So, day six on our journey into hell. This morning I went to see our GP for a follow up on my own cold/flu issue to see if I was safe to be with my husband. Actually I went to see a different doctor in the practice because ours was not due back until tomorrow. As it happened, when I arrived, I noticed that he was in the office and asked if he could see me for a few minutes. I could still do my follow up with the other doctor but wanted to know what info he could provide. He was in for an admin day, but agreed to see me. He ended up doing my follow up (I was allowed to see him with a mask and lots of hand washing) and then spent the better part of an hour discussing everything with me, which I so appreciated.
He had already received everything from the hospital and had reviewed the results earlier. The expected diagnosis is malignancy. What we're waiting on the biopsy to learn is whether this is a primary site on the pancreas that has metastasized to the liver or two separate primaries. New info for me - the biopsy will be able to tell us which organ the spots on his liver came from. If they originated in the pancreas, they can detect that. Had no idea. He told me each organ has its own code and that will be imprinted in the cells they biopsied. Apparently, best case is they are two primary cancers and each will be treated individually. Basically, if it has already travelled from the pancreas to liver, as he put it "the seeds" are now everywhere and treatment would be more about extending life as long and as comfortably as possible. Scenario one will likely have some combination of surgery and chemo/radiation in the hopes of removing the larger mass and shrinking the rest.
I did not share all of this with DH when I got back. He is still operating on lets just hope this is something else. He's not ready to hear what I heard today. The social worker came in this afternoon and discussed critical illness benefits and caregiver benefits, as well as what support needs to be in place for the kids and that conversation threw him for a loop. He said it was a "sobering" discussion. Then the internist tonight came in to discuss his heart situation and what tests they plan to run to figure that out and used the word malignancy. That also hit him hard. He needs time to process those two conversations before any further bombs are dropped. The internist tonight said the results could be back tomorrow or more likely Wednesday. I hope so. I'd been hearing two weeks and the wait is torture. Although still with a certain ability to hang on to "this isn't really happening."
He has very little appetite. Hates everything in the hospital so I went home and made him a sandwich and brought it back. He texted every second I was gone - "how long, he was starving." He barely ate 1/3. As he says - and so it goes.