My First Surveillance Scan

Anyone who has an illness that revolves around getting any type of scan knows the terminology “scanxiety.” Personally, I sort of, kind of, find the term to be a bit annoying. Maybe it’s annoying because the pun bothers me. Maybe it annoys me because I begrudgingly admit it’s true, too.

When I first received my cancer diagnosis, the idea of a surveillance plan made me feel better – reassured. Now when I’m actually living my surveillance plan, I definitely do not feel reassured. I was concerned about all of the potential outcomes.

• What if my scan is a false negative? What if they miss a new cancer? What if my cancer was never actually gone?
• What if my scan shows something and they just want to watch it?
• What if my scan shows something and it means I need to get another biopsy?
• What if my scan shows something and it’s definitely cancer?

What you will notice is missing from this list is – what if everything goes well and it’s abundantly clear there is nothing new to be concerned about and there truly isn’t anything to be concerned about? Well, that would just be admitting that I’m only focusing on the negative! But it’s hard not to focus on the negative, because it still feels like this wasn’t supposed to happen to me.

When I think back on my mammograms and biopsies in 2021 and early 2022, I definitely approached them with some nerves. But I mostly thought, “Oh, here I am! Being overly concerned and I’m going to end up being embarrassed because it’s nothing!” And that was absolutely the right attitude to have! The chances it was going to be cancer were pretty low.

Infusion first

I had my 9th Herceptin infusion to complete before my mammogram. I will receive a total of 14 of those “maintenance” infusions before this is all done. The infusion proceeded as usual. Terri was my nurse and she is always great. Everything went without a hitch. Since I no longer have to wait for my labs to be completed to get a “go-ahead,” I was pretty much wrapped up around 10:30 AM.

The highlight of my infusion today was that it was the first time I ever got a visit from a therapy dog! After 9 months of being here I finally got to see a hospital therapy dog! She was a very sweet 2-year old Cockapoo named Ryder. It was a very pleasant surprise and something I considered to be a good omen!

My mammogram

As I’ve already mentioned, today was my surveillance mammogram. I will most likely fall into this category, a higher risk category, for many years. The significance is that I will always have Diagnostic mammograms versus Screening mammograms. The only real differences between the two are that there is a higher scrutiny due to an abnormal finding in the past and I do not leave before the radiologist looks at my images and speaks with me.

There was a good bit of time between the end of my infusion and my mammogram. I definitely started to freak out more as it got closer. Sean showed up and waited with me for a bit, which was really, really, really appreciated. I was called back by the nurse, got changed into my clinical robe and waited. I grew more and more nervous sitting back there.

When I finally went back, the nurse asked me questions about my breast cancer risk. That felt a bit weird given everything that I’ve been through and that I’ve done everything through the same institution. But we went through my family history and my genetic testing results. It was at this point that I started crying. I just couldn’t stop myself. Then she put some special super sticky stickers on my lumpectomy scar and away we go!

I forget how much it sucks to be in a mammogram machine. You stand in unnatural positions, hold your flexed limbs, have your body parts mashed and are told to stop breathing at inopportune times. The machine actually tells you how much pressure they are putting and I noticed it was like 20 pounds! That would be like someone put a 20 pound dumbbell on your breast!

After they took the initial set of images, I was sent back to the waiting area to make sure the Radiologist didn’t want more images or to perform an ultrasound. After awhile, the nurse came back and said that the doctor wanted more images – I really started to freak out. Why would she want more images if not because she saw something?

I go back to the mammogram room to get the rest of the images and return to the waiting room where I start crying a bit more. A nurse comes by to tell me the doctor is ready to see me and talk about my images. Of course she’s like, “oh my goodness, are you alright? Let me get you a box of tissues. Are you worried? I will tell the doctor.” The doctor came in very quickly and the first thing she said was my mammogram was negative and nothing looked worrisome. She apologized for the extra images freaking me out and we reviewed my results.

Relevant to my latest blog post on breast density, I learned that I have dense breasts and that Mercy has actually been notifying women of that for a long time! She requested the extra images because the micro-calcifications which was the sign that led to my initial diagnosis were really difficult to catch on my last mammogram. She wanted to repeat the same set-up to ensure nothing looked amiss, which, thankfully, it did not.

Maybe I’m being overly critical of myself, but I never thought I would be this worried. It’s hard to not look back on today and wonder who is that person who got so upset. Why am I so weepy? The best way I can explain it is that everyone tells you “it’s going to be okay” or “nothing is there.” And everyone includes my doctors – the people who I need to trust and rely on and who know what they are doing. And I maybe believe them like 90%. I want to believe them 100%. I want to be wrong. I hope every time I go for a scan for the rest of my life I’m wrong. But my naivety is gone – I lost that with my diagnosis. Sure, most of the time it will be nothing, but I’ve already experienced the time when it wasn’t nothing. And I will never be able to forget that, so I think that’s why I’m this worried person now who cries at the doctors office. Maybe this new person isn’t so bad. Maybe I can give her a break. Only 6 months until the next scan!