Biopsy Results, Choices, and Reaching For The Hemp Oil!

I had wondered why my initial instructions for my journey with Can-Seer advised to bring a friend to take notes, because, even tho the initial appointment was long and they did throw a lot of information out at me, I retained it all.  There should be an emphasis on bringing your note taker to the biopsy results appointment.  It is actually a funny thing to witness your own mind crumbling.

I had my first follow-up appointment from Surgery on the 29th, yesterday, Dec 5th.  My Doc (PA) checked my two incision sites and was very happy to see how well I was healing.  I have been watching the intense infusion of energy coming into me, I would have been shocked if my body wasn’t healing well.  Then she asked if I received the biopsy results yet, it was really the only reason I was there in her office.  Not yet…  she went to go get them.

It is funny how the mind can completely hide what you don’t want to look at.  Before my lymph node / wide incision surgery, I already had a sit down with my spiritual team and was assured they would find more cancer within me.  I so forgot about that conversation.

When my doc came back into the room toting paper work with all my biopsy results on it, I flashed her a smile and said “I am all clear, right.”  She looked at me and simply stated “It is what it is.”  In was in that moment I witnessed my own mind shifting…. away.

I also realize, it is for these conversations, a note taker is really important.  Her words started to blur in my mind’s eye when she said they found a tumor in one of my lymph nodes.  Why does the word tumor sound so much more daunting than saying they found cancer cells in my lymph nodes?  A google search would (later) help me understand that.?

She did give me good news, I had 7 lymph nodes biopsied (they pulled a small piece off of 7 different lymph nodes) and only one came back with a tumor.  Yay?

She talked about my original pathology report, stating something I had already understood… the original “levels” may be off because the tumor that was removed from my back went all the way to the very end of the thingie that was taken off my back.  So my Clarks level 4, Breslow level 3 could have very well been deeper and thicker.  But because of the healing/scaring that was already taken place (the original tumor was removed Oct. 25th) when they did the wide excision biopsy, it all disintegrated upon removal.  But the new, updated pathology states, it was probably deeper than stated.  But because we will never know exactly how deep or how thick the orginal tumor was, we stick with the original staging: t3b  (T= tumor, 3 equals breslows thickness level 3 (3.2cm to be exact) and b = ulcerated.)

She did remind me, in this original pathology report review, that the thingie on my back was ulcerated.  Yup, I researched what that means to the point, I will not forget.

So she said something I really didn’t understand, nor ask more about in that moment.  The tumor they found in my lymph node was visible without staining.  By this time, my mind was elsewhere, it felt like it took a much-needed vacation.

She then wrote the next part of my “staging” on my pathology reports: N1b  which I didn’t even look at till I got home.  In all my previous research, I got the n1 (n=node and the 1= amount of nodes biopsied with cancer in them)  the b confused me.  I don’t think I payed much attention to that until it was written on my paper.  Thank god for google (smile) b- means macrometastasis… what the hell does that mean?  The a would have been the mirco, well, now I know.  The b means the tumor within the lymph node is visible to the naked eye.  The micro would have meant you needed to stain it or see it with a microscope.

This automatically puts me into a cancer Stage IIIb category   The last part of this dance comes up Friday when I have my PET/CT scan done.  I cannot tell you how much it still breaks my heart that the hospital canceled my original PET scan date of the 28th because I had no ability to answer the phone.  It feels like such cruel and unusual punishment for something, I have zero control over (my cell signal.)  Now I have to sit and wonder about this last part of my staging until Monday, otherwise the whole view of my entire body would have been known yesterday.  Freakin rip the band-aide off in one full swoop.  In the words of my doc, it is what it is.

I paid very close attention to the numbers of yesterday.  It was Dec 5th, a day of change.  My intake window upon arrival at my doctors was window number 5.  I knew right then, they were going to tell me they found more cancer.

When my doc started talking about survivability rates for the next 5 years, I was at 55% without the PET scan figuring into the final staging of this.  If the PET scan finds any other cancer in my body at all, I go into the group known as Stage four and my 5 year survivablity plummets to less than 20%.  Of course, these are all just figures and statistics, but right now, it is what my mind is chewing on.

Five is the number of change.  It is my life path number, it is the number LISA reduces to a 5 in numerology.  I was being presented with so many 5’s in one day that I really just wanted to puke.

Then of course, the conversation naturally progressed to treatment.  The first thing, more surgery.  This time, they want to remove ALL my lymph nodes from the right half of my back (around the original tumor site) to my right arm pit, and even cut into my pectoralis and remove my lymph nodes from under the front of me.  She did say it will take more recovery time than the 9 inch gash currently across my back.  Then they want to start me in clinical trials, injecting some sort of localized chemo or something.

I just stopped her, I am not doing a damn thing more until I come back from Christmas vacation.  Period.  I can’t even process any of it today anywayz.  I watched her face grimace when I told her I will be back in NM Jan. 3rd.

It’s funny, sorta, it is a feeling of a boxer in a ring.  You can see the upper cut coming, yet, it still leaves you disoriented when it impacts your head.  That is very much what it felt like getting the news yesterday.  I knew it was coming, yet, for as prepared as I was, it still leaves a dizzying sting.

I suppose, what I never even thought about beyond the news of the cancer spreading, was what it would mean to my life… namely, my financial/work life.  It was all I could think of on the ninety minute ride home… well, that and my up coming PET scan.

I did ask my doc what would happen if my PET scan showed other cancer in my body, but of course, more biopsies.  Blah!!  No more cutting this year!  Instead, I listened to the 20 links that came to my email concerning help oil.  I invested in that and will start taking them (gel caps) tomorrow when they arrive in my mail!

It almost seems kind of crazy, but I am so OK with this whole cancer dance.  I know I will be a good listener and we have something to do together and thru it, we will serve the greater good.  It’s the down time that has me most concerned.  It is funny, no matter our choices in life, there is a domino impact on any given choice.  IF I choose surgeries next year, my down time will affect my landlady, the birds in the yard, my own ability to keep and maintain a roof over my head.  If I choose to do nothing except take hemp oil and meditate, my children will have a melt and I just might not be around long enough to see my grandson play soccer or whatever his interest will be as he grows.

Of course, I am already paying the hefty price for doing nothing and I am not willing to bear that again.

I am just so grateful I put Christmas money away, which will cover my December bills and January will just have to take care of itself for now.  As I hear my loving spiritual team echo a sentence they said a few weeks ago in a reading “don’t worry about a future that has not arrived yet.”

I am so grateful I am walking this path with sooooo many loving hearts, loving hands to hold me steady on days like today, when the upper cut is still stinging my face.  This too shall pass!!

I love you all, so much, and am grateful for your loving joy that fills my air space!!

((((HUGZ)))) filled with loving gratitude!!

Lisa Gawlas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Journey Into Biopsies and Wide Excisions! DeLightFull Even!

Special Note:  I am sharing this on both of my blogs to thank EVERYONE and not miss a blessed Soul!!

I know so many people wonder if their love and prayers really do anything… I promise you, more than you know.  As I started to come out of anesthesia yesterday I remembered soooo many Lights, multi-colored lights in my surgical room.  I remembered feeling the presence of ET’s, my family from the stars, but also…. others.  The energy of the room itself was deep gray (not painted, this was energy, I never seen anything other than light energy in whatever it is I am remembering.)  I semi-remember seeing the ET’s and knowing they were there.  It was the moment I looked at my facebook on my phone did I fully realize what all those other streams of multi-colored Light was… it was YOU.  Your love.  It is my only memory from my operation and I will remember it forever.  Thank you so much for loving me that much!!

I also have to give a huge shout out to my beloved body.  It was so cooperative thru this whole days worth of procedures.  This is when you know… you’re in your flow.  Even if it is a flow you prefer not be in.

In my morning’s procedure to find out where the closest lymph nodes are and where they drain into, they inject you with a nuclear fluid of some sort.  6-7 needles all around the site (my upper right back.)  I have been warned by everyone, this hurts.  My doctor was kind enough to prescribe be Ativan to take prior to the procedure, the hospital itself put some sort of numbing goo all around the site.  Once in the room to get this party started, everyone warned me, sometimes the numbing doesn’t take and it hurts.  With each needle pick the lady counted to 3…. after about the 3rd or 4th time she counted to three, I had to ask her, are you doing something after you count to three?  There was zero picking or burning!!  They were all happy to hear that and oddly enough gave the credit to the goo.  I had to give the credit to the lady with the needles.  She poked me in perfect harmony with my body and I thanked her for being so good with those needles!!

She did tell me, some people have to be stuck 10-20 times before they can get a good picture of their lymph nodes… I thanked my body for being so cooperative in this.

Since I was in nuclear medicine, I had to have a talk with the lady who gave me the news the day before about my PET/CT scan being canceled on the 28th due to their inability to reach me by phone.  My cell signal had been off for two days in a row, solid.  Even my landline was sketchy at best… my cell signal never came back on until 5:30 am on the 28th, the day of my PET scan.  When it came back on I had 14 phone messages…. yikes!  The first one I listened to was from the hospital saying if we do not talk to you by noon today (which would have been the day before) they are canceling my PET/CT scan!  What the hell!!???

Of course, no one is in at 5:30 or even 6am but I called and left three messages anywayz.  I had to leave at 6am to get there in time for my 7:30am appointment.  I was not about to take a chance they really don’t mean they are going to cancel me when there was an appointment already made.

7am they called me and said yup… they canceled me.  The good news is, I was only in Bernilillo (an hour out) by the time she called, near walmart to get my drugs filled.  I had to go there anywayz.

Me and the lady from the nuclear med department had a conversation, me in disbelief that an appointment set does not really mean its an appointment set.  She apologized 100 times and said that is the policy and agreed with me that it was wrong.  No one sent me any mail saying you need to confirm your appointment the day before or you lose an appointment you once thought solid.  They never even tried to call me on my landline, a second number I provided.  Their policy is, if they leave you a message on an answering machine the consider that contact.

It was the very same lady that was there yesterday and we talked some more, as well as reset my PET scan for Dec 7th at 9:30am.  She talked to me about how many patients just don’t show up for their appointments.  The medicine or stuff they use for a single treatment is costing the hospital $5 – $10 thousand dollars and is special ordered.  If the patient doesn’t show up, the med is wasted and cannot be reused.

I thought about people for a long minute.  I cannot for a single second imagine not wanting to know what lays within my body.  I love my body and whatever we are going to do together, I want to do it ASAP.  But then again, I am not afraid .. at all.  Instantly I could feel the collective who has been given the news of cancer…. denial and fear was soooo strong.  Not wanting to look at that, deal with that.  It was a feeling of turning their own backs on their body’s.  Body’s want to be well!  The body is as an active participant in this light show called cancer as the mind/ego is.  How is it that the ego wins more often than not.  FEAR.

The lady was kind enough to put a note in my file saying I was going to show up whether or not they actually talked to me.  With my internet provider doing whatever they are doing, I am not a reliable contact on the phone especially as we get into afternoon and evening… forget it.

But I will also write to the policy makers to help them understand that sometimes a phone call is not enough to confirm someones desire to be well.  Back it up with a mailer.  Maybe they can even put how important these first initial steps are to the body, to the well-being of the person.

It is almost strange to be in a cancer related relationship that begins with trust issues.  They don’t trust me to show up but yet, I must trust them to be there for me.  I think that is the gray I had seen in my surgical area.  Murky really.

After the injected nuclear stuff to find my lymph nodes was done I was off to surgery.  Other than this hospitals (UNM Hospital) trust issues with their patients, they really are a very efficiently run hospital with beautiful staff who are really really good at what they do.

As I am getting prepped for surgery the first thing they do is take my blood pressure, the man said how surprised he was that my pressure was perfect (this was not the case when I went to the dentist lol.)  I told him I am not scared, I just want to get this done.  Then came the IV needle, again, painless and got it done on the first stick.   I thanked the man for being so good at what he does.

What is really strange, in the several times they tried to wake me from my anesthesia cloud, man oh man my incision sites hurt like flipping hell.  As the anesthesia wore of, it was actually less and less painful.  One would have thought it would be the other way around.  I have places they poked holes in me.  The back of course, in my right breast (sentinel node site or first lymph contact with the cancer cells) to remove a lymph node and in my arm pit (drainage site) to remove a lymph node or two.

And then…. I went Pee!!  Holy weirdness batman!!  When I wiped, my toilet paper was a beautiful blue.  What they hell did they do to my va-jay-jay???  They weren’t supposed to do anything there.  When I got off the toilet, the entire water was this beautiful sky blue…. OMG I am now peeing in Technicolor !   This is a kewl perk!!  When I asked they said it was from the dye and my body processing it, which is good.  Of course it is good… my body and I, we are team players together!!!  And radiant in the process lol.

I must give a shout out to my earth angel from Santa Fe, Christine.  She rearranged her life to be by my side thru this journey.  Good thing too… i was seriously loopy even after I was “alert” after surgery.  I couldn’t even walk forget drive!  It is funny how strong gravity is.  We take gravity for granted, but when you are in the cloud of anesthesia, my ass and my feet felt like they placed lead onto me.  I tried to stand up and would plummet back to the chair.  Weird!!

She took up the task of letting my family (both my kids and dad, as well as my facebook family) know what was happening every step of the way.  She even tied my shoes for me and buttoned my shirt, you talk about loving kindness!!

We got to the hospital at 9:30 in the morning, my surgery itself was 2.5 hours long and then it took me 2 more hours to come out of the anesthesia cloud… we were at the hospital til about 7:30 pm…. sooooo much longer than I expected.  My girl was filled with grace!  She didn’t complain, had such an attitude of gratitude for what she got to do while waiting for me (watch 2 back to back episodes of her favorite show: CSI Miami.  I am grateful the universe provided that for her!!!)  She also stayed an extra day with me.  I am so grateful!!

By the time I was semi-clear in my head my stomach wanted some serious attention.  I was starving!!  I was not about to go home and cook, so we looked for the nearest Applebee’s and I treated us to some take home Applebee’s.  When the lady brought out our order I had to smile sooooo big when she buckled up our bag of food.  It was the cherry on top of a day filled with loving compassion!!  She simply said, she needed to make our food safe for the long ride to Jemez.  I had to take a picture:

 

My surgeon said I will have the biopsy results when I come in for my next appointment, which is on the 5th.  Phew!  Ohhhh and he did say my chest x-ray came back clear!!  Hurray!!  Of course, x-rays only shows masses not cells emerging… but clear sounds good to me!!

This morning, I really have no pain at all… just sore.  My right side is swollen and stiff but not in pain.  Thank you dear body and god and you and the team who worked on me and my earth angel and everyone.

Ohhhh, I have a question.  As I was in recovery someone told me I got a phone call at the hospital.  A female wanting to know how I was.  I asked my youngest daughter if it was her…. it wasn’t.  Was it one of you?  With the Hippa Laws (another asinine law) they cannot tell anyone a thing…

Let me just say, i am so good, so grateful on every level of Being!!

I love each and every one of you soooo much.  Thank you for flooding my world with your radiant Loving Energy… I was happy dancing all the way thru even this moment!!

(((((HUGZ))))) Filled with Love and deep gratitude!!

Lisa Gawlas

 

 

 

 

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Celebrate With Me, as the Poking, Prodding and Dissecting Begins in Earnest!

Over the last couple of days, I swear I am doing a sanity check on myself.  Who in their right mind would be embarking on this phase (the poking, prodding, dissecting)  part of their Can-Seer journey with absolute de-Light in their hearts?  When I packed my overnight bag on the 13th to head to Albuquerque,  to head to the UNM Cancer Center financial department to see if I can qualify to receive the services they offered and if I did,  you would swear my body was getting ready to go somewhere super exciting!  I swear I was as giddy as a school girl, excited about her first big school dance.

I actually kept looking around inside of myself, thinking, there should be some nervousness  worry, apprehension… anything other than the desire to dance all the way to my appointments.  I couldn’t fake worry if I tried real hard.  I have been excited every step of the way.

Well, let met tell you, skyrockets went off all around me and within me when the financial aid department said I am qualified for their coverage for the next 6 months.  Suddenly, I was so grateful to have a financially difficult year last year.  It has become a massive blessing as this year comes to a close.  My co-pays are so affordable:  Any office visit=$5.00  Any lab test: $10.00  Any surgery done as an outpatient $25.00 and if I am ever admitted as an inpatient, my daily hospital fee’s are $25.00 a day!  I looked at my co-payments with shock and gratitude and hugged the gal who did up my financials to give me something more to celebrate!!

A wonderful friend (whom I just met in person this day) met me after my visit with the financial department, we got a hotel room for the night so she could accompany me thru my next day and take notes and ask questions I may forget to ask.  It was wonderful to have her there with me and NOT feel sorry for me.  My body was in party mode and I really needed someone to feel that with me… and she did!  We celebrated by having a wonderful dinner and all I could feel in me was gratitude on every level.

Our day at UNM started early on the 14th, just before 8:30 am.  I had no idea what to expect at all, but was hoping for an MRI and then go home.  Not!!

The first one I met on my now official “team” was the most amazing PA named Fay.  I listened to her words, how she talked and described what lays ahead for me, what treatments I would be looking at… she was using verbiage I was very familiar with, things like Self and other, the way she strung her sentences together… I knew she had to walk on the spiritual side of life.

My chin about hit the ground when she said she studied Chinese medicine and was an acupuncturists before becoming as close to an MD as you can: a Physicians Assistant (aka PA) and then she talked about her first mode of therapy… Akashic Record Healing.  Really?  The already intense celebration party happening inside my body was now in extreme mode.  Before she even mentioned this modality, she kept asking me if she knew me.  That I looked so familiar to her.  I told her a very little bit about myself and maybe she seen me on the internet somewhere.  When we couldn’t establish how she knew me, she simply said: “maybe we met in dreamtime and you are one of the grandmothers.”  Let me tell ya, I was sitting there in heavenly shock.  What are the chances I am going to have my family DR and now my Can-Seer PA both energy workers?  Both fluent in the world I live deeply within!!!  No wonder my whole Being has been celebrating instead of crying!!  This is actually becoming more and more exciting and every ounce of me is flush with this excitement!

So the game plan begins   The first thing her and my surgeon (as well as a witnessing medical student) does is, as my PA called it, the Monkey treatment.  The two of them starting going over my entire body checking my skin for any other potential melanoma’s.  Weird would be a huge understatement with this procedure.  Besides them picking my hair apart, looking in and behind my ears, feeling up my throat and arm pits, spreading my toes apart, they also checked in between my butt cheeks and vagina… I now know I have freckles in places I never knew I had freckles!!  As does my companion thru this journey, who stayed present to take notes!!  Good thing I left the bashful gene back home!!  That was just weird… really, really weird!!

They also ordered a chest x-ray, blood tests and an EKG for this same day.  I did feel relived that the process started of getting to know the landscape within me, but I also came to realize this is just the beginning of a very intense journey.  They are also ordering a PET/CT scan which should happen over the next week.  I was immediately scheduled for surgery, which will take place on the 29th of this month.  I had to smile when she gave me that date, it was the only date in all of November I had already booked off for myself!  Phew!!  I think tho, I am going to add a couple of days to my “Off” schedule to recuperate.

The day of surgery is going to be a multitasking procedure.  The first thing they are going to do is inject dye into the area the melanoma was removed, targeting the lymph nodes around that place to see where they drain to.  She did say that not all bodies work the same and even tho the most likely place (given the location) of the lymph drainage was in my arm pits, these could also drain into my neck or even my groin.  So this dye thing will be the internal monkey test (smile.)   She assured me that this part of the test was going to hurt.  It will pick and burn and gave me a prescription for Adavan to take just before this procedure begins.  I am grateful for that very much!!  I go into la la land very easily!!

Once the results of my lymph drainage is known, then comes the surgery part.  They will extract 3 lymph nodes from the drainage site for biopsy and they will also be removing a large hunk of my back.  It felt like about a 1 inch by 4 inch section all around my now removed melanoma will be gone from me forever.

All of this combined is going to cost me less than $100!!

My friend, Christine and I spent 7 hours at traipsing between the UNM Cancer Center and getting all the labs at the UNM hospital itself (which they did provide a shuttle for, thank goodness.)  The only test result I got to know immediately was my EKG… my heart is in good shape!  I love my heart!!  Hell, I love my whole body.  Every cell in my body has taken on the air of excitement to be on this journey.

By 1 pm in the afternoon with one more lab to get done, I realized that I was exhausted   I mean, really exhausted.  It was as if every ounce of energy I had pooled up on the floor and all I wanted to do was curl up and take a nap.  I had to wonder about this…

I had a great nights sleep the night before, everyone I met, the DR’s, lab techs, every single person was wonderful.  Not one person looked or talked to me with dreaded gloom… just matter of facts and processes, which I was so grateful for.  So why the energy drain when emotionally I was elated?

I realized, it is from the patients themselves.  Fear eats energy.  It consumes even what is not theirs to consume.  I realized, even in the very best of hospitals  with the very best of doctors and technicians, one (the patient themselves) not only gives their own life force away by being scared or worried, they consume the energy around them to feed their own lack of energy.

What was so exciting for me to experience on this interesting day, the moment I walked into my Home (at about 5pm) all my energy was restored.  I could feel me expanding and getting more perky.  I LOVE my Home and am grateful, I will be coming Home after surgery!!  Phew!!!!

This may sound a bit strange, but I really feel like I am on a bigger journey, a process and understanding I would have never realized without moving thru it myself. My entire path has always consisted of “On the Job Training” so why would this moment be anything different?

My whole world is surrounded by loving Beings (You) providing me with the energy of Love and Joy and trust me, I feel it and utilized every bit of it yesterday!!  In a field of medically trained professionals, I am also surrounded by LightWorkers.  I have someone to hold my hand and support me thru these moments in person, including driving me home after my surgery.  All of this without a financial worry.

When Archangel Michael says “we got your back” he means it on every level, in every way, for ALL things big and small… FOREVER!!

My greatest desire is that one day, anyone who seems to be facing their darkest moments realizes and feels it to their core, it is really their Lightest moments and embark on everything with a song in their heart and a step of Joy for the blessing!  I would also like to transform hospitals into a place of hope and joy instead of a place of dread.

On my surgery day, I would like everyone who feels moved to… to fill it up with joy and happiness.  Songs that make you want to dance all night (no elevator music please) angels dancing on the ceiling drunk from all the love and excitement in the air!!

This journey with Can-Seer has not been eating me up… quite the opposite really.  It has revealed to me how steadfast I Am in the field of Love and Trust… no matter what!!  And that I have the most powerful earth angels walking this path with me, side by side!!  Singing songs of Love and Joy everywhere I/we go!

So on that note, I would like to leave you with a song that is playing in my heart by the wonderful Kool and the Gang!!

I love YOU and Thank YOU!!! Soooooooooooooooooo Much!!!!

(((((HUGZ))))))  of deep deep gratitude and love,

Lisa Gawlas… together let’s Celebrate!!!

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