Jose, The Death Donut, and Dr. Scripture

With a needless digression about radioactivity

I went for my PET scan yesterday which was administered by a nice young man named Jose. He seemed smart and engaging. I tried very hard not to sing out in the middle of the scan, “Jose, can you see?”

This is my third PET scan but the first since I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. This one is focused more specifically on prostate cancer, and seeks to answer the million-dollar question: Has the cancer spread?

I won’t know the results for some days yet. My appointment to review the findings of the scans is not till January 8.

The main part of the procedure is being inserted into something I call the Death Donut. This is because the machine looks like a nice, friendly donut (in my experience, donuts are always friendly) but for the 20 minutes inside the donut you must lay flat and perfectly still, as if you were a corpse.

But before inserting me into the Death Donut Jose stabbed a needle in my arm and hooked up a very small IV. Then he inserted a radioactive element in my bloodstream. Yes, you read that right: He pushed a radioactive chemical into my body.

That led me to find an answer to a question that’s been stashed away in the corner of my mind for a long time: what does the word “radioactive” mean? What does it have to do with radios? And why are active radios bad, but lazy radios are apparently ok?

These are the musings of a very deep mind.

Turns out the confusion can be blamed on the French (like most things). The French word for it is radio-actif, which was invented by Pierre and Marie Curie, who combined radiationem, Latin for "a shining" with actif, French for "active."

Wait…why are they combining a Latin and a French word? Pretty sure either of those languages have terms for both the concepts of “shining” and “active” (though I’m too lazy to look it up). Why mix languages? And why not use good old English like Jesus did?

Frenchies are weird.

Anyway the “radioactive” means “active shining”; not busy radios. Good to know.

What is doing the shining? Besides my personality, that is.

Well, the radioactive chemical Jose shoots into me emits small particles called positrons, which interact with surrounding electrons (and this happens more often in cancerous areas). This interaction annihilates both the positron and the electron but also creates two photons which go careening off. The photons produce a type of light that can be seen by the Death Donut. Thus, when the Death Donut sees more photons than normal hanging out after a certain chemical is introduced to a part of the body, it reveals cancer.

In the end the Doctor gets a visualization of your body in which cancerous cells are lit up like Christmas lights on a tree. Pretty cool.

As I’ve said, this is my third PET scan in the past 18 months. During that time I’ve also had a CT scan and an MRI. Four times I have had to lay on a table while some woman examined my lymph nodes by ultrasound. And every few months a dermatologist named Dr. Scripture (not kidding) checks my skin from head to toe for melanoma.

I’ve been scanned more times than Kim Kardishian’s Mastercard.

And you know what? I’m a little tired of it all. It’s no fun laying there while an MRI machine whirls around you at 10,000 decibels. It’s not pleasant having an ultrasound wand poking your poor, innocent lymph nodes. A trip to the Death Donut is not as fun as a trip to Dunkin Donuts.

But it is needed. And it is worth it.

I mean, hey, there is something wrong within me, something that will try to kill me if we don’t spot it and remove it.

As I reflect on this, I am reminded of a passage from the book of Psalms, where David says to his Lord:

Search me, God, and know my heart;

test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139:23-24

Asking God to search you is not to be taken lightly. Often, He will simply bring to mind things you need to change. But sometimes the searching will involve some sort of discomfort, as He allows things to interrupt our settled and safe state of being. He shakes the snow-globe and allows us to glimpse what is present in our heart (though usually buried too far down to see).

And often we are searched as we search. We search God’s Word, and, like a mirror, it shows us things we need to change.

This takes intentionality; it’s easier to surf the internet than let the Dr. Scripture examine us.

No, the searching of God is not always fun. But it is always needed. My soul needs it far more than my body needs PET scans and ultrasounds, for I am an eternal being.

And so are you.