Life was very normal for me about 3 months ago. I was busy with work, my wife was taking care of the house, and my children were busy with school. It's amazing how quickly that can change.
I came home from a business trip to New York City with a pretty nasty chest cold and ended up at the emergency room a week later due to a late night coughing spasm. I was expecting to be sent home after a breathing treatment but that is not what happened. An abnormal blood test led to a CT scan and before I knew it I was admitted to the hospital. I saw a doctor the next morning and that is when I found out there was an "abnormal" mass in my chest and that a biopsy had been scheduled for the following day.
That was the point when I first had to deal with the possibility that I have cancer. It was quite a shock as you can imagine. I came to the hospital with a chest cold and was leaving 3 days later with cancer.
The next few weeks were a blur of doctors appointments and a surgery. The biopsy from my hospital stay came back as suspicious for Hodgkin's Lymphoma but lacked sufficient tissue for a conclusive diagnosis. Two weeks later I had a surgical biopsy removed in an outpatient procedure. That biopsy confirmed the original suspect.
Now that we had a diagnosis it was on to other testing to determine the stage. I had a PET scan and bone marrow biopsy done. These tests showed that the cancer has spread to other lymph nodes and to the bones of my spinal column. My oncologist determined from these results that I have stage IV Hodgkin's.
My doctor assured my wife and I that stage IV is just as treatable as earlier stages and the discussion moved on to treatment plans. She said we are looking at 16 chemotherapy treatments over about 8 months. We scheduled another surgery to implant a port to make chemo a bit easier and it was on to treatment from there.
I started chemotherapy at the beginning of November but more on that next week. Until then feel free to post any questions or comments and I'll be sure to respond within a day or two.
