Story time! When Peggy and Ham were in town, I showed them the lump and told them I was going to get it and the alcohol pains checked out. I mean, nothing stops me from drinking without me getting to the bottom of it! I distinctly remember saying in my KP never-serious way, "This is either a swollen joint that I don't need to worry about or it's lymphoma." And Peggy scoffs, "Psh lymphoma." You see, I had googled chest pains when drinking alcohol and found old forum posts about lymphoma. But I'm not one to actually self-diagnose on the internet and much less with cancer! That explains my flippancy.
Alright, so I'm now in the period of my pre-diagnosis where I don't know that much information but I'm freaking out about what I do know. My chest x-ray and CT scan reports are put online on my patient portal and I'm able to access them on Saturday 1/10.
These reports are written and signed off by the radiology doctors interpreting my scans. They include scary phrases like "abnormal findings with a large mass" and "strongly suspicious for malignancy". I find out there is a 10cm x 12cm mass in my left chest. I find out it it pushing into my chest wall causing pain.
I fire off some questions to family medicine doctor - is this mass in my lung? Is the asthma or asthma symptoms related to this? He responds with - yes, it is I'm your lung. Yes, the mass is pushing on your airway and causing the breathing problems.
Note to remember for later: the mass is not actually in my lung, but I don't know that now. It's actually in my chest cavity pushing down on my left lung.
With my limited knowledge of what's going on inside my body and Google, I begin to think that it's lung cancer. And since it's pushing into my chest, it's got to have spread, so it's late stage. I begin envisioning telling my siblings and my parents and leaving them and Damien behind. I keep thinking that my parents shouldn't have to bury their child. But I oscillate between despair and hope. We still don't know definitively what is inside me. There's no point in this premature worrying. I tell Peggy and Kevin about the mass and they echo this sentiment - don't worry until you know for sure what it is. Damien talks to his father who used to be a hematologist oncologist years and years ago. He looks at the reports and tells us that this is serious. The mass could be many different things but they're serious.
Damien and I process our emotions and thoughts and we stop googling. I calm down and become more rational. The biopsy will tell us more and until then, we're not doing ourselves any favors by trying to figure out what it is on our own. Dummies.
I tell my friend PJ about this and he makes me awkwardly photoshopped things to make me feel better. I'm a Doctor Who fan and this definitely helped :)
Hi Karen,
ReplyDeleteI am one of Peggy's friend and I just wanted to let you know I am praying for you. I would like to share a story with you that recently happened in my family. I know you will be 100% cancer free since you have so much joy in your tone of voice when your blogging.
-My cousin underwent debridement surgery on his left foot on July 29, 2014; the doctors diagnosed that the wound in his left foot was not healing and decided surgery was the best option. To investigate the underlying reason for the stagnant tissue growth, his tissue samples were sent off to pathology. A week later, at the age of 35, he was diagnosed with Epithelioid Sarcoma, a very rare case of cancer. He pretty much hit the lottery with this one. Only 4% of patients get this rare form of cancer. To put it into things into perspective, 1 out of 2.5 million deal with this cancer, meaning he would have had a better chance of getting struck by lightning twice before getting this cancer. The good news was he had a bone scan done and results came back negative; the cancer did not get the chance to spread into his bone. He also had a PET scan done and the cancer was found to be localized to his left foot; it did not spread anywhere else in his body. He once again underwent surgery as the doctor performed a radical resection on his left foot to remove the remaining tumor cells. Tissue samples were then sent off to pathology to confirm if the cancer cells were completely removed. Unfortunately, during the second surgery the doctor took a biopsy of the bone and results indicated the cancer cells were found on the surface of the bone. Alec once again went into surgery for the third time, as doctors indicated it would be best to amputate his left foot.
After all the surgeries and patiently waiting on test results, he was finally 100% cancer free a month later! However, Alec’s battle is not over; his medical oncologist still wants him to undergo chemotherapy to increase the chances of the cancer from returning. Therefore, this past Christmas he was told he would be undergoing 12 to 18 weeks, which is 4-6 cycles, of chemotherapy, starting on December 1st, 2014. Alec is a fighter who is full of hope; he is half way through with all the surgery and medical therapy and I know he will make it out on the winning side of this battle.
He is currently seeing a physical therapist to gain enough strength to resume walking and is excited to wear his new prosthetic. On November 18, 2014 he was fitted for his prosthetic and he is able to walk 100% normal again!
-He is a HUGE FAN of the Dallas Mavericks team, so I decided to write this story to the Dallas Maverick's marketing team. Although they never responded to be, he was able to get his prosthetic signed by the players when they made an appearance at an event they host.
-I just wanted to share this story with you because if my cousin was diagnosed with a really rare form of cancer and able to be 100% free. I KNOW YOU WILL TOO! =)
Christine Ho
Christine,
DeleteThank you for sharing that story! It is very inspiring to hear such a great success story!
Karen