Cancer: More MRI Scans, The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

April to July 2023

17 April 2023. I got my feedback from the MRI scan taken just a month ago. Nothing has changed much since the previous MRI. Stability. I'll settle for that.

4 May 2023. Went out for breakfast yesterday with David and Jeannie, a good catch-up over food. Came home to find copy of letter sent from Leeds hospital to my GP. These always give more info than you get over the phone. Phone conversation had said "not much change" in the size of the cancer and there wasn't - only half a centimetre. But it was half a centimetre bigger... ho hum. Too small a change to do any more about it yet, fingers crossed for the next MRI which will probably be end of June or early July. We have a few trips planned between now and then, let's hope for some good weather then. Haircut today - I want to make sure it doesn't keep getting in my eyes... Afterwards we were watching a documentary on Bruce Lee and I make all the same noises getting up off the sofa but for entirely different reasons...

18 May 2023. Diabetic 6 monthly check-up this morning. The nurse told me I was "perfect". I may have mentioned this to Miss Franny with something of a smug look on my face...

12 July 2023. Trip to Leeds for the MRI yesterday. Graham picked me up around 8:30 and we drove over the A59 past Clitheroe, Skipton where we stopped for a cuppa and then Otley where we got held up by roadworks a couple of times. Got to the hospital with time for a quick bite. Didn't have my iron pills as the MRI can make metal objects suddenly whizz off at 400mph and the thought of the pill suddenly shooting out of my side put me off a bit... Went into Radiology a bit early hoping for a quick getaway.

I was taken through almost straight away - I still hadn't finished filling out the forms denying all types of previous operations or implants including some that made my eyes water just reading about them... Got sat down in a small cubicle, answered all the same questions again but verbally, had a canula and tube put into my arm then someone called the nurse and there was to be a ten minute delay.

Twenty minutes later, still sitting in the same chair but now on my own I felt something on my arm and the tube had dropped out of the canula. Gingerly attempted to put it back then went in search of nursey who put it back properly and said the woman who had been in the MRI machine had had a problem with the injected dye not working properly. Ended up going in ten minutes late.

Lay down on the machine and was asked to lower my trousers in case the zip was metal - I certainly didn't want that suddenly zooming off anywhere near at 400mph... "I'll get a gown to cover you," said nursey.
"I have undies on and they're just plain - they won't betray any character traits," I said cheerfully.
That gave her a laugh, "Well I don't think anyone's ever said that to me before..." she said

The next half hour in a tube is best forgotten so I won't dwell on it. Came out and sat in chair to have canula taken out of my arm. A pad of gauze placed on the spot and was told to hold it. My head was still pulsing - how does it do that when it's your liver they are taking images of? Looked down saw that the tie strings of my pants had come undone and without thinking reached down to tie them, causing the gauze to fall off and the next thing is Nursey goes "Oh!" and my arm feels wet and there's blood all over the place... I'm a bit of a bleeder...

"I'm going to run if I see you coming here again!" exclaims nursey, "you'll have to stay until you've mopped that floor now!"
"Told you I was a bleeder!" I said apologetically. All sorted.

As I left the MRI unit nursey was preparing her next victim. She saw me as I passed and grinned. "I hope you're not going to be as bad as my last patient," she said loudly...

I still had to go up a floor to give blood samples at the oncology clinic. Luckily they were expecting me this time unlike in April where the Receptionist had demanded to know from me why they weren't expecting me and did I know it was just for cancer patients. I've never said a dryer "y-e-e-e-s..."

Anyway blood was taken from my other arm than the canula one and all went well except that by time I was home both arms were feeling heavy and itchy and I ripped off plasters to find lots of bruising on the second arm - not where the needle went in either... Totally shattered by then, Graham had to help me out of the car, poor old dodderer that I am. Pain killers, food, bed... wake up every quarter hour with pain lancing through side, oh the joys. Don't expect me to do much today except snore and the occasional wince!

Family Memories: Personal Index