A woman can never be too rich or too thin?

Well Wallis Simpson was wrong on one account. According to Dr. Diaz, the plastic surgeon I saw Friday, I am not a candidate for using my body fat for reconstructing any of my parts. It was almost humorous. He's saying "push your stomach out" and I'm saying "I AM pushing it out." Also Dr. Diaz does not have a good poker face at all. Since I am a psychologist, many of my friends and associates have a very good poker face. Dr. Diaz, as I was asking him about treatment options he did not consider to be in my best interest, was making faces like I was subjecting him to a series of really noxious smells, to the point where I actually said to him "look at what you are doing with your face!" Very expressive.

Monday I saw Dr. Levine, which was not very productive. I waited an hour to get in to see him, and then he didn't have the results of the BRACanalysis because his office failed to send in my family history of cancer so it didn't get approved by insurance, and the tumor analysis wasn't back yet, and I was kind of feeling like What Am I Doing Here? This is two hours out of my life that I will never get back. The positive point is that he did order a PET/CT scan, and his staff called me today and I am having it tomorrow AM. It should light up any metastases, although I really doubt I have any. And the BRACanalysis lady called me today to say that now that Dr. Levine's office sent my family history, my test is approved and covered 100 percent by my insurance. Results in about two weeks.

This AM I saw Dr. Korey. Got to love Dr. Korey. He is straightforward, plain-spoken, makes me feel like a human being, went over all my options with me (again), all the pros and cons, answered every question I could think of even if the answer was not pleasant. Dr. K doubts that the axillary lymph node dissection will yield any further evidence of metastasis. Me too. But we gotta do it. Dr. K said that if the river is really flat this weekend then maybe I can do a little paddling, and that I can go in the pool when I have my mini-getaway later in the month (no diving).

In the meantime, I'm working to maintain a healthy balance of life and healing and work. I walked Friday and Saturday and Sunday and I can't tell you how great it felt to get my whole body in motion. I did lots of resting over the weekend. We spent Saturday evening with some cherished friends and there was lots of interesting conversation and laughter. I'm healing great and that spastic hand is getting better by degrees.

I appreciate each and every one of you who are checking in with me by card or email or phone or smoke signal. I am touched to hear from people I don't really know who are taking the time to send me a kind word or a kind thought.