I am a Dandelion!

“What exactly did the last doctor tell you about your biopsy results?”.

I immediately had a bad feeling.

“He told me ‘Atypical cells likely due to severe inflammation’ and when I asked if that meant benign he said that it did”.

“Well, that is true. There are Atypical cells. And most are benign. But there are some that we don’t know what they are. And with you, with your history, we can’t not know.”

I stood there on my front lawn, bouncing my toddler on my hip. My older children swinging on the tree swing. It was Friday afternoon, Spring Break. And this doctor had just pierced my bubble of domestic bliss. 

“How serious is your concern?”, I asked, nervously.

“Serious enough for you to meet with a team of specialists at the STAT clinic on Monday. We want to discuss options with you, but it’s looking like surgical removal.”

Surgical removal. SURGICAL REMOVAL.

I was just told a week earlier my lung biopsy came back as benign.

No cancer.

I was so happy. So grateful. 

“So you’re saying you think it’s cancer?”.

“I’m saying we don’t know what it is, and with you we have to know. A normal 35 year old, we’d watch and wait. But with you? We just have to know.”

He continued; “The biopsy shows benign, but not all of it. So the only way to know for sure is to remove it. I have you meeting with the thoracic surgeon, Dr. Mayfield.”

It was at this point I began crying. And I don’t cry easily.

All of the memories of my diagnosis nearly two years ago came flooding back. 

His language. His urgency. The assemlance of specialists.

“There are a lot of eyes on you. You’re okay.”

Over the next few days his words stook with me.

Beforelong I was at the STAT clinic. I met with that doctor, the pulmonologist. Dr. Mayfield, too.

My wedge resection surgery is scheduled for six days from now. He will be remove a wedge-shaped piece of my lung to get the nodule.
“You’ll hardly even know it’s gone”, he said.

The surgery itself doesn’t intimidate me. Having my lung cut open and stitched back together really doesn’t intimidate me at all.

What intimidates me is the PET scan. Which I am having momentarily.

A painless scan scares me far more than chest tubes and ventilators.

I know what to expect from my lung surgery. 

I don’t know what to expect from my PET scan.

Being overly-confident feels like tempting fate. 

So I quietly repeat to myself, “There is nothing there” as if the magical hand of the Universe will swoop in and make it so.

A PET scan will show if there is cancer anywhere. And that means the invisible cancer monster will 

be visible. It won’t be able to hide.

The results could be life-changing. 

I receive them in the next 24 hours.

Last night I decided to do something really fun as I calmed my nerves.

I ran a bath. That’s not the fun part, though. It gets better.

I threw in bath bomb I received as a gift, and it turned the water a murky color. I quickly received some daisies and dandelions from the garden and turned my bathtub into an Ophelia—esque pond!

And it made me happy. It made me so happy.

I forgot all about lung nodules and PET scans. I was free. 

Playing in my green bath among the wildflowers made me think of how dandelions grow under the harshest of circumstances. Still, they rise above. They are strong.

I am a dandelion! I AM A DANDELION!

I, too, will continue to grow under the harsher of circumstances.

I, too, shall rise above. I, too, am strong.

And just like a dandelion, perhaps I am not as beautiful as a rose, or a lily.

It takes a special kind of person to see the beauty of a dandelion.

Knocking on the door soon greeted me as I left behind my pond bath, and waiting for me on my porch was azaleas from my friend and co-worker.

“They symbolize life”, she said. “I thought you needed to see that.”

Life. 

Yes. Life. I am very much alive and still have a lot more living to do.