It’s quite a big thing, a CT scan….and I have existed in this robotic world of just getting on with things that you almost forget that it isn’t “normal” having to drive 1 ½ hours away to get a CT Scan to find out if your Cancer has returned inside you without your knowledge.
It would be without my knowledge….the odd unexplained twinge….the sense of unease….but otherwise I am fit & well. Melanoma won’t care about that though. But, I have to be honest that this time my pre-scan anxiety known as scanxiety has been heightened.
And I don’t know if it is because I have been more neurotic than usual or because The Mr has been worried too but this time I didn’t go my CT Scan alone.…whether it just didn’t fit with our juggled work schedules, or the CT Scan was tagged onto the end of the day, I have been to all but one of them on my own….and I didn’t mind….like I said – I was in robot mode – I just went & did because that is what you do.
The less “importance” I felt I was placing on a Scan itself the less anxious I got about the results.
I still laugh about the scan I went to in September 2013 where I had had a tooth extracted in the morning & literally drove from one to the other…having taken a day’s holiday from work for the pleasure & it certainly wasn’t how most people would choose to spend a day off work!
This time the Scan was in the evening….I was always planning on going alone…straight after work….but this time on my way between a few work appointments I rang up The Mr to remind him I would be late…”unless…I said…..” & The Mr leapt into the pause I left at the silent thought….like he was desperately waiting for approval to gatecrash my silent car journey.
School holidays mean that 2 in the car became 4…..a family outing of sorts. The first time The Little People have been to any of the Oxford hospitals, where I have been without them so many times.
The discussion of what the Scan was for & where we were going, happened before I came home to pick them up….but they were ready on the doorstep looking smart because Daddy had promised dinner out on the way home!
It might sound weird but a little milestone became a major turning point…..I let my husband take some of the burden of my scanxiety from me , and The Little People who I have intentionally protected from all things “mummy hospital” related saw another glimpse into the reasons that I go to the Churchill Hospital.
I actually feel myself welling up just thinking about what we shared.
Partly from sadness that my children even have to have the monster that is Melanoma in their lives….but mainly because it made what was such a bitter day…such a quietly frightening day that little bit less traumatic.
The little hand holding mine as we walked out of the Radiology department…the little lips that kissed the plaster over where the cannula had been ….the total distraction afterwards & all the way home as we drove through scenic, picturesque Oxfordshire countryside before finding a lovely pub in the heart of Stow-on-the-Wold to eat dinner.
Anyone who looked at our happy family of four last night as we laughed at the quaint signs around the pub would never imagine for a second where we had been an hour beforehand.
And then….as if my Little people couldn’t make me burst with happy any more…in the car on the way home my Son read to my daughter until she fell asleep on his shoulder…and then when the Mr drove over potholes on the roads closer to home he was reprimanded for nearly waking the adorable one!
Sometimes it’s the little things that count x