It's been 6 months since this all began. It seems like a long time, but it's nothing when you're living it. I guess I should start at the beginning, so that my ranting and raving later makes sense. I want to make it known first that I'm not seeking attention, or donations, or pity. I just know that the harder I wall up and keep things in, the harder it is to heal. I also know that cancers and chronic pain and the other medical issues I've experienced aren't common in someone my age, and I'm hoping that someone else may be able to find comfort or answers in my journey. So, here goes...
I can remember one day in late October walking down the halls of a mall shopping by myself. I felt a moment of odd heat in my lower abdomen and then a feeling like someone had stabbed me. It went away after a few moments, and I continued to shop, my need for a new purse outweighing my concern. A week later I was at work. All day I'd been having terrible nausea and a heavy ache in my pelvis. The pain got worse and worse as the night went on and I knew something was not right. By the time my shift had ended I'd been advised by healthlink alberta to head to the ER. I drove myself there, and was seen by the ER doctors. They ran tests, which all came back negative, but the doctors were convinced I had pelvic inflammatory disease. They sent me home with painkillers and a few days of antibiotics. I spent the week at home on the couch in pain. It never got better and by the end of the week I had returned to the ER. Doctors were a little more concerned, as I was showing symptoms of appendicitis, and they admitted me to the hospital and began to flood me with IV antibiotics. By this time, symptoms were severe. Nausea, vomiting, tachycardia, pain in my pelvis and lower back, a host of "bathroom" symptoms. I stayed in the hospital for a few days waiting for the antibiotics to kick in, but they never did. I was scheduled for immediate exploratory laparoscopy. When I woke up, parts of my reproductive system had been removed, as had my appendix. All too damaged to save. It's unknown why they were damaged. They thought it was an infection, but they assume now a cyst had grown and ruptured and caused severe damage.
The appendix was a different story. About a month after surgery, I was called and told over the phone that a rare kind of cancer had been found in it. Neuroendocrine carcinoid tumors appear mostly in your lungs and digestive system, are exceedingly rare, and have a poor prognosis. My tumor was found at 0.8 cm by complete accident. The cancer doctors believe they got all the cancer out in surgery, but this kind of cancer is notorious for having more than one origin site, and can appear in more than one place. I'm also very young for it, so I'm going to be undergoing tests to ensure I am cancer free.
On the non-cancer side, for the last six months, I've been fighting chronic pelvic pain, chronic symptoms, and hemorrhagic cysts. There have been CT scans, ultrasounds, ER trips, and more doctors than I care to count. Getting someone to take my pain and symptoms seriously after they believed they had done all they were supposed to has been a nightmare. I've been told that cysts are normal (some are), been put on opiates (even though I have a history of painkiller abuse), and turned away from ERs. The last little while, I've been really down about all of it so I thought that I'd let go of it all a little bit and try to get it off my chest.
I'll be writing a lot about the processes and treatments and tests and all of the technical things, trying to spread awareness of early onset cancer and diseases, but a lot of it is just for me to vent and gather my thoughts.
Thanks for reading, and for sharing this process with me.
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