Not the Best of News
Wednesday 23rd July 2008
Another hot, beautiful, day dawned. Pita has gone to stay with Auntie Yvonne and Moley has gone to Feline Friends Cat Hotel. It always seems strange when we are without the animals, but at least it gives us chance to organise ourselves. Depending on the outcome of today’s appointment we could still be going back to the UK on Thursday, albeit for only a couple of weeks. Not being sure of where to go, we arrived at the hospital 20 minutes ahead of time. The main desk seemed the best place to start, so we joined the waiting queue for our turn. Patiently, we explained to the girl that we wanted to see Dr Gomez at 5pm; equally patiently she replied “mañana”. Frustrated we said “No, hoy” only to be met with “No, no hoy, mañana. Several versions of this conversation and a good ten minutes later we are no closer to seeing Dr Gomez. Then Derek has a brainwave and remembers the name of Carmen Maria. The very mention of her name seems to disturb her tranquility and gets her reaching for the telephone. She hands the telephone over to me and after a few words of confirmation with Carmen Maria, I hand the ‘phone back to the girl. I don’t know what she said to her, but her attitude changed immensely as she spoke on the ‘phone. Conversation over, the insurance card is requested once more and still no one seems to notice it is two years out of date. Armed with a handful of sticky labels we are pointed in the direction of Dr Gomez consulting room. Derek and I are called in to see the doctor. He quietly explains, that from all the information he has in front of him, Derek appears to have a 4 to 5 cm mass on his left kidney, which from the scans he is pretty sure is cancer. The next step is for a biopsy of the tumour to be taken. Doctor Gomez wants to do this as soon as possible, so returning to England is not an option.