Biopsy Day
May 10, 2024
I had the biopsy yesterday. What a day! So much hurry up and wait at the hospital. There was a lot of info nobody told me before the day, that might have been good to know in advance. But let’s start at the beginning.
Rosie picked me up at 6AM, and we were off. It took about 45 minutes to get there. When we arrived, we discovered that the directions on the site and given to me over the phone, were not exactly accurate. We went in the wrong door, security guard pointed us to regular radiology, who then pointed us to ADMC, Advanced diagnostic Medical Center. We ended up having made a big old loop, and back almost at the door we should have used to enter. It would be good for departing the hospital.
A man named Sergio started events with me. Not sure of his title, nurse’s assistant, nurse, don’t know. They’d told me to wear comfortable clothes, and when I arrived, Sergio told me to undress and put on the not so pretty gown waiting on the bed for me. He left us alone for that, and I got changed and scooted onto the bed. Sergio came back, took my blood pressure, checked my oxygen levels and my temperature. Then he was gone, and we didn’t see him again.
Next came a nurse, maybe maybe Seanna. She got me all wired up. She took my blood, inserted an idea, took my pressure again. She went over all my details again. One question she asked was, “if you need a blood transfusion, do you agree to us giving you blood product?” Okay, this made me want to laugh. I thought, what is blood product. Is it like cheese product? They call velveeta cheese product after all. Anyway I got a chuckle out of blood product.
At that point, it probably wasn’t even 8AM yet, and hurry up and wait time began. Soon, the radiologist who would be performing the procedure came to discuss. (why is it that they “perform” procedures instead of “do” procedures? Lol. My mind does go to crazy places sometimes. And here came the first info nobody told me before. Radiologist said that the nodule they needed to take a piece of was in the lower part of my left lung. “It might be hard to get a biopsy from it”. said he. “We might have to put it off a couple months until the thing grows a little more.” Then he told me that there was a possibility that my lung could collapse during the procedure, and that if I felt pain, I was to raise my finger and absolutely not speak. Speaking could cause me to breathe which could collapse the lung too. if my lung collapsed this would mean I would have to have a chest tube inserted to put some air in my lung to uncollapse it. After this cheerful declaration, he whizzed out, and I never, consciously at least, saw him again!
Well, I was heading in to freak out mode over all that, and Rosie was giving me encouragement, when Seanna spoke up. She squeezed my hand and reminded me that they do these biopsies all the time, and that there is rarely a problem. She did help me calm down. Thank you Nurse Seanna.
Following more hurry up and wait time, A man came in. His name was pronounced Zaya, but he told me to call him Z. He said he would be one of the nurses assisting in the procedure. His cheerful words of the day, let me know that though they would give me pain meds and numb me, I would actually be awake during the procedure. Something about not letting me sleep, because deep breathing could cause that happy lung collapse. But he was friendly and comforting, and though freak out mode appeared again after he left, I calmed down again.
A quick side bar here. The weird thing during all the freaking out modes, was that the heart monitor dined every time my heart rate wen below fifty, and even when I was anxious or scared, it would still fall below fifty. My blood pressure started out extremely high for me, but in the midst of freak out mode number one, it dropped back down to normal. Weird.
It was now twenty after eight, and we were back in hurry up and wait. But right at 9AM, Z came in with another nurse for the event, and after Rosie and I exchanged see ya laters, they wheeled me off, with all my attached equipment. The procedure was about to start!
They wheels my bed right next to the CT scan table, and they had me move as far to the left as possible and rolled me over to my stomach and on that table. They stuck a pillow under my face and told me to turn my head to the side. “I can’t turn it far,” I objected. “I don’t have much motion there because of my arthritis.” They kind of blew that off, or at least didn’t respond. I tucked the pillow down as far as I could from my nose. Z placed a oxygen thing into my nose, and I remember feeling much relieved as I felt the oxygen go in. Then z said he was going to put something in my IV, and I went away. Well, I guess I was there, but I didn’t know another thing until they were putting something on the wound and being rolled back to my original spot back on my original bed.
I asked them to call Rosie, and she was right back with me. We talked. I tried to go back to sleep, but the area was just too noisy. Every time that heartbeat went down to less than fifty, ding, ding, ding, went my monitor. There were monitors from all the curtained alcoves surrounding mine. There were phones ringing, nurses and technicians and patients talking, and loudly.
Hurry up and wait mode took two hours this time. They had to do a chest x-ray to make sure all was well with my uncollapsed lung, and they waited two hours to do this. Not explaining why it needed to wait for two hours, but I’m sure there was a reasonable reason for it. Two techs came in and they had me sit up and put a very hard x-ray film plate behind my back. Click, they took the picture, and then whisked away to develop it. Can you say hurry up and wait again?
The only way I knew the x-ray had been read by the radiologist was that we heard him say, “Gomes is good to go” and then he took off, never speaking to me at all. I had questions about the procedure. How much tissue did they get? Would I probably or possibly have pain around the area? You know, the sort of things you’d ask a doctor after they “perform” a procedure. But he didn’t bother to even say hello and goodbye. Nurse Seanna came in, read me all my instructions, had me sign things. Rosie helped me get dressed, Nurse put me in a wheel chair, and I was out of there!
When we arrived home, I went to bed almost immediately and slept four hours. Doug fed Shani for me. I got up for a couple hours and had something to drink and ate part of a bowl of yummy home made broccoli cheese soup Doug made for me. I went back to bed at around 8PM. I was feeling considerable pain by that point, but I fell asleep and didn’t really wake again until almost 6AM today.
I’m going to go lie down again for a while after posting this. I still have some pain and still feel sleepy. But it’s over, this part anyway. I don’t see the oncologist again until June 10, because he’ll be out of the office for a couple weeks. We don’t know when I’ll get the results of the biopsy. So, guess what mode I’m in now? Yeah, you got it, HURRY UP AND WAIT!!!
sherrygomeswrites 