The Plot Thickens

The other day I wrote about my new tumor. Only ONE new tumor that is 2 centimetres in size. Now I’m wondering if I’ve got another one. It’s nothing I can feel physically, but my body seems to be causing me more problems. Just like it did last year at this time. One year ago I was having my ovaries removed because of a tumor. Now here I am with a new tumor (see previous post) and possibly a second to keep it company. 

Another thing that was discovered over this past year of scans was something suspicious on the tube that goes from my right kidney to my bladder. It’s known as the ureter (there’s your anatomy lesson for the day), and the ureter on the right side of my body has a blockage. Whatever this thing is, it’s gotten larger and is stopping urine from draining properly from the right kidney to the bladder. The last test that discovered the new tumor on my liver also saw that this “thing” was larger. My bone scan also showed that the radioactive isotopes were still in my right kidney when I was scanned. They should have been in the bladder or already eliminated (peed out). The shape of the kidney has changed and it’s obviously not functioning as it should. I can NOT feel anything and don’t notice a difference in anything.

I saw a urological surgeon last week about the blockage in the ureter and he painted a few different scenarios of what could be going on. He also stressed that we needed to do something soon, and the first step was to put a stent into the ureter to help the kidney drain. An opening came up this week and I went in on Wednesday (Dec 16, 2009) to have the procedure done. Everyone else was going in and out of there fairly quickly. Until I came along. Why is it that nothing goes right with this body of mine?!  It can never be simple for me.

This was supposed to be a simple, quick procedure but it wasn’t. The surgeon first needs to put a wire up through the bladder, into the correct ureter opening (left or right) and then the stent can be guided in place into the kidney. As the patient you are awake, not even sedated because it’s not really necessary (at least not as a woman…might be different for men!). I’ve had procedures done in the past where I was awake and unsedated but I don’t recall anything like this. I wasn’t worried or tense beforehand, as I knew what to expect. Or so I thought.

It turned out it would NOT be a simple, quick procedure for me. I should have known I was in for another medical adventure when I started feeling burning pain. It’s not an understatement to say that I’ve been through a LOT in the last 9 years of my cancer battle. I can put up with a lot, but for some reason this really got to me.  In the beginning I was chatting and joking with the resident, 2 nurses and the x-ray tech while the Urologist did his thing. Then it got to the point where all I could do was groan or swear when I started to feel this burning sensation. I tried deep breathing to deal with the burning, pressure and overall discomfort. It didn’t help matters that I was tense and the room was cool, as operating rooms usually are. I realized I was very tense so I made a point of relaxing my body…hoping it would help. It didn’t. I don’t know how long I was in there but there was a point where I wanted to say “STOP! I’ve had enough!”. That was some time after I really wanted to ask “How much longer?!” but was scared to know. The swearing got a little bit worse at this time.  I wasn’t loud or screaming, just repeating the same word over and over again. I was feeling like I might faint, and was actually hoping I would so I wouldn’t have to feel anymore. The sensations became so bad that I went back to deep breathing but started breathing too fast and they asked me to slow down. I was likely close to hyperventilating, but I also needed to hold my breath or breathe slowly and deeply for the x-ray that was guiding the wire up the ureter.

And finally I did what I should have done all along. I reached out my hand, so someone would hold it. I wanted to ask someone to hold my hand but the words wouldn’t come. I couldn’t speak, so I just stretched out my hand and the staff knew what I needed. A very experienced and smart nurse gave me two fingers to squeeze. I know she’s smart and experienced because if she’d given me her entire hand I would have squeezed the bejesus out of it, rendering her hand useless and putting her on Workman’s Comp. I squeezed those two fingers with every ounce of strength I somehow miraculously had, was deep breathing and still swearing occasionally (when I could actually utter a word). It seemed like this was taking forever, but in reality it likely wasn’t that long. I have to say the doctor didn’t just ignore me through all of this….he kept asking if I was ok and I told him what I was feeling at the time.

I think what really sticks in my mind is doing deep breathing and staring into the chocolate brown eyes of the x-ray technician. I’d been visiting with him earlier and when I was in pain I was staring up at him with what must have been a look that begged “Please make it stop”. I swear I could see empathy in his eyes. He genuinely cared, but of course there was nothing he could do to make it better. Just thinking he cared made it better.

Then it was all over. And when I knew it was over, I needed to get rid of the tension and uttered a long string of profanities that made the x-ray tech (with the chocolate brown eyes) say “We don’t usually hear language like that in here!”. I thought he was joking, but he wasn’t I had been so tense that now I really started to feel cold, was shaking and feeling light headed. Out came the warm blankets and I slowly sat up on the table. Those two nurses were so patient with me and wouldn’t let me get off the table until they were sure I was ok. I definitely needed the wheelchair ride out of that room.

I was supposed to have a stent put in that would go from my kidney, down through the ureter and into the bladder so urine can drain from the kidney. Turns out that whatever is blocking the ureter is bigger than we first thought. It’s blocking a fairly large stretch of the ureter and there’s no way a stent would fit. I’m guessing that the burning I was feeling was from the wire trying to go up through this area of the ureter. I think maybe it was such a narrow opening, and that’s why it hurt and caused such discomfort because I didn’t feel a thing in the early stage of the wire going up the ureter.  I don’t want to even think about what it would have felt like to try and get a stent through! For some reason (I should have asked why), the urologist said he thinks it’s breast cancer that is causing the blockage. I guess it could be a tumor or lymph nodes that are near the ureter and putting  pressure on it. There’s no way to know right now. I don’t know where we’re going from here, but the urologist was able to get the wire into my kidney and get a sample of the urine so it can be tested for cancer cells. It will be awhile before results come in. I can’t help but wonder if I’m one step closer to going back into chemo with this new development.