using ice packs. That night I went to my parents, which is about an hour drive from my home, to visit and help out with a few things. I didn’t want to stay up late at night, so I employed my technique on my drive back home. It was good I wasn’t pulled over by the police. It would have been uneasy trying to explain why a bag of ice was stuff down my pants.

It’s amazing that we spend a lot of effort dodging superstitions, yet many times we’ll do little or nothing of the things that really have control in the outcome of our lives.