The New Baseline

Yesterday was MRI day and what a day it was.

Heading towards the November 2nd MRI appointment for a first post-surgery number two look inside my brain, I had no fears, no worries, no expectations, only gratitude for being alive and having recuperated almost all my speech and language processing abilities. A crisp breeze accompanied Mike and I as we walked, hand-in-hand under bright, blue autumnal skies, the block and a half to the hospital when I asked, “Why do you continue to accompany me to my MRI appointments?”

“So you don’t get lost.” he answered. I was smiling as we entered the hospital.

Once inside, Mike reminded me to register before going to the imaging center. I’d forgotten. After completing that procedure, Mike guided me to the correct elevators, then through the basement corridors to the MRI waiting room as I realized I’d buried all conscious memory of previous visits yet, was beginning to feel anxious. Upon entering the waiting room, the tears began to fall, more surprising to Mike than me. I wept intermittently for the rest of the day.

A rough looking tech called my name, gave me instructions through a bit of a speech impediment to remove my bra and put my belongings into a locker and disappeared. So nervous by then, I had the urge to urinate. After emptying my bladder, I had sat down in the waiting room before Mike reminded me of the tech’s instructions. Looking at Mike sheepishly I thought about his remark about making sure I didn’t get lost. When the tech returned, I was ready to follow him to a different room where I answered in the negative all the usual questions regarding the presence of any plates, pins, or other metal objects on, in or around my body after which I signed another form, and repeated my date of birth so he knew he had the correct patient.

The phlebotomist arrived shortly after the tech left me and proceeded to sniffle through sticking me with the needle, and inserting a port for me to later receive the dye for the second, contrasting image to be made. Gratefully, he landed in the correct spot, a feat seldom accomplished on me on the first attempt. After he left, a young, athletic tech came to take me to the dreaded MRI tunnel. He’d taken pictures of me before and rightly remembered it was almost a year ago. Having remembered me, he and his cohort took care of business as if I was weekly customer; a distinctly erroneous assumption.

Prior MRI’s were conducted in a slow, deliberate manner, asking me questions as to my concerns; how did I want the noise to be muffled, did I want a blanket, was I claustrophobic. Instead, once I had my head and body in place, I was quickly ear-plugged and the face cage was snapped into place at which time I said, “Stop. Take that off. You are going too fast for me to absorb what’s happening” as tears were dripping down towards my ears. I apologized. They apologized and took off the cage and assured me I could take as long as I needed.

What I needed was to know that I couldn’t hear much at all. Next I needed to take a deep breath to relax myself and close my eyes before that cage was once again enclosing my head. Even so, I had to work mightily to lengthen my breathing and become one-pointed in my focus as I was wheeled into the monstrous tunnel. It took no time before the clanking and clanging of the machinery was at work.

Scanning my brain usually takes about fifteen minutes before I am wheeled out for the dye injection so It must have taken about seven or eight minutes for me to be cold enough to be very, very sorry I’d not asked for a blanket and held onto that thought until the injection break occurred. Almost immediately after I said I was cold, I was wrapped in a wonderfully warm blanket and my muscles went limp for the duration of the second lap of the MRI. By the time I was upright and had my bearings, the techs were gone and I felt abandoned until I saw, on my way to where Mike was waiting, I saw the young tech interviewing the next patient and remembered they were running late which helped me to further understand why I had felt pushed too fast from the start. Forgiveness, I thought, is easy when understanding is present.

Mike and I left the MRI rooms and headed for Dr. Schmitt’s office, located in the adjacent building, for the consultation appointment scheduled at 11:45 a.m., approximately thirty minutes later.

Schmidt’s waiting room has a television. It was beaming Fox News and I barked that I would be asking the doc who was choosing the channel and objecting the choice. Mike noted that I was a bit touchy and I resumed crying, not because of Mike’s comment but with the relief and release of the tension I had built up during the MRI procedure. Mike’s gentle hand steadied me as we sat in wait. After a while, being assured that I was returned to a state of OKness, Mike found the latest Sports Illustrated and read to me the Andre Aggasi book excerpts to pass the time.

Dr. John Schmidt only recently snipped off his pigtail. He continues to ride a motorcycle. Though I’m sure he’s got detractors because of his ‘old hippie’ demeanor, Mike and I have been greatly impressed by his blend of directness and humor. Without unnecessary alarm, the doc reviewed the reality of my circumstance. One tumor, the first, may be completely cured because Dr. Fukushima conducted a complete resection of the tumor. The second tumor, however, could not be completely removed because of its location, somewhat embedded in the visual cortex. To remove the tumor would have killed the patient – me. What is currently shown in the MRI is a tumor the size of the tip of the little finger, too small to worry about for now.

He went on to say since my tumors took fifty years to grow to the size they were when discovered it is unlikely to return so aggressively that treatment cannot be done. Should it begin to grow back, he would recommend I see an oncologist and consider radiation treatments. He described two types of radiation treatments and the best places to receive them.

While he’s telling us about radiation, I was turning emotionally numb and physically tight. No tears then. Continuing on, he voiced my greatest fear; another surgery might be indicated if the tumor returns aggressively to which I unequivocally interjected, “No! No more surgery! I’m doing that again!”

At the last of the conversation, Dr. Schmidt suggested I go home and live a wonderful life and come back in six months.