life on the treadmill

I almost didn't know how I was going to write this post, mainly because I didn't think anyone would believe it! We went to MSK yesterday for the results of the needle biopsy. We were sort of dreading it, and tried to think of the ways it could go:

1) Dr. Z says "here are some brochures for my 5 favorite mortuaries" (Andrew's joke)
2) it's "xyz" lymphoma, and we're admitting you today for fabulous new chemo cocktail
3) it's some weird infection, here's an antibiotic, and we'll see you next month for your transplant.

But we never, ever, EVER seem to be able to predict correctly. Instead, we were told -- the sample is non-diagnostic.  What?
The surgeon extracted enough samples, and some atypical cells were seen in some of the samples but not in others. This means that they cannot conclusively say if they are cancerous or not. Which means ... wait for it ... ANOTHER BIOPSY! This time of the liver!  You're kidding.  You're kidding, right?! So the 96 hour chemo infusion was a waste, the following PET scan was a waste, and the CT assisted biopsy was a waste. It's almost too much.  It's like a bad soap opera that you would turn off, because it's just too far fetched. But this is what it is.

So, now they want to do a PET assisted needle biopsy of the liver. It's impossible to see any liver mass on the CT scan, but you can see it light up on the PET scan.  They will put Andrew in the PET and take some samples from his liver. They could have done the liver to begin with, it seems, and it would have been more accurate, but it has more risks. The liver bleeds when you start sticking it with needles, and Andrew doesn't have such great platelet function these days. But his counts are much better now that he's a month out of chemo, so hopefully everything will be fine.

Of course all of this means more radiation, and more delay on necessary transplant treatment as my husband continues to be used as a human science experiment. And I'm beginning to believe that they will never be able to come up with a diagnosis. But you can't refuse any of it -- not if you want to live.