Bon voyage.

I first spotted her in the hallway behind the receptionist's desk and I thought, oh how nice, the doctor brought her daughter to the office today. I came to find out later that she is a mother herself, to a five-year-old little girl. It's not just that she's young -- which is fine with me, she's up-to-date on the latest treatment options -- but she has a cherubic face and warm smile, and such a sweet disposition that I immediately felt comfortable with her.

I was her last appointment of the day and she spent at least an hour and a half talking to me. It was sort of a good news/bad news conversation. Biopsied tissue is tested for certain tumor markers -- proteins that may be found in the cancer cells. The status of these tumor markers helps predict how the cancer will respond to specific treatments. They refer to it as being hormone receptor positive or negative. My results indicated I was ER+ (estrogen receptor positive). Knowing how tumors love estrogen the way that coyotes love rabbits, I responded, "Oh, that's bad." No, she said. That's good, because I will respond well to hormone treatment that blocks or decreases estrogen. Frankly, I was surprised, at my age, that I was pumping out any estrogen at all. The upshot was that being ER+ meant that I would fall into the group whose tumors appear to grow less aggressively than those that are HR-. Definitely good news.

On the other hand, I was HER2 (a protein receptor) negative. "So that's good?" Well, yes, it is good. But, for HER2-positive patients, the really good news is that when given Herceptin therapy in combination with chemo, they are responding better than ever before. And while that doesn't apply to my situation, it is definitely good news for the HER2+ group.

The oncologist wanted to send my tumor for more extensive analysis to a lab in California called Genomic Health. I stopped her right there. The hospital still has my tumor? Oh yes, she replied. They keep them for years. So, there's a little box in storage with my name on it and inside that box is a quivering little tangelo-like mass that's going to be sliced and diced and then returned back to its home base? Yes. Precisely.

I had to absorb that. While I was sleeping at home (or sleeping on the job), a piece of me would be winging its way to California -- accumulating round-trip air miles. I hoped it had a wonderful time.