Bone Mets? What happened??

Just as the 'end' was in sight a new pothole, or maybe sinkhole, has developed. I'm scheduled for bilateral mastectomy with immediate DIEP reconstruction on June 18th.  Last week I saw my PCP for a routine med refills appointment. I'm already hurting everywhere because I developed chemo-induced fibromyalgia. But I mentioned I'd been having a new pain in my back that was like a broken rib.  I guess when you're a cancer survivor no small pain goes ignored. I've already had a chest study x-ray and a bone scan to rule out bone metasasis. Neither were conclusive so now I'm scheduled for a CT scan with 3-D something.

What happened?  I feel like I've been run over by a semi, again.  I can't have bone mets, I can't even spell it!! How is this possible when I went through all my chemo? Does that not conquer the bad cells everywhere? 

My reading on the internet about bone mets is confusing. Is this a condition that's not curable? Now my PCP and surgeon are both saying that my surgery may have to be delayed!!! 

Any advice, words of wisdom or been there done that, is welcome. 

Guess what!?!

The CT scan was inconclusive.

It says, "this could represent an old fracture, but the possiblitiy of a metastatic lesion cannot be totally excluded."

I cannot imagine why an "old fracture" suddenly became painful and has been quite painful for nearly three weeks now. The CT scan also revealed a second fracture in the same rib. So there are two breaks in that rib and still no reason why.

I spent Wednesday morning waiting to see my breast surgeon - supposedly about a bone biopsy. Well, she won't do a bone biopsy until I've had a PET Scan. I can't get the PET scan until May 28th. And the person who made the appointment couldn't tell me how long it takes for PET scan results to come back. Does anybody know?

I've gotten copies of all the reports, X-ray, Bone Scan and CT Scan. One tells me that my hiatel hernia has returned - it's been surgically repaired twice now. Another said I should see a doctor about a possible fracture to my knee. My knees were surprised to hear that. 

On top of all this dh has been gone nearly every evening to spend time with his friends. No we're not teenagers. He's Pakistani and culturally used to hanging out with the guys while the women hang out together. It's me, two cats, a goldfish and you guys. Anybody out there up for a game of checkers? 

More waiting.  

Thanks Tender and everyone else out there. 

I don't know if it's a PET/CT scan or just PET. I guess I'll find out on Wednesday.

I finally did get some gabapentin - which seems to be helping. Actually it seems to be help my nerve damaged toes more. I could actually feel the bathroom tiles under my bare toes this morning!! No other advice has been offered on the broken rib. I think rest and pain control is all they do these days. 

One thing is for certain from all of this - I will have to work harder on being my own advocate. The doctors are so worried about WHY my rib is broken that I didn't even ask for assistance with the pain from the broken rib for three weeks. I'm well aware of drastically increased pain in my knee but I've got so many appointments with so many different doctors that adding in the orthopedic doc seems like too much.  

If I don't take care of me nobody else will so I better get started!!!  

That gives me more to do than just wait for test results. :-)