Cleo Across the Street

Hospital Journal

There is always a sense of worry when leaving the hospital to go back home after a session of chemotherapy. Before I go home, I went across the street to get a CAT scan to see what condition my cancer is in, and throughout the day, I was nervous about getting home safely with the ambulance service. I imagined that I would be discharged from Kaiser and a nurse would take me to my scan appointment in a wheelchair, which is directly across the street from my hospital room. To my surprise, it was a full ambulance transport with a gurney. My appointment was literally one block away, yet we drove there in the ambulance. It took a while to find parking for the vehicle, and it seems that the city does tow ambulances, which struck me as a bit odd.

In a tiny reception area—part of a trailer parked behind the Kaiser parking lot—my drivers squeezed me between their couch and table. The receptionist requested that I fill out a document, which is difficult to do while lying on a gurney, and, as one knows, a ballpoint pen doesn’t always work well in that position. But I did sign the document, which, in actuality, no one really cares about. I was then taken to another trailer where the scan is located.

In great detail, the technicians who run the CAT scan told me exactly what would happen. They inject a form of sugar, known as a radioactive tracer, and the cells in my body eat it up. On their screen, a bright spot indicates active cancer. The best result is when nothing lights up, but if I act like a Christmas tree in the middle of the night in December, then I’ve got trouble.

When I got home, I felt extremely exhausted. My legs were stiff and sore, and I felt a tingle in all of my fingertips. I was told by the technician that I was radioactive and should stay away from small children. It was one of the few times I refused wine with my dinner, because I was totally wired from the five days of chemo and the scan. I was buzzing up a storm, and I felt that although this was my body, I was wearing it like a stranger’s suit.

So far, last night was the strongest effect of what I have been going through. Overall, I feel I will survive this ordeal, but the results of the CAT scan are a Cleo from 5 to 7 series of moments. I have friends who are waiting for the results, but I’m not that anxious about it. I don’t want to be confined by news—either bad or great—but to live for the moment and feel the dice as it hits the side of the wall.