Scanxiety isn’t usually a big problem for me, and I’m really thankful for that. Sometimes the hardest part is waiting for the results, and often that takes weeks.

I’m so grateful for my oncologist. He has occasionally emailed me to tell me good news, which is fantastic, but the downside is when he doesn’t email me I can start wondering if that means it’s bad news. We talked about this some time ago, about how it can be hard to wait and also how no one wants to get bad news about cancer in an email. To be honest, my chemo brain doesn’t remember how we left things.

The other day when I was having a hard time waiting for my scan results, I decided to email my oncologist to ask if he’d seen them yet.

I know what my next steps would be if it’s bad news. If the cancer grows, the plan would be for me to go back on IV chemotherapy because there aren’t any more targeted therapy pills available in Canada yet. (That I know of.) There are several more in the pipeline, but whether I’d be able to get them is the question. The idea is to take the IV chemo and hope that it works until another targeted therapy is available to me through a clinical trial or compassionate release.

This is what it’s like for countless lung cancer patients. This is why research and access to new drugs is so important to us and to our loved ones.

Thankfully I don’t have to take that step yet because the scan results are in and they are good! My oncologist emailed back saying it looks awesome!

Woo Hoo!! Happy Dance!!!

Pause to let it sink in, and give thanks for continued good health and for such a strong support team who makes a huge difference for me. Thank you!