It's Complicated

Bennie and I are back from visiting Moffitt in Florida, and were able to get there and back safely.  We got there around 10 am on Thursday, and went directly to Moffitt for Bennie's ct scans of his body.  Here is a picture of Moffitt Cancer Center:

Everything went well there, and we left to go find our hotel and also head out to a Valentine's dinner that Bennie had scheduled for us.  We went to the Salt Rock Grill, which is the same restaurant that we went to the last time we went to Tampa.  We had a lovely evening, but we were tired and anxious for the results of everything at the Dr.'s appointment the next morning. 

We met with Dr. Weber the next morning, and started to talk to him about the clinical trial that we wanted to get accepted into.  He said in order to get accepted into the trial you have to have clear scans from head to toe.  Unfortunately, Bennie's scans did not show that.  His Ct scans showed no tumors in any of the vital organs; which is good news!!! However, there were about 14 different bone lesions scattered around the spine and pelvic bones.  They were mostly sclerotic, which means they could potentially be old/healing bone metastasis.  But they could also be active tumors.  Ct scans aren't really good at showing a clear picture of the bones.  So, in order to determine what these lesions truly are Bennie has to get a MRI of those areas to look closer at what it is.  If they are old or healed up bone mets, or something benign, then Bennie still has a shot of getting into the trial.  However, if they are suspect for a bone metastasis then he will have to get on board ASAP with a different treatment.  So, Bennie is having a MRI done on Monday, and the report will get faxed to Dr. Weber to determine what Bennie's status is.  It's not the answer we were hoping to hear, BUT we still have hope that he can perhaps still get into the trial.  Also, Bennie's brain MRI that we brought from MD Anderson showed some sort of nodular something that has to get re-read by one of Moffitt's radiologists to determine if that is something benign in nature or if that is his tumor still there.  So all that to say is we still have many, many, many more hoops to jump through before he can move forward with all of this.  Next week will bring more answers that we are anxiously waiting for.  It stinks not knowing, not being able to plan, and just never knowing what this disease will bring.  We just have to have hope that something will work, and whatever treatment he goes on next will be the right one.  We have to keep hope that it will work really well, and provide him a very long normal type of life!!!!  It's all out of our hands at this point, and we will just pray from here that Bennie is being led to wherever he needs to be!  We definitely couldn't do this if it wasn't for all of our family helping so much with Emmi and Colby whenever, and wherever we need them!  WE are so so blessed to have such a strong support group!!  Emmi and Colby were very happy to have us back (although they had a great time getting spoiled by grandparents and Aunt Heather), and we were just as excited to see them!  No matter what type of anxiety, frustration, or sadness that Bennie and I get from all this Melanoma crap, those two little smiles just make everything better!