A slight change of plan…

My now blue titted wife and I bimbled through the next few weeks with no routine or sense of time. All we could do was wait. Wait to heal. Wait for more results from the operation. Wait for a date from the Oncologist. Wait for treatment dates. And all the time your waiting you know that the clock is ticking and sometimes when you allow that thought to fester it can be the most scariest feeling in the world.

We planned and anticipated how things were going to change over the next few months. Chemotherapy was our biggest topic of conversation and we had so many questions we needed answering. How long would it take? Would it be given orally or IV? Could she return to work during? We were now having to consider the financial implications of everything as well. The Mrs had only been in her current job for 18 months and as much as they were very sympathetic and understanding, no one gets sick pay indefinitely.

We spoke about hair loss and the Mrs made me promise to buy her a wig.

“I’m gonna need an expensive one that doesn’t look cheap and tacky and it needs to match my hair colouring as well”

“You can have whatever you want babe as long as it ain’t a headscarf.. that just screams cancer”.

The Mrs had read up on radiotherapy and it looked like it would be a 4 week course consisting of 15 minutes of radiotherapy every morning, 5 days per week. Due to her age and diagnosis of triple negative cancer they were talking about possibly having an extra week at the end just to make sure.

“That’s ok” she said ” I’ll have radiotherapy in the morning then I can go to work afterwards and do a late shift, it’ll work out fine”.

Yes dear. I don’t anticipate any flaw to that plan at all. Bless her.

At our post op consultant appointment they were confident they had removed all of the cancer and the lymph nodes all tested negative for any spread. I think we were so elated by that news that we didn’t really take much notice when he said that they had sent it off for more tests. I vaguely remember him saying something like, it didn’t fit the standard pattern of triple negative breast cancer but again I wasn’t really listening. The only sour point of the meeting was that chemo and radiotherapy were still very much on the table. Despite the positive news, TNC can be a slippery, devious, sly little bugger and has a high rate of re-occurrence. What an absolute Tuesday.

Up until this point I have to commend the Mrs for how she had dealt with everything so far. She doesn’t do crying, especially not in public, therefore it’s usually just me who might witness this extremely rare event if and when it ever happens. She was (still is) strong enough for all of us and would often simply say..

“It is what it is, there’s not a lot I can do about it is there?”. Very true.

If anyone is the crier in our relationship, its me. Children in need, comic relief, watching ET… There’s always potential for a few drips. Add a wife with cancer and a couple of vodkas and I could turn into an emotional wreck.

As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, Friday is normally always results day, therefore you are always slightly on edge and if you ever receive a call with no caller ID, chances are it won’t be PPI. Our oncology appointment was booked for the following Tuesday and we weren’t expecting a call today.

“Hi Mrs Perry, we’ve had some more results come back and we’d like you to come in on Monday to discuss them.”

“Yeah that’s no problem, is everything ok?”

“Erm, I can’t really tell you much over the phone, its a bit rare and complicated, but we’ve cancelled your oncology appointment for Tuesday”.

Confused, anxious and worried would be an understatement as to how we felt that weekend. If they had cancelled the oncology appointment then surely that meant no treatment? What was so rare and complicated? If they had got it wrong and it wasn’t cancer after all surely they would have just told us on the phone and put us out of our misery? Was it suddenly worse than they first thought?

That was a lovely, chilled and relaxed weekend we had.

Monday afternoon came and we were back in the clinic with absolutely no idea how this was going to go.

In a nutshell… the pathologist had requested a second opinion as he had never seen anything like this cancer before. What they had originally believed to be triple negative breast cancer just wasn’t behaving in the normal typical way for those particular types of cancer cells. A preliminary report had come back suggesting it may not be breast cancer but a rare type of tumour instead.

Not for the first time since all of this had begun we were in shock. Dumbfounded. We had lots of questions but they had no answers.

“So it’s not breast cancer?”

“We believe it might not be a ‘breast’ cancer”

“So it’s still cancer?”.

“We think it might be a rare tumour”

“But your not sure?”

“No”

“Does it have a name?”

“Yes, but let’s wait until the reports come back”

“Could it still come back as breast cancer?”

“Possibly. Do you have any other questions?”

“Yes but it sounds like you haven’t got any answers?”

“No”

It was like talking to a politician. He neither wanted to confirm nor deny.

We left the clinic slightly bereft, confused and exhausted. Was this positive news? Worse news? Nobody knew which was the most frustrating thing. The next lot of results would probably take about 2 months to come through as they were now sending the pathology reports on to a third hospital for more tests. So for now, everything had been put on hold and it was time to try and carry on as normal.

As we drove home I reminded the wife of our upcoming mini break to Spain.

“At least you won’t be half bald when we go away”.

Every. Fucking. Cloud.