Chemo day in San Francisco

Here we are at the end of our first day of the two day trip to SF. The mornings MRI guided biopsy (that costs $10,000), took over two hours to complete. Once finished Lulu told me now she's starting to understand why this test costs so much. She also was a little freaked out by the numbers of doctors and support staff attending to her for the test. She said that there was at least one attending doctor, one fellow, two residents, and two radiologists, and three nurses or other types of support staff. In her words, "this is no normal breast cancer tumor". We desperately wanted to know why Lulu needed six doctors and three other hospital staff to do what we thought was a simple biopsy? We discussed the reasons that they needed all this personnel?

1. They thought that Lulu was Sandra Bullock and they just wanted to say that they assisted in treating her?

2. They all get wind of this journal and were hoping they would be included in it by helping with Lulu's care?

3. The hospital was very overly staffed today?

4. Lulu is a very rare case or difficult case and they were using her as a teaching case? (this was the most probable reason).

No matter what the reason, a very concerning moment in our lives. As it turns out, today we didn't get a chance to meet with any of the doctors to explain it all.

Lulu's surgeon is still on vacation and i guess that the other physicians don't normally cover each other's patient unless its an emergency? So, we were left wondering what the overly staffed, $10,000 biopsy was all about? Tomorrow we will be meeting with the Oncologist, and maybe she can give us some information about what's going on? Before we left the UCSF clinic around 1:00 PM, we wanted to get Lulu's blood test done. By getting the blood test done today, meant that we wouldn't have to be here tomorrow morning at 7:30 AM when the lab opens. (you have to have your blood taken before each chemotherapy session to verify that the chemotherapy drugs haven't totally destroyed your immune system.

I got my chance to make my first, highly anticipated, cancer patient connection. When we walked into the lab there was one of the fellow infusion patients that was a directly crossed from Lulu two weeks ago. (when she had her first course of chemo drugs). I was so eager to make a connection, I almost pounced on her. I said to her, "Hi we saw you a couple of weeks ago getting chemotherapy, how are you doing?" She replied only with, "I'm OK." This was going to be harder then I had anticipated! As I struggled for the next thing to say (feeling like a pre-teen asking a girl for his first dance), she was called into the back for her blood to be drawn. However, I did get a "nice to see you" as she pass going out to who knows where? Near miss, but I was undeterred by the cold reception by the obviously very sick young lady. If I've learned anything by going through all this is, don't assume what kind of day or mood anyone is having? She could have just been told that she might only have weeks to live? Or that she has to have more surgery to remove another body part that she'd rather keep?

I did have tomorrow and I'm armed and ready to make a difference! I wasn't able to attend the breast cancer support group at 5:30 PM. As it turns out the group meets every 1 and 3 Thursday of the month, and I'm on the 2 and 4th track. I spoke to Lulu that when i get back to Reno I plan on finding a support group that I can attend, and ask her if she might want to do the same? We spent the rest of the afternoon at the Fisherman's wharf area and pier 39. I had been to this area for 3 or 4 years at least, and I wanted to see how much it has changing in that time. I'm here to tell you not much. Same street performers, restaurants, tourists, and shops that I remembered from 4 years ago. We had lunch at Alioto's (both had clam chowder in a bowl). We found out that if you leave any thing in a cab in SF, as surprising as this sounds, you may get it back? For a small price.

I never remember to ice cream tasting as good as it did today (we had a sundae at the Giradelli square a local and tourist favorite). Lulu and I couldn't understand why so many people were filling the streets on this most dreary day? But then it dawned on us that it was summer/vacation time for many and probably one of the most visited places on the planet? (easy to forget that it's summer in SF when the fog is in and the temperature hover around 60 degrees and you swear that it's got to be winter). Wasn't it Mark Twain that said, "The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco"? We returned to my cousin Chris' stylin' house for a home cooked, restaurant style meal made by his significant other (girlfriend, main squeeze, better half, "the one") Maria. Let me tell you this girl can cook! I left that "eating a better diet" thing at the doorstep this evening. We ate delights that I can't really describe, but i can tell you that if I come back here, I'm requesting a "do over"!

I feel a little closer to everyone these days and I can add my cousin Chris and Maria to the getting to know better list. Again the out pouring of generosity around us is just amazing. Thank you Chris and Maria for making our trip just a little less difficult. I'm ready to turn in for the night. I've already prayed for Lulu's chemotherapy treatment tomorrow to heal her illness, and given her a kiss before she slipped into a restful sleep. Now I'm ready to give that cousin's bed a second chance to live up to the hype of being able to cure aching backs and pains?