There are two reasons to get a PET scan; one, if you have cancer and; two, if they think you might have cancer. Either way, it’s a serious business. I had never had one before and didn’t know what to expect. I found myself in a cubicle with a curtain; one of six on either side of the room, three curtains facing three more, directly opposite. I had only seen the pulmonologist four hours earlier, and already had done PFTs (Pulmonary Function Tests), blood, urine, and before the clock struck five would have completed an echocardiogram. I can see why people come from all over the world to be seen at the Mayo Clinic.
The nameless man in the cubicle directly opposite me looked to be about sixty, balding, completely grey, thin, didn’t obviously look like he had cancer, but then, neither do I. His curtain was opened when I was put in my cubicle, but he was there first and soon left for his scan. The way a PET scan works is that you have to be fasting for at least four hours so that your blood sugar is low because the first part of the exam involves starting an IV and than transfusing radioactive glucose intravenously, and you want the tissues to take up the glucose and it doesn’t do that as well if starting from a high-glucose position. Tissues that are metabolically more active, like cancer and inflammation will take up the radioactive glucose (any glucose) more than normal tissues and so the abnormal areas “light up”.
All the other cubicles were closed. After my infusion of radioactive glucose I was told to lie back and be quiet. The tech said they didn’t even want me to read, and the cell phone had to be turned off. Do you know the last time, other than before sleep, that I was alone with my thoughts; no music, no book, no kindle, no paper, no TV news, no nothing? Yeah. I don’t know either. At first, I started with Hail Mary’s, which is what I often do at night before sleeping. I never get past three decades, counting them off on one hand with folded fingers, five down, then straightening my fingers, not necessarily in order just to mix things up, five up. Then, with palm flat against the bed-sheet, two Our Father’s, then repeat.
After two or three decades I got bored and said some Act of Contrition’s, then switched to Mark Antony’s monologue from Julius Caesar, Friends Romans Countrymen, and then To be or not to be, that is the question…then I heard another man from behind the curtain opposite and kitty-corner from me. The tech was asking him what the PET scan was for and he said that he had bladder cancer that had spread to his lymph nodes. Bladder cancer is difficult if it escapes the bladder. He was very collected and matter of fact almost like it wasn’t him, like he’d graduated to the acceptance stage some time ago.
I looked at my watch. Thirty minutes passed. Thirty to go. I heard a voice from the middle cubicle opposite. My curtain was closed now and the lights down so I couldn’t see anyone, even if their curtain would have been opened. I heard a young voice ask, “What’s a PET scan do?” I could hear the tech say something similar to what she told me. I heard the clicking of the transfusion machine for the radioactive glucose, then a curtain open, and close. Then I heard her.
I heard a woman humming. It had to be her mother. It was a classical hymn that I couldn’t name, but it was perfect. It was beautiful. It was like she was singing her song of love for everyone in that room behind all the drawn curtains when in truth, it was solely for her child, to remove the fear and uncertainty that all this entailed. Her compassion and love were palpable and I was so thankful to have experienced that, thankful for the awareness of the demonstration of God’s Grace in that room between mother and child. I was not aware of the passage of time, call it eternity if just for a moment, and when my curtain opened for the scan I looked away so the tech might not notice the tears in my eyes, tears from the sound an angel makes.