Seattle Cancer Care

My meeting with my new Seattle Cancer Care doctor turned out to be on the lackluster side. We arrived at the office early as requested to run through the necessary registration paperwork and questions. I wonder if there is a socially acceptable phobia of discussing banal personal details with perfectly uninterested strangers. Every new doctor we visit, every new office and reception staff: the script only ever varies slightly. Name, date of birth please, social security, addresses ad naseum, education, employment. I feel like I should keep a profile on myself with all the necessary information and answers and just hand it over upon my entrance. This fantasy of course would be quickly dashed; it turns out it is of tantamount importance that this information proceeds as a direct response from my mouth no matter how many times I assure them that I was still born on the 25th of May, 1989. Then comes the health history pages. I like to pretend with myself that they request the names, phone numbers, fax numbers, emails, addresses, specialties, and most recent appointment information from each of my zajillion doctors for my benefit, like some kind of brain game meant to exercise my long term faculties and not actually some infuriating plot to frustrate me to the point of tears. At the end of the day they have all of this information already and my writing it down will not stop them from asking me at least 4 separate times for all of the same information as if I might've grown an inch or so since having been asked my height twice in the same five minutes that I was measured.

Our check-in at Seattle Cancer Care was really no more or less painful than I have come to expect from the opening act of the doctor dog and pony show. The nurses were no more or less blandly polite but uninterested at the same time and the receptionists had a rather expectable tang of too busy for your questions yet unfortunately reliant on your answers in order to effect the end of an overall disagreeable experience for both parties. We found some decently comfortable high backed recliners facing a wall of windows with a peekaboo view of lake union. The boats were regal and cool, gliding through those green glass waters with pristine sails. A dusty warm glow of money floated on the warm afternoon air over the boats and beautiful condos of South lake union. We had been warned that the doctor was running late so we settled into the recliners and watched the world bustle outside the window between the sunbeams. 20 minutes later we were called back to the doctors exam room and again warned that the doctor was running late.

It is my humble opinion that doctor's exam rooms are one of the more underrated effective stress environments for human physical and emotional discomfort. A standard exam room consists of 1-2 hard plastic observer chairs, a doctor wheelie stool (or less commonly 3rd chair), and the exam table/bed/chairlette itself. The exam bed can vary from the sloping short bench version to the full hospital setup, longer and more dramatic in its ergonomic design. Exam beds are exquisitely uncomfortable to sit casually upon. They are meant for more dramatic posturing for examination's sake: they do not lend themselves well to the kinds of conversations had regarding results and treatments betweens doctors, patients, and families. Sometimes I opt for an observer chair as these at least promote forward facing casual sitting as well as the added benefit of a back and sometimes even armrests. Inevitably however, this leaves me feeling guilty and uncomfortable as it both dooms someone else to the uncomfortable side hunch on the table and also never fails to throw a doctor or nurse for a loop as they find it odd to address you from the observer's chair. Luckily I opted for this option as we had been warned of further tardiness.

We waited an hour for the doctor in the exam room. Waiting is one of my top 5 most uncomfortable activities. It makes me focus on the pain that starts to build up on my right side as my body weight bears down on the tumors in my liver. It makes me sweat which makes me irritable and further aware of the discomfort of my situation. I don't handle this kind of emotional stress well, particularly not around others. I prefer silence, usually the bitter furious sort, and will sit folded around my sore self, mouth set into an angry deep line, as I pinterest with all the force of a raging fire, mysterious as the dark side of the moon.

When the doctor arrived he was a tall thin gentleman with elegant long limbs like a crane. His accent was polished indian and his smile was warm. He assured us jovially that we would become accustomed to his lateness. Our faces were hard and our eyes didn't laugh at his jokes. Some of the easy bounce slunk off the edges of his footsteps by the time he had fully entered the room. We walked him through our story as we had told it a million times before and felt the room fill up with the anxiety and fear and exhaustion of the disease. He asked me if I understood the gravity of my diagnosis. They always ask me if I understand how serious things are. I always say yes. I wonder what else they expect me to say and what they might do if I were to deviate from the script.

They are hoping that my current round of interventional radiology will be enough to cut off the blood supply to the legions of tumors in my liver, a sort of modern-day medical siege of Vicksburg in two part s. We revamped my battle strategies for pain management, switching from a pain patch to heavier baseline painkillers a few times a day. This change has made the last few days a bit more bearable, a bit more lucid. Hopefully I will continue to improve as I go back in to see the radiologist on Friday to determine the start of the second half of my radiation. I hope I am well enough recovered that I will be left with some remaining liver function. Regardless, I think i'll be clearing my social calendar for the next week or so as I do battle with the diamond backed green dragon that lives in my right side.

If I'm lucky and successful, this will allow my doctor to treat me with some new cocktail of immunotherapy drugs aimed at teaching my body to identify tumor cells as dangers and allowing my immune system to then go about targeting and eventually destroying them. He tells me about a patient that has lived through the 3 year mark following this course which is a marginal improvement from the last set of stories dating back up to 2 years. Thinking about numbers like these is surreal. I cannot wrap my mind around them as facts that could apply in any relevant manner to my life. Hiding my fear as anger, feeding it with my frustration gives me the strength to look my doctors in the eye when they talk to me about death. Somehow standing strong in front of those doctors is enough for me to feel strong about this burden I carry. Holding myself upright and without shedding a tear is my first step towards being stronger than this disease. My upturned face and dry eyes are lines in the sand.