trial run

My apparent absence from the Nikiverse has only partially been about work, as i previously claimed.
 Almost 3 weeks ago i found out that my mom's doctor had found abnormalities on X-rays of her lungs.
 That isn't much of a shock as she has 2 COPDs (emphysema and chronic bronchitis) and beat pneumonic MRSA last year, but this mass looked different and he ordered CT scans.
Those results were even less promising and he ordered a PET test.
  Cancer started to crop up in conversation and consultations.
And mom was trying to keep it to herself.
I only found out because i sorta bandied it out of her because i could tell that something was wrong. For a week i knew but my brother and sister didn't. My aunt (mom's sister) was going to fly to FL from OH to be with her for the test results, but she got sick and couldn't go. Then the test kept getting pushed back because the equipment was broken.
UUUUUGGGGHHHHHH!
 I couldn't stand the set backs and the uncertainty and being so far away so i rearranged what had to be at work and finished off my end of the fiscal year paperwork and flew to FL yesterday.
 I landed at 12:30 and the doctor's appointment was at 3:45.
Good news!
 The dark mass is most likely not cancer (no one can be sure without surgery), but instead it could be calcified scar tissue. The tests did show that there is some artery blockage that will need to be addressed in the not-too-distant future and a hernia that might need surgical correction, but no cancer.
Most Likely.
I am certainly ecstatic that i was eating Sonic tater tots by the pool today instead of taking a crash course in chemo, but i remain just a bit unsettled.
 My mom has been a bit sickly since i was a child.
 I've spent a lot of times in hospitals and doctors' offices.
You'd think i would be prepared for this.
 During the day i could be stoic (or as stoic as i ever get) and believe that there was no use in getting upset until i knew what the diagnosis was, but at night it was a different story. I had to take some time off of work because i couldn't sleep which wrecked my concentration. I was afraid in a way that i haven't been in a long time. Even last year with the MRSA i was more concerned about how she'd tolerate the treatment than mom's mortality. She has survived so much for so long that i had trouble wrapping my mind around the possibility of a disease that might finally take her out.
The enforced information brown-out didn't help my nerves much, either. I convinced her last weekend that she had to tell my siblings cause we needed their support. That made it a little more bearable, but also more real.
My boss said something that has been top of mind for the last 72 hours. He said that even if everything went well with the test results i should look at this experience as a trial run for the real deal.
 Typing that makes it sound fatalistic, but that wasn't his intent; he meant for me to find comfort even in the terror, by giving it a purpose.
So tonight i rejoice that it was a false alarm this time, but find myself again unable to sleep as my brain busily files away tidbits of information to be used at a (hopefully much) later date.