Friday was my 3 month follow up MRI and the process took much longer than it has in the past. I remember lying in the machine and thinking, gosh, this is taking forever. For those of you who have had MRIs before, you know it is not a quick process; but I have always been in and out within half an hour. This time it took almost a full hour before I returned to the waiting room to go home with my mom. I didn't think much about it, until the next day when Dr. Baronia texted me asking when a good time would be for him to call me and discuss my results.
My heart almost stopped. It is not typical for a Physician to get back to you that quickly regarding an MRI and if they do, the news is usually unfavorable....so I did the most rational thing possible and went to the darkest place of mind to explore the options available if the MRI results were not good. Saturday came and went and I did not receive a phone call, so I began to assume that things were not that bad because if they had been, he would have called. I spent Saturday and Sunday stressing to no end worrying about how I was going to react when Dr. Baronia called to tell me the bad news.
This morning I walked around treating my patient's with my cell phone clutched for dear life in my hand and shifting occasionally to my pocket. It was about 12pm when my phone rang and I saw that it was Dr. Baronia. I took a huge breath and answered the phone.
Much to my relief the news was good and honestly, better than just good. Dr. Baronia told me he felt my MRI results were still stable with no progression, but that if we look at the bigger picture and compare my imaging results from last year to this year with all my MRIs; there is noticeable improvement. I violated my running restrictions to sprint out of the office and celebrate (sorry Dr. Baronia).
He still mentioned that we continue to see some increased signal intensity on the MRI, but he is not sure if it is residual tumor or residual from treatment so he will use my next MRI in July to decide whether or not that is the case. The positive news was just so wonderful that I honestly feel so relaxed at the moment. In fact, I'm exhausted because I am coming off an emotional roller coaster that was so up and down it made every muscle in my body tense and I couldn't relax out of it.
As my recovery continues, I am now up to working about 5-6 hours a day and look forward to returning back to work full time on the 20th of April. Only 3 more rounds of Chemo to go and then I will hopefully be done with treatments. My hair is growing crazy fast and you almost can't see my scar anymore! I have been doing yoga therapy weekly and can feel the strength I am gaining in my muscles. I feel like running is definitely in my future and September can't get here fast enough so I can receive clearance to return to running. I will be continuing with yoga for a while as I have found it to be incredibly challenging physically and have started to gain muscle mass back. My yoga instructor Lindsay Kerr has also introduced me into some Essential Oils, which I have been using to help improve my sleep at night. I am including her information on this page
