Best Medicine

Today is Thursday one week post chemo.  Normally they schedule doctors appointments on chemo day but since my chemo got bumped out one week, my doctor's appointment with my Oncologist was today.  We talked about how treatments have been going since we started.  He talked about how we reduced the chemo by 20 percent and added the Emend.  I told him that for the most part I have been tolerating the treatments since that point.  We questioned the use of Ativan during treatment and he confirmed what we were doing was perfectly fine to do during a treatment weekend.  Finally he brought up the schedule and stated we would do a scan after 6 treaments.  I just completed number 4 last week so in roughly one month I will have had 6 treaments.  I will then have a CT scan to compare to the Pet scan I had before we started chemo.  I will then have an appointment with him on September 14 to go over the results of the scan followed by treatment number 7.  This was all good news for me to get.  

This is only a small slice of the story however to effectively tell the rest we have to rewind to my first office visit with an Oncologist following my hospital stay back in May.  That day as well as other NP and Doc visits you are given a clipboard and paperwork to fill out which talks about symptoms and medications.  I filled out the paperwork and waited for my name to be called.  The person who called my name that day was responsible for taking my paperwork, temperature, and blood pressure.  That particular day (as most of them seeing a Doc) my bp was unusually high.  What followed was a discourse between this person and me about how my high bp was not my fault and rather it was his since he was wearing scrubs.  White coat syndrome is a real thing and in my case it is not restricted to actual white coats.  Scrubs are included in that too.  His response to me was that it was not him.  The next time he saw me he would wear his Shark Bathing Suit instead so my bp would be "normal".  I fully anticipated he was all talk and no game.  Since I treat stress with humor I was willing to play along so I told him I was planning on it.   

When you get chemo you wait in the same waiting room as when you get called back to the doctor.  Over the last 4 treatments I have seen this individual plenty of times.  Each time he looked at me and said,"he forgot."  Every time he claimed he "forgot"  my response would be, "next time."  Most recently his comebck was, "I'll put them in my backpack so I wouldn't forget".

Today I registered, got my clipboard with paperwork and waited for my name to be called.  The title decribes what happened next.  Who else but this same person called me back for the Doctor.  Leah and I were facing the opposite direction in the waiting room.  When we stood up and turned around to walk toward him I saw him standing there in scrubs with his Shark printed swimsuit over top.  Leah and I started laughing and did plenty of it.  Leah said to me, ( after he left the exam room) "it was good to see you laugh."  It really is the best medicine!  There is not as much laughter in our house since May.  I wish I had a photo but to spare more embarrassment for all no photo was taken. The best I can do is include a picture of a suit that looks similar to what he was wearing over his royal blue scrubs. I'm glad he stood up to his end of the bargain even though I thought it would never happen.  Laughter is in fact the best medicine.

~Kent