Oncologist Appointment Today

I know I said I was going to talk more about some ASH abstracts, and I promise that I will. 

But I had my six month oncologist appointment this morning. Everything still looks good.

I don't really have much to report. It was, as usual, difficult to get there. I see a lymphoma specialist now, instead of a general oncologist, because I wanted someone who could answer my (sometimes very specific) questions. But that means I have to go into the cancer center in city near where I live, and my appointments are usually right around the time the city gets busy. And to make it worse, the parking garage is under construction, so I almost got into three accidents while I was trying to park. 

That's not really anything that you want to hear, I know. No one likes to hear someone complain about something like traffic.

But what you do understand is that bad feeling that bubbles up when an oncologist appointment comes up. I was diagnosed almost 15 years ago, and I've thought about cancer every day since then. I don't have the fear of it that I once did. But driving to the hospital for an appointment, even having done it dozens of times, I still get that little bit of stress. And I can see it in myself -- I know when I'm stressed, I get annoyed very easily. So it's not about traffic and construction. It's about those feelings that we all have, whether we were diagnosed 15 years ago or 15 days ago.

But I have to say that the hospital I go to has gotten better over the years. By that I mean it's gotten more personal. For a while, it was all very business-y, and I felt like I was just being moved out as quickly as possible. But it's better now. The staff seem genuinely concerned about patients. I was waiting for my blood draw, and the receptionist in that office told me that if the music was too loud, just let her know and she'd turn it down. (Of course, it was Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You," so I told her it was fine for now, but if it happened a couple of weeks from now when I would be sick if it, I'd ask her to lower the volume.)

My actual appointment with the oncologist was fine -- it always is. He likes that I'm an "easy patient," meaning I don't force him to make difficult treatment decisions. He's still very impressed that I have gotten almost 13 years of Progression Free Survival out of 6 rounds of Rituxan. My physical exam was fine, and my blood work looks good. 

Other than that, we talked about my kids and what they are up to, my travel plans for next year, my dermatologist appointment, my colonoscopy, and a few other unimportant things, the kind of things that people talk about when they only see each other every six months. 

It was a good appointment.

And more importantly, it was a reminder that I'm still a cancer patient, even if I haven't had treatment for a while. That's a good thing. I don't think I want to forget how that feels. As long as I'm a cancer advocate, I want to keep that connection. It's all much too big a part of my life to just let go. 

ASH commentary is coming soon.