That was the end of last year.
They found that there was a difference in my lungs and there were a couple of spots
that there was more density.
And so, that was a shock.
First of all, it was a totally different cancer than I was prepared to deal with.
Then in my experience I hadn’t heard really good results in treatment of lung cancer.
The survivorship from what I had heard wasn’t great.
So first there was the shock of dealing with a second cancer.
And then just the shock when we’re told, it’s such a blow to be told that you have
to deal with a life-threatening disease.
Because of my previous experience and the fact that I was a cancer survivor, that gave
me a lot of hope that this could be dealt with.
And once I got over that initial shock, that kind of numbness that comes with that, I was
able to get to a place of okay—we have to deal with this now.
And I have to put all my energy and presence in taking care of this issue.
It was in the very early stages, so treatment for me didn’t involve any chemo, didn’t
involve any radiation.
The surgery is considered a major surgery but when I think of the timeframe from diagnosis
to being able to get back into my life, it was a matter of six weeks from having my upper
right lobe removed in which the cancer was all encapsulated in that lobe, so it hadn’t
metastasized, hadn’t spread.
They were very, very small so I was able very kind of succinctly and simply have treatment
and be able to be back into my life in six weeks.
I don’t think I can say too much about the fact that I was so lucky that this cancer
was found early.
The care, every step of the way there wasn’t a person that I dealt with from going to have
x-rays done to having the actual surgery to post-op to care in the hospital, follow up
of phone calls when I came home.
It was really a partnership throughout with so many caring people that it’s so obvious
that there was a great heartfelt love for aiding in recovery and health.
Lung cancer is not a death sentence, not at all.
Try not to be afraid, and reach out to the people in your family and at Swedish because
there’s a tremendous amount of support for you, for anyone to go through that process
with as little fear as possible.
So, I encourage anybody who has to face such a diagnosis to embrace it, move forward, get
treatment, keep the hope, knowing that you very well are more than likely to be a survivor
and flourish in your life and get back to everything you love.