Thinking You Might Have Cancer Is Scary

 It all started with a passing, but worrying reference on a CT scan I had done because of lingering pain in my lower abdomen. The test was taken to rule out a hernia (which it did), but it also noted the following: “PANCREAS: There is a 5 mm focal low density in the body of the pancreas as seen on series 2 image 39. Orthogonal images are more suggestive of a fatty cleft than a focal lesion.” 

Oh. There are lots of different kinds of cancer, but one of the ones you *really* do not want is pancreatic and here I had in front of me a medical report that was at best equivocal about that possibility. The radiologist recommended an ultrasound be taken in six months. On a separate, but parallel track, I was due for a colonoscopy (I had turned 50 a month earlier) and when I showed the report to the gastroenterologist, he prescribed an MRI instead, explaining that an ultrasound was unlikely to resolve the question of what was on my pancreas because the sound waves used in the test would probably bounce off my stomach (which is in front of the pancreas, who knew?). I had to get through the colonoscopy first (which I did, and it was clean) and then wanted to wait a few weeks so my right arm didn’t turn into a pin cushion (both the colonoscopy and MRI require IVs).

Obviously, this weighed quite heavily on me. It was not enough that I had spent months in almost complete isolation during a pandemic, had been trying to juggle working from home with being at home (not as easy as you would think) and my general struggles with depression and anxiety, now I had to worry about a ticking time bomb in my body that could end things entirely. Add to that a succession of snow storms over the span of about 3 weeks that dropped a total of more than two feet of snow in front of my house and I was really at my wits end. I started having trouble sleeping, was anxious all the time, had what felt like were hours-long panic attacks, and all the while, just tried to keep my shit together and my driveway clear (ha ha). This stress, along with COVID, finally hit my waistline - I put on 5 pounds in about 2 weeks bingeing on sweets and not working out as much as I should. It was at the lowest point in what has felt like almost a year of one long, ongoing low point. 

When I opened my gmail account this morning, there was an email from the gastroenterologist notifying me that the report was in. I nervously opened it. It did not start well: “At the site of the questioned abnormality, there is a 3 mm focus of intrinsic signal abnormality which is isotense to the adjacent fat on T1 and T2-weighted images.” (Uh-oh, this doesn’t sound good). It went on: “It demonstrates suppression of signal on the T1 fat-saturated sequence.” (Heart pumping faster). And still more: “It is hyper intense (yikes!) on the in phase sequence with a rim of low signal on the out of phase sequence.” At this point, I assumed the worst because hey, there was a lot of verbiage that did not sound very promising and then, the kicker: “These findings are consistent with a small fatty cleft in the pancreatic parenchyma. There is no pancreatic mass or cyst.” (emphasis mine). EXHALE and then, a feeling of relief. 

I have spent the last four months unsure whether a lesion was growing on my pancreas that might kill me and now I know there is not. It is an odd feeling to not have this hanging over my head anymore. In the movies, the character would embrace ~ a new lease on life ~ but now, I just want my stupid COVID vaccine so I can get back to my normal level of grumpiness, not the dark hole I have been in for almost a year.  

Follow me on Twitter - @scarylawyerguy 

Movie Review - I Used To Go Here

As the title implies, I Used to Go Here is a coming-of-age story in reverse. The movie opens on Kate Conklin (Gillian Jacobs) a mid-thirtysomething author who is having a really bad day - her first book has just been published to middling sales and a canceled book tour. To add insult to injury, her fiancé recently called off their wedding while her best friend is about to have a baby. Relief appears to come in the form of an invitation from her former professor (and mentor) David Kirkpatrick (Jemaine Clement) to travel from Chicago downstate to Carbondale to do a book reading for his creative writing students. 

Yes, the setup is about as subtle as a sledgehammer, but the ensuing hour-plus of this tidy, 82-minute film is not without its charms. At first, Kate gets a modest boost of self-esteem in the form of a graduate assistant assigned to shepherd her around town (complete with an itinerary!), a fawning reunion with Kirkpatrick, and a modest-sized auditorium of students who dutifully applaud her work. Of course, this ego boost is temporary and Kate’s perceived inadequacies rush back to the surface and focus the rest of the movie. 

Kate’s lodgings (a B&B run by a prickly older woman) are across the street from the group home she shared as an undergraduate 15 years ago and still houses creative writers. Her former room even has those glow-in-the-dark stars we all remember from college still affixed to the ceiling, their luminescence long ago snuffed out (METAPHOR ALERT). The room is now used by Hugo (Josh Wiggins), a cheeky, if a bit introverted student who shares the house with two other students, Tall Brandon (self-explanatory) and Animal (never explained). 

The beats follow as you might expect. Kirkpatrick, who Kate knew as an idealist whose work had just been published, is now jaded and middle-aged, in an unhealthy marriage, and carrying on an affair with Hugo’s girlfriend April (Hannah Marks). Kirkpatrick offers Kate a temporary teaching position while trying to sell her on the benefits of a low-pressure job while acknowledging that few of the students he teaches will ever make it as writers. On the other end of the spectrum, Kate critiques April’s work as being out of step with what publishers are looking for (at one point admonishing April that one word poetry titles are out of vogue). Kate thinks she is being helpful in offering suggestions that sound to April like trimming her sails to satisfy unseen New York editors. No, April tells Kate, she plans on starting her own press and publishing her work without all that interference. 

These two set-ups frame that tricky time in life - Kate is still young enough to chart a new course but has enough adulthood under her belt to recognize the risks inherent in starting over as you get older. She rolls her eyes at April’s bravado, seeing it as naivete, but also views Kirkpatrick as someone who settled, gave up on his dreams and became a cliche. This generational tension is at the heart of the movie but is never quite fleshed out enough to make the viewing experience wholly satisfying. Kate falls in with the kids in the writer’s retreat, getting relationship advice as they scroll her ex’s Instagram feed and spending a care-free afternoon at a local lake high on marijuana edibles. Hugo compliments a college-era essay she wrote about the untimely death of her brother, but she poo-poos it, noting that publishers are not interested in personal essays anymore. 

And therein lies the tension Kate must grapple with. She compromised her ideals in the service of achieving a goal - becoming a published author - but in doing so, produced average work that did not resonate with the book-buying public. Kate’s last hope, a favorable review in the New York Times, comes to naught. Her book is criticized as amateurish and maudlin. At the same time, she must admit the truth about her failed engagement. The story she wants to tell is of being betrayed by her fiancé but the opposite is true. She knew she did not want to marry her boyfriend and yet, was prepared to go through with it, the implication being that as a woman ~ of a certain age ~ it was expected. Instead of owning her shit, Kate has been looking for scapegoats to blame. 

Jacobs carries the movie nicely as a woman on the edge of aging out of twee adorkableness with a winning cast of supporting characters striking that right note of youthful idealism tinged with being exposed to capital “A” adults behaving badly. Fifteen years on from graduation, they see someone who has achieved what they think is professional success but still has to sleep on a couch because she lost her key to the B&B. Further up the chain, Kirkpatrick is sleeping with one of their own and Hugo’s mom (who appears basically out of nowhere) is a divorcee who spends lonely nights watching You Tube videos of people passing out on roller coasters while cooking souffles at 1:30 in the morning. 

In the end, everything gets wrapped in a neat little bow. April calling out Kate as a hypocrite after learning Kate slept with Hugo (which you could see coming a mile away) is the light bulb moment that sends Kate on a different path - away from settling for a low rent gig as a visiting professor in a sleepy little college town, accepting a compliment about her book while acknowledging it could have been better, and back to the world of adulthood that includes her friend going into premature labor. It is a bittersweet note appropriate to someone closing in on 40, uncertain of her future but ready for the challenge the next chapter in life presents.