First blog

I have never been one to "open up" about my feelings and have in depth conversations about "me". I don't know why but that is how I am. I feel like what is happening in my life at the present time warrants some type of release so I thought I would start a blog....

So what's happening to me you ask? Well, I was just diagnosed with kidney cancer. I think it's kind of interesting how I found out. Here's the story.

I hurt my back pretty bad several weeks ago. I was almost completely immobile. I went around like that for a couple of days before finally going to the doctor. Doc gave me a shot and some muscle relaxer and sent me on my way. That was fine by me. All I wanted was the muscle relaxer anyway.

So, about a month or so goes by and my back is still kicking my ass. I have to carry pretty heavy equipment around at work and I was having some trouble doing my job without pain so I was thinking I may have injured my back a little worse than what the muscle relaxer was capable of taking care of. I went back to the doc.

Doc this time gives me another scrip for a different muscle relaxer and sent me to get a MRI. So at this point I have already had more medical care than I have probably ever had since I was born but I really didn't have any major concerns.

A day or so goes by and I get a call to schedule a CT Scan. I thought this was pretty strange and the lady scheduling the appointment just said I needed to call the doc's office so I did. The nurse said they found a spot on my kidney and they wanted to get another look at it with the CT Scan. I was told this was unrelated to my back injury so naturally I was kind of concerned.

I had the CT scan the next day and had to wait the weekend until my next follow-up appointment. I knew something was going on when the doctor came in the room with the nurse. The doctor said there was a concern for some disease I had never heard of called Renal Cell Carcinoma. The doctor said he didn't think it was anything more than a cyst on my kidney but I could see it in his eyes there was more too this. Doc then sends me to see a Urologist.

My first impression of the Urologist was that he really didn't seem very concerned at all. He scheduled an ultrasound of my kidney. I showed up for the ultrasound and had it done. I asked the girl doing the ultrasound what she thought and she told me right away that she thought it was more complex than a cyst. I think from that point on I knew what the outcome was going to be. From the reading I had done up to this point I knew that a kidney tumor is rarely benign.

I didn't have another appointment with the Urologist, the nurse just called to schedule a biopsy for me.

I had the biopsy last Friday and again had to wait all weekend to find out the results. Monday came around and I called the office that morning. (I didn't want them to forget about me!)
I had to leave a message and by lunch I still had not received a call back. I simply drove up to the office and demanded to hear some news. You would have thought I was some kind of terrorist showing up without an appointment. I was told they had no results and I would be contacted when the results come in. I was called later that evening and was told the results.

I have since been set up for another appointment with the Urologist next week on Tuesday. Hopefully I will be able to get a lot of information and get this ball rolling.


So now it begins...