I had my (bi-)monthly oncology check up last week and it went swimmingly. My AFP was a 5, and I've apparently been on blood thinner long enough that we can trust my clots to be gone. So I could go off my blood thinner and "dive head first into the salad bar," as Dr. Hallum put it, EXCEPT that I still have a foreign body lodged in my vein, in the form of a port-a-cath, the thing they put in my chest in September so they wouldn't have to start IVs all the time. And I'm stuck on blood thinner till I have that taken out. I hesitated for about .2 seconds before telling them to pull it.
The risk, of course, is that Grazelda might come back. We're not yet at the big One Year UnCancerversary, when odds of recurrence plummet. And it's a surgical procedure, they knock you out at least partways and cut you open, and you have to sleep all day, while your sister is totally wired and bouncing off the walls after getting the LARGE coffee at the hospital cafeteria. (Well, that's what happened last time.)
Many people live happily with their ports in for many years. Those people either don't have clotting problems or don't like spinach as much as I do. So, I'm taking the risk, and this Friday (which is almost tomorrow) at 7:30 am Pacific Time at Northwest Hospital in Tucson, I'm getting my port out.
I'll miss it, I think. I play with it and tap on it and slide it around under my skin. I push on it occasionally and think, "Beam me up, Scotty!" On the other hand, it looks a little odd especially with my sleeveless summer attire, and it rubs a little when I have a backpack on. And now that I'm not using it anymore, I'll gladly trade it in for copious quantities of basil and cilantro.
picture by Kristi
