I would say that there are only a few things in this life that can really scare the crap out of someone but one of those things is to be at a hospital and have them say they found something in your results that looks like it could be cancer.
This is exactly what happened to me yesterday during my full day at the hospital for yet another series of tests as the docs scramble to try to figure out what is wrong with me and how to fix me.
I didn't go in there for any sort of cancer suspicions, but this was just one of the things that the doctor said to me during one of our many visits.
That's Vinmec hospital by the way and while I disagree with the color scheme, I can say that this is a very modern, friendly, and clean place. They put you at ease right away and the fact that everyone in the place, even the workers at the cafe, speak fantastic English, makes you feel even more confident that you are in the right place as a foreigner.
I have never been in a position to suspect that cancer could be a part of my life. In my extended family nobody other than a non-blood-related Aunt has had any sort of cancer and I wasn't relishing being the first of my kind to start this trend.
Although in the end the head oncologist sat down with me for a while and explained to me using words and also images that it IS NOT cancer, there was a period of about 3 hours where my mind was running around in circles and I was seriously ill at ease.
I don't know exactly why we were taking blood tests when I was in there for a spinal problem, but according to my first point of contact, the original doctor, there was a cloud inside my pelvis near the spinal cord root (I seriously need to find out what that is called, is it "lumbar?") and she wanted to run a blood test for reasons that she didn't explain to me. Since the tests cost very little (relatively) I signed up for it. In times like these I don't question the people that went to medical school. So when the result came back she was kind of careful with what she was saying to me, but she did mention the Big-C word and that is something that you never want to hear in any setting, let alone a hospital when they are talking about you.
So I got to have my very first ultrasound in my entire life. Call me ignorant if you will, but I have spent all of my life thinking that this process was only for pregnant women to be able to see their babies before they are born. I had no idea that they could look at your other interior workings and well, I have to say I am very impressed by this machine.
If you have never had one of these done, they are exactly like you have seen in the movies. You lie down, they put some grease on the contraption that they press on you, and then on the screen a black and white image of the inside of your body appears. It's pretty wild and I was kind of surprised at how hard they have to press on your body to get it to work. It is borderline painful but mostly just tickles.
I didn't get any of the results as they were happening, because it isn't the job of the ultrasound tech to interpret the results, just to get them. It was several hours later that the actual oncologist (a doc specializing in cancer) talked to me and those several hours were very stressful. Nobody likes to be told that they potentially have a life-threatening and mostly incurable disease. At the minimum you are looking at a massive expense and a ton of pain during the treatment. At least that is how I understand it.
Many hours later a doctor that I have never seen before up to this point and the only doctor man I have dealt with up to this point had me go into his office where he took a while to get to the damn point where he told me that I don't have cancer. One would think that they should exclaim this as soon as you walk in the door because the delay in his presentation lead me to believe that he was trying to be slow about his words so as to break the bad news to me slowly and cautiously.
Well I don't have cancer, and that is a good thing. Other good news was the fact that, and I guess this is just protocol because you are already paying for the service, that all my other internal organs are in excellent shape for someone my age as well. I am particularly surprised about the state of my liver and kidneys since I have basically been kicking the shit out of them for the past 30 years.
I guess I just have good genes in all departments other than the spinal ones.
So now here I sit at my desk with horrible posture that is probably contributing to why my back hurts to much, and haven't really made any progress as far as my back pain is concerned. It's frustrating to not be able to run but other good news is that for the first time since I have lived in Vietnam, I am under 90kg. In fact, this morning I was under 89.
I suppose that is just one more thing to celebrate. That and not having cancer of course.