April Fool's Day

Dani drove with me to meet with Dr. Alan Bornstein We arrived at his Bell Road office (I think he has a total of 4)around 3:30. I have got to hand it to Dr. Bornstein and his assistant Taska they run a really tight ship, I have yet to wait for a scheduled appointment. We bustle in to the exam room and Dr. Bornstein pretty much just lays it out I have ductal carcinoma, the good news is it's the "most common" breast cancer, probably staged around IIb or III. I will need a few more tests for a specific diagnosis. Possible treatment options are a lumpectomy (at this point my lump had been removed), he would remove margins around the mass and lymph nodes to check if the cancer had spread. This option would be followed by radiation and chemotherapy. This option also depends on if there is enough good breast tissue remaining so that I would not be severely unbalanced (my breasts anyway:). Option #2 is a bi-lateral mastectomy with some kind of tissue saving procedure???? He would also take out a few lymph nodes, more if they are determined to be cancerous. The reconstruction process would begin at the time of the surgery. I would not need radiation with this option, I would however still need chemotherapy. The good news at this point was it was not an immediate death sentence which my overactive imagination had dreamed up. The bad news was that this is going to take a year out of my life, and of course we needed the information provided by a few more tests.
Dr. Bornstein ordered a PET scan and a breast MRI to be done the following day. This would help determine if there were any other "issues" that would effect the surgical options.
I left the office feeling scared, but informed I had options none of which were going to be particularly fun but it gave me a hope.
I was to return home to Prescott and have these tests completed at local facilities, no problem or so I thought.
I got up early on April 2nd to schedule my tests. I headed to Prescott Medical Imaging around 7:30 AM I was going to get these tests completed and make it to work by 9:00. PMI only does the breast MRI well that's 1 0f 2 so I give the scheduler my order and she say the dreaded words....."do you have prior authorization from your insurance carrier?" I tell her no but they did approve a stat ultrasound and a biopsy, so I was more then likely in the approval loop. I thought all this with my logical non-medical insurance company brain. I talked the woman into scheduling me for the MRI the following Tuesday at 2:30 saying my approval would be here by then, coincidentally they only do breast MRI testing on Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. I would have to wait a week or longer to get the test rescheduled if my approval did not come through.
They inform me I will need to go to the hospital to schedule my PET scan...I had this sinking feeling that things would not be going as easy as I thought....drink water and breathe.....