Way back in April, my right leg started hurting and it was definitely swollen, that was on a Sunday. The pain got pretty intense over the next few days, aggravated even further by playing multiple boot-hockey games with my youngest son. By Wednesday it was just too much so I made an appointment with the After-Hours Clinic.

The doctor prescribed an ultrasound for the next day. I showed up at the Hospital at 8am, expecting a 12-hour wait, but it was less than an hour to get the first ultrasound, then there was blood work immediately afterwards. So by 10am I was told to wait for ninety minutes in the ER for the results, and they scheduled a more in-depth ultrasound for the afternoon.

…so I drove home to schedule an after-school pickup for the kids. I got back in time for the second ultrasound, this time they did the whole leg. I went back to wait in the ER, again expecting to be there for hours, but the results came back within thirty minutes.

The doctor told me it was a “…deep vein thrombosis.” A blood clot in the thigh of my right leg.

But the prognosis was good, I’d be on painkillers and blood thinners for four months, and I’d be back walking with a cane for a few days. But the really good news was my new and improved kidney, which is in the same region as the blood clot, was unaffected and working properly.

All together — from presenting myself to triage, to paying for my parking — I was in and out with a diagnosis and a treatment option, in 4.5-hours. But, while I was waiting for the doctor to write out the prescriptions, I told him about my recent weight loss. In three months I had lost close to thirty pounds, with no clear reason why.

That sparked a lot of interest. He ordered a CAT Scan for the next week while telling me that when people presented with weight loss like that, and for no good reason, there could be cancer involved.

When the full-body CAT Scan results came back, by now it was the first week of May, they found another blood clot — this one was in my lungs, and a “mass” on my right kidney (one of the old ones, there’s nothing wrong with the new one).

The doctor couldn’t tell me if it was cancerous, or just a cyst. Coincidentally I would see my Family Doctor the next morning, so he was the one who put in requisitions for more ultrasounds, an MRI, and more CAT Scans to figure out what was going on. For the newish blood clot in my lung, the doctor told me to just keep taking the blood thinners, and to immediately come back to the ER if I was short of breath.

A week later I was in the MRI machine, three days after that I was having an ultrasound on my kidneys and bladder.

A few days after that, the results came back… of the four cysts they found on my right kidney, one large one was was cancerous, but it was benign.

I have one more MRI scheduled in August just to make sure nothing’s growing that’s not supposed to grow.

…in other news: since the weather got better (ie: the snow went away) I’ve been taking photos of Events around the region. I’ve been updating my photo-blog almost weekly with tonnes of shots, and some of the photos have been regular features in our local paper.

It feels really good to be outside and having something to do. And the event-organizers mostly leave me alone, so all I have to do is concentrate on making sure my camera is on the right setting.