More poking and proding

So, what did I need after such an eventful weekend?  Well, a day in bed mightn't have been too shabby but instead I was treated to a day of hospital outpatient appointments!  Why they couldn't have scheduled theses at a different time than two days after chemo is beyond me but apparently hospitals just don't work that way, the referring doc sends a request to the appropriate department and  they just send you an appointment.  Unfortunately the effect is that you feel like an object rather thn a person.

So first up today was cardiology, not been to that department before, it was at the exact opposite end of the hospital from the outpatient department, so about a mile walk!!! (Not really but seemed like it the ways was feeling).  There I had an echocardiogram, basically an ultrasound of the heart, they checked all the valves were working as they should and measured the thickness of my heart muscles.  Adrian got to see really cool pictures of venous and arterial blood flow which I unfortunately missed as had to be facing the opposite way - gutted as it was wasted on Adrian!  I got to hear blood going through each of my heart valves though, that was pretty cool.  All was good and as far as I know I'll have a few more of these throughout to check no adverse effect on the heart from the chemo.

Next on the agenda was an ultrasound, we had no idea what this was for despite trying to find out at chemo on Friday.  It turns out it was to put a marker into the middle of the cancer tumour - yikes, didn't like the sound of that after my bad experience of the biopsy.  However, it turned out not to be to bad.  They gave local anaesthetic first then made a cut and inserted a needle with a kind of metal coil on the end, after it was in place I had to go for another mammogram to check it was all in place, then that was that.  So, sore boob for another week or so again but the purpose of the marker is that if we have the best possible outcome and the chemo shrinks the tumour then they can see where it was when they have to remove the tissue.  So, lets hope this happens for me. Nasty chemo stuff, do your magic.  Nausea I can deal with. :-)