CRAP…what next?
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Marion, As for my scans date being in mid April. I talked to the Mayo oncologist (who I’ve only seen once because he was the replacement for my previous oncologist of 2 years, who left at Christmas to start his own practice. He said that since I had a CT Dec 30th, of my abdomen, it also “caught” the lower half of my lungs and they considered that good enough along with the intraabdominal ultrasound during surgery on Dec 7. So, in looking from Dec 30…three months ahead would place the next scans at April 1 and they have me scheduled for 14 days later. I’m very ansy about this, of course, probably because when I went 4 months between scans , the next scan showed this new tumor they removed in Dec. If there hadn’t been a recurrence, I think I’d feel more comfortable. I could be wrong, but if my original oncologist was there, I don’t think he’d have waited until mid April. I know I”m probably just more paranoid and wound up because of the recurrence and recent surgery……what they’re telling me makes sense to some degree. I guess it’s just that this CT scan on Dec 30 was not done with contrast (I’m apparently allergic to the CT contrast) and as such, it isn’t as clear and as good at detecting smallish tumors as the MRI with contrast. It’s two months away……I’m going to try to chill out and keep busy….and I know when the time comes, I’m going to be a nervous wreck with scanxiety in any case. After that….we should be back on track.
Porter, thank you for the info on your incisional hernia. I saw my GP today to have her give it a look. She did not think it was anything serious….in fact she said straight out that it was not something serious, though she really didn’t give me a great explanation either. She said that it definitely wasn’t anything having to do with the cancer. And, she said she’d seen a lot of hernias in the course of her long practice and it wasn’t a hernia. Sooooo????? What then? Today, the lump had gotten much smaller, but is definitely there still, so she didn’t feel it when it was at its worst Monday night. The Mayo surgeon said the CT I had at the end of Dec showed some thinning in the abdominal wall, so I’m “thinking” that maybe what my GP was getting at is that there is no actual hole yet in my abdominal wall, but the intestines (and contents) bulge against this thinned place occasionally more than other times causing this lump type thing. It receded when I had a BM…but not completely. Since it’s on the side where a hunk of the left liver lobe was removed, it seems that it’s logical that intestine has moved over to fill in some of the space and is bumping up against this particular place under the incision where the wall has thinned.
Okay….that’s my take on it. My “plan” is that if I get into a situation where there is really bad pain or a bigger lump appears…I’m headed to the ER here in town. But, otherwise, I will wait until my Mayo appt in mid April to see what they say about it then. I can also always call my Mayo surgeon. This may be just a change in anatomy following the surgery coupled with that thinned abdominal wall area under the incision and nothing more…..something I will have to just get used to. GRRR. But, in the great scheme of things….it’s minor. I was just so bummed the other night at the idea of yet another surgery. But, for now, it looks like that isn’t going to happen any time soon….and it’s not the big CC……so I will try to not sweat it.
Julie T.
hi Julie, I know you saw and we briefly mentioned this on FB, but yes. I too was just told I have a small incisional hernia right at the top of my abdomen right before my scar starts to curve to the right. Mine is small doesn’t present symptoms. We were going to address after my cardiothoracic appt on Monday but like I said I have not yet given everything else going on. They are common and from what I have heard, fairly easy to repair.
Julie….my husband had an incisional hernia, which had to be repaired. Although I am not the patient, but based on my observance, he recovered quickly. Abdominal surgeries are known to cause hernias; our site has many postings on this. Now, if only you could stop these little ones from kicking grandma!
Agree with you trying to move up the Mayo date. Hope it works out for you.
Hugs,
MarionI may be worrying over nothing, but off and on, for the past several weeks, I’ve had discomfort under the one lap incision from my last resection. This was after first having a month of horrible pain following the resection. So, today, I actually had pain in that area whenever there was pressure over it (grandson sitting against it) or it was bumped (grandson pushing his toes into it…WHY does he choose THAT place?). Sigh. About suppertime tonight, I suddenly felt some pain there again, and felt a lump that was under the one lap port incision area. It was tender to the touch. I walked around a bit and it seemed to recede some .
So, now I am wondering if I have an incisional hernia. The surgeon commented in early January when he saw the late Dec CT I hand carried to him, that he saw a thinning of the abdominal wall. It wasn’t a hernia at that time, but now I’m thinking it has crossed over into “make Julie miserable again territory”.
I know there are a number of kind of hernias. Has anyone dealt with an incisional hernia.? I don’t think I can get to my local GP tomorrow, unless this is an emergency. She is closed on Tuesday afternoons and in the morning I have other things already set up. Yeah, I know…..if it is really important, I will cancel those and see if I can get in to see her yet before she closes.
I’m so disappointed…….I had thought things were finally healing better and now here I am again…..
On top of it, I got news that Mayo had scheduled me for 4 and a half months post op for my next scans and that would be 5 and a half months post last full set of scans. At the time of the operation in early Dec, they just did an intra-abdominal ultrasound, and had difficulty seeing all of the liver. The lungs were last checked in early Nov. My understanding was that they were going to go back to 3 month scans, which means that I shoiuld be scheduled for an appt in early to mid March instead of April 14th. I must now try to see if they have any time available to do it sooner. I think they may have tried to arrange it around a diabetes consult at the same time, but if the diabetes consult is holding up the scans, then I want to scrap the diabetes consult and I will go back to doing the diabetes management here or wait until the next set of scans.
Julie T.
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