5 years ago today I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. As soon as the doctor told my mom and I the news that day, we drove home and packed the first of many "hospital bags", and spent the next 11 days in the hospital getting my first doses of hard core chemotherapy. For ten months I was a bald, angry little cancer patient. Angry that everyone else's lives kept going while mine was forced to stop. I pushed everyone away. I didn't want anyone to remember me that way.
Chemo was bad- Daunorubicin, Vincristine, Prednisone, Asparaginase, Teniposide, Cytarabine, Methotrexate, and Leucovorin. I hated getting bone marrow biopsies and spinal taps. Steroids made me look like a different person. For a while, my legs were so weak, I had to use a wheelchair. I hated UAMS and it's loud mouthed nurses waking me up in the middle of the night. Hated how I could taste the medicine that was put into my port, hated flushing the lines and changing the dressing. Some chemo gave me sores in my mouth so bad I couldn't eat. Some made my legs hurt so bad I had to keep heating pads on them constantly. I would sweat so bad during the nights that I had to sleep on towels and change them out every few hours.
I never wore a wig. I was a bandana girl. At one point during a break in my treatment, my hair started to grow back, but as soon as I got my next dose, it died and started falling out again. I didn't want to go through the whole "loosing my hair" process again, so I bent over the bath tub and pulled every hair out by hand. That was a weird feeling.
It was the little things that got me through those 10 months. A lamp and fan for my hospital room. White cheese dip from Casa Manana and live music at Rudy's Oyster Bar. 2 hours of the West Wing every morning and the Gilmore Girls every afternoon. NPR, the Tour de France, and 3 at a time from Blockbuster all helped keep me sane. Oh yeah, and my Mom, the most amazing lady and the only other person who knows how hard it all was on me because it was just as hard or harder on her.
I didn't take any pictures while I was sick. I didn't want cancer to ruin that part of my life too. I wanted to save my hobby for when I got well, like a reward. I don't have many photos of myself at that time either. Here's a scary one my mom took. Too bad I didn't know Wes back then, I would like to have had a better photo of my bald head.
I read a book while I was sick about other people's survivor stories. A lot of them said they would not want to give their experience with cancer back if they could. I never understood that idea when I was going through it, but now I feel the exact same way. Life is so easy to live now that I know how hard it can be. It is easier for me to be happy than it was before. Now when I'm having a bad day, it is easy for me to think "at least I'm not stuck in a hospital room feeling like crap", and I usually realize I am not having a bad day at all.
5 years doesn't necessarily mean anything in particular for me and my cancer. As soon as they put the first chemo in me, I was in remission and have been ever since. Everything went according to plan and my doctor now tells me he thinks I am done with it for sure. I don't know if I will ever go a day without thinking about it. I like being reminded that I have done something that took so much strength and courage, something that other people have not done. It makes me special, makes me who I am, and gives me the freedom to do what I want to do with my life. A strange blessing in disguise.
