Polly gets PETted

I had another lovely medical experience this past Wednesday afternoon: a PET scan. This is a full body scan; the doctors ordered it to determine if there was any cancer beyond what they already knew about.

I was instructed not to eat carbs, fruit or anything with sugar beginning on Tuesday evening. For me, abstaining from carbs is like abstaining from breathing. I’ve had a bowl of cereal for breakfast (and other meals, too) almost everyday of my life! And I don’t do well fasting, which I had to after my light, crappy breakfast Wednesday morning. When I don’t eat I get really cranky and usually develop a terrible migraine. The PET scan was scheduled for 2:30pm, so by the time I got to the office I was dying of hunger.

The first thing they had me do was drink two large glasses of this disgusting white stuff called barium. For any of you who have had a PET scan, colonoscopy, or similar tests, you know all about this yummy concoction. I was actually so hungry that the first half went down fairly easily. I plugged my nose for the rest of it.

Next they started an IV, and I was brought into a small, dark and very warm room with a recliner. A technician inserted “radioactive glucose”—really—into my IV and told me I should relax and try not to move much for 45 minutes. No problems there; I fell asleep (probably from low blood sugar due to the fasting). Next was the scan. The PET scanner looks suspiciously like an MRI, where I’ve spent a lot of time over the last eight years. After drinking one more glass of good ol’ barium, I was told to lay down with my arms held over my head and stay motionless for a half hour. After about 15 minutes, my arms & hands were totally asleep and my comfort level was rapidly decreasing. To top it off, I had an itch on my thigh that I wanted to scratch so badly. It was all I could think about. Finally it was over. I raced home and ate the best bowl of cereal I’ve had in a long time.

A day later I finally got some overdue good news. The PET scan results showed that other than the already-known lumps in my bumps I do not have any other cancer lurking around! And on top of that, I learned the results of the genetic testing were NEGATIVE for both the BRCA1 & BRCA2 genes. This was great news; it means I do not carry the gene that would put me at a much higher risk of developing breast cancer in my other breast, or ovarian cancer. If I was BRCA positive I would probably be encouraged to have a double mastectomy after chemo. Now I’m wondering how one small but real boob would look next to the DD upgrade I’ve been thinking about.