From Stomach Flu Sufferer to "Cancer Survivor" in 45 Days

In my last post, entitled "Everything Happens for a Reason," I told you the story of how the little angel baby next door gave me a bad case of the stomach flu just before Christmas. That led to a trip to the ER, which led to an X-ray, CT Scan, and MRI of my abdomen, which revealed that I had a small mass (oxymoron!) on my right kidney. Ugh.

On Tuesday, February 6th, I underwent surgery to have that mass removed, not knowing whether it was cancerous or not.  The technical name for the procedure I had done is a "robotic-assisted laprascopic partial right nephrectomy." That's a fancy way of saying the doctor used something akin to a medical video game to go in and cut out a chunk of my right kidney, taking the tumor with it.

My post-surgery belly

The nice thing about this surgery--if there can really be something nice about having part of one of your body's vital organs removed--is that it could be done via four smallish puncture wounds in my abdomen and a small incision in my belly button (through which they removed the tumor). Thank God for robots.

The surgery went as well as it possibly could have, and after an overnight stay in the hospital I was on my way home just about 24 hours later. I was sore and a bit limited in my ability to move for a few days, but I was incredibly lucky to have my amazing wife to take care of me.

Last week, I followed up with my urologist and got the results of the pathology report on my tumor.

Measuring 2.2 cm x 2.1 cm x 1.6 cm, the mass removed from my kidney was indeed cancerous. Officially, it was a "papillary renal cell carcinoma, Type I." But the doctor told me they got all of it--"it just kind of plopped out," he said--and there were no signs of cancer in any of the fatty tissue adjacent to the tumor. In my doctor's words, I'm "gonna be fine." No need for any chemo or radiation. Just a follow-up CT scan in eight weeks or so to see how things look without the tumor there. And maybe a couple/few CT scans down the road just to make sure things continue to look good.

Whew. That's a load off my mind, for sure. Obviously, I was hoping the mass was benign, but if it was going to end up being cancerous, I think this scenario is about as good as I could've hoped for.

When I posted the pathology report findings on Facebook (because that's what we do nowadays, right?), I got a lot of love from my friends. A few of them even referred to me as a "cancer survivor," which made me feel kind of strange. I wondered: Can I be a cancer survivor despite the fact that I didn't even know I had cancer until it was removed from my body? I guess so, but I tend to think of cancer survivors as people who are diagnosed prior to having to undergo surgery, or chemo, or radiation. People who fight like hell to beat cancer and succeed. People whose bodies and minds suffer greatly while they go through the battle of their lifetime. Me? I went from having a bad case of the stomach flu to having a tumor removed in just 45 days. I barely had time to worry about cancer, let alone survive it.

If people want to call me a cancer survivor, I'll begrudgingly accept it. After all, it's way better than the alternative. But I know there are true cancer survivors out there who have been through a hell of a lot more than I have, and who are way stronger than me.

One thing is for certain, though: I will be forever grateful that my little buddy next door--his name is Everett--got me sick so doctors could discover a cancerous tumor on my kidney. If I didn't get the stomach flu from Ev, that tumor would still be growing inside of me. And who knows how long it would've been before it was discovered. Or if it would've been discovered? Or what my prognosis would've been by the time someone finally figured out I had cancer?

I have to admit, this whole serendipitous experience has freaked me out a little. But in a good way. And I am thankful for whatever force, or forces, put it all into motion.

"Can you still have any famous last words/If you're somebody nobody knows..."
--Ryan Adams (from his song "Strawberry Wine")

Everything Happens for a Reason

Author's Note: I started writing this blog post yesterday. And then I tried again today. But the story was getting so long and wordy that I didn't think anybody would want to read it. My dad used to say this about people who talked too much: "You ask 'em what time it is and they tell you how to build a watch!" I didn't want to be that guy, so I decided to try and distill my story down to fewer words, and put it into a format that (hopefully) won't bore people to tears. Enjoy!

"Everything happens for a reason."

I used to have a hard time subscribing to that theory, but as I've gotten old(er) it seems like as good a way as any to explain some of the weird things that occur in our everyday life. Especially the things that start out bad, but end up maybe being blessings in disguise. And the things that make you stop and think hard. Really hard. Case in point...

Afternoon of December 21st: My neighbor sends me a Facebook message asking me if I could come over and give her a hand, because her adorable seven-month-old baby, who was sick, had just thrown up again and it was "everywhere." So she needed help holding the little guy while she cleaned up the mess. I run next door to help--the puke really was everywhere--and eventually my wife shows up, too. My neighbor asks us: "What if you guys get sick?" My wife answers: "We'll just deal with it."

Wee Small Hours of the Morning of December 23rd: I get up to go to the bathroom and I feel super dizzy. A few minutes later, I'm the one who's puking my guts out. Multiple times. After making a mental note to never eat Chinese food again, I wake my wife up and tell her she has to take me to the hospital. I guess this is "dealing with it."

At the Hospital: The doctors and nurses (eventually) take good care of me, and several hours, IVs, and medications later, I'm finally starting to feel like I might live after all. But the powers-that-be decide to keep me overnight for observation. Woohoo!

December 24th: It's Christmas Eve day and I'm feeling reasonably okay. I've even progressed from being on an all liquid diet to eating real hospital "food." My stomach appears to be fine. But wait! The doctors tell me that my stomach x-ray and CT scan seemed to show something abnormal with my right kidney. So now they want me to have an MRI done. Wonderful.

I get the MRI done, but not before I almost throw up in the MRI machine. (Apparently, I had some kind of reaction to the contrast liquid they put in my IV before the test.) Now I'm anxious to go home. But a doctor comes in and says the MRI confirmed that something is indeed amiss with my kidney, and that he doesn't feel comfortable reading the MRI and talking to me about it, so I have to have a urologist do that. And the urologist on call has already left for the day, so I have to spend another night in the hospital and talk to the urologist in the morning. WTF???

December 25th: Merry effing Christmas. I'm in the hospital on Christmas morning, my wife is sitting in a chair at the foot of my bed knitting (surprise!), and we're waiting for the urologist. I, of course, continue to imagine all the most horrible scenarios I can possibly imagine, including the "C" word. The one positive I keep coming back to? At least it's my kidney, because I have two of them, and I'm pretty sure a human only needs one kidney live.

Eventually, the urologist shows up and pulls up my MRI films on his computer. He shows us the mass that has decided to call my right kidney its home. Luckily, it's small (2.0 x 1.8 cm). And it's right on the edge of the kidney, too. (Kind of like a pimple on the end of your nose.) The doctor says it's likely a tumor, not a cyst, and tells us we can either have a biopsy done and go from there, or just have the thing removed, because it should be pretty simple. His suggestion is the latter, and we think that seems like the best way to go.

After the consult, I finally get to go home and open gifts with my family. My favorite Christmas present? A purple paring knife from my wife. My least favorite Christmas present? This goddamn tumor on my kidney! 😢

A few days later, my wife and I follow up with the urologist at his office. We finalize the decision to have the tumor surgically removed, and the next day we're informed that the surgery is scheduled for February 26th. Unfortunately, that's just a couple days before a concert we already have tickets for (Phoebe Bridgers), so we call to see if we can possibly get an earlier date. The surgery scheduler tells us that if we change hospitals, the procedure can be done on February 2nd. Great! Sounds like a plan!

But a week before the 2nd, I get a phone call from the urologist's office. They have to cancel my surgery and reschedule it because my doctor had a meeting come up that he has to attend. Seriously?!? All I can think is that this meeting had better be the most important damn meeting of this doctor's life.

The next day, the doctor's office calls to tell me my new surgery date is February 6th. And after I hang up, I start to freak out a bit.

It took me a little while to put two and two together, but when I finally did I realized this:

February 6th, 2018 = 5 years to the day that my father died...in the same hospital I'm supposed to have my surgery at.

Gulp.

I have to admit, this spooked me out for a few days. I mean, it spooked me out to the point where I was seriously considering calling and having them reschedule my surgery yet again.

The other day, though, I was driving my sister to work--she had fallen and hurt her arm, so she couldn't drive--and we had a conversation about this weird "coincidence." I confessed to her that I was more than a little uneasy about it. That's when she told me about another possibility: Maybe my surgery got moved to the day and hospital it did so my dad could watch over me. "Everything happens for a reason," she said to me, matter of factly. Hmmmmm, I thought to myself. Maybe instead of this being a creepy, scary thing, it's actually a good thing.

To be honest, that hadn't even crossed my mind before I talked to my sister. And the more I thought about it, the more I felt comforted by the notion that my dad might be there with me on Tuesday while my doctor and his robot perform a partial right nephrectomy on me. If you're gonna have someone watch over you in the operating room, it might as well be your dad, right?

So I decided not to change the date after all. Because everything happens for a reason. My neighbor's baby got me sick so I'd go to the hospital and they'd find a tumor I never would've known about otherwise. Then a concert and a meeting caused the date of my surgery to get changed to the anniversary date of my father's death; and the location to get changed to the same hospital that he died in. And my sister hurting her arm resulted in me driving her to work and talking about a fear that she turned into something incredibly comforting.

And suddenly, everything makes sense.

What my Christmas Eve looked like.