The Art of Starting Over

Chapter 24 - Fact Finding

The nurse's voice woke me from my reverie. Millie placed the magazine back onto the coffee table and stood up mechanically. I followed her through the brilliant white corridor and into Dr Debattista's brilliant white office.

"Good afternoon, Emily. Good afternoon, Alison," he greeted warmly, extending his hand as we walked in. I shook it anxiously, realising that now the moment of truth had come, I wasn't ready to hear what he had to say. I wanted to run back through the waiting area, through the glass doors, and as far away from there as my legs could take me.

Nanna and I sat on the two chairs that faced his desk. My heart was pounding so loudly in my throat that I was almost certain Dr Debattista and Millie could hear it. I looked over at Millie. She was completely focused on the doctor's face as he took off his glasses, set them on the table, and sat down in front of us. I noticed a slight tremble in his fingers as he reached out for a dusky blue file, which I assumed held Millie's notes. He cleared his throat loudly, set both elbows on the table, and rested his chin on his thumbs. He drew in a heavy breath, and it felt as though he had sucked the oxygen from my own lungs.

I closed my eyes and said a quick prayer to God. I prayed that it was low-grade cancer, that it had not spread to any other organs, that it was still in Stage I. I prayed that Dr Debattista would say that it would all be over very soon and that we didn't have much to worry about. Please, God, let there not be much to worry about!

"Okay," he said gently, his voice husky. "So, I have the results of the CT scan and the hysteroscopy, which I am sure you are both anxious about. But before we get to that, tell me, Emily, how are you feeling? Did you experience any new symptoms since I saw you three weeks ago? And have any of the symptoms we talked about worsened or improved?"

Millie swallowed patiently before speaking. "No, no. I think the spotting may have decreased slightly, but that's it. The pressure in my navel area gets slightly worse at times, like mild to moderate pain rather than the usual discomfort. But I can't be sure whether this is real or whether I'm just more conscious of it now," she added with a meek smile.

"I see," Dr Debattista said slowly, nodding his head and looking down at the closed file in front of him. A cottony ball of panic swelled in my stomach, making me feel sick. Again, I wanted to run out of the room, away from whatever it was he was about to say next, but my spine was bolted to the chair. "Well, like I said, I have the results."

Another heavy breath.

"The histology report from the biopsy confirmed that the tumour is cancerous. It is what we call a carcinosarcoma, and it is considered to be a rather high-risk type of cancer — a Grade III, if you will." He paused and focused his thoughtful eyes on Nanna Millie. "This means that the tumour cells can travel to other parts of the body at a considerably fast pace. However, the CT scan does not show any affected areas other than the uterus and the cervix. So, we think it is in Stage II."

He paused again, put on his glasses, and turned his computer screen towards us to show a black-and-white image. I stared blankly at it, trying to make sense of the abstract blobs in front of me.

"As you can see," he went on, pointing towards a darker, asymmetrical circle, "the cancer is still well contained within the uterus, so this improves the prognosis greatly."

Another pause.

I tried to stay calm. I breathed in and out rhythmically, willing my heart to stop increasing its already fast rate. I tried to clear the white noise creeping in around the edges of my field of vision. But the voices were back in my head, getting louder, more distinctive.

Cancerous. High-risk. Grade III.

They multiplied and echoed the same phrases over and over as Dr Debattista's pen frantically outlined the mangled shape on the screen. I tore my eyes away from it and tried to focus on his lips. If I concentrated hard enough, I could just make out what he was saying.