Unexpected News

     Around this time last year, I was home for Christmas and was having a good time with family and friends. I had an upcoming Cleveland Clinic doctors appointment but I was not nervous for it at all. I had finished radiation a month before and was told the cancer was all gone.
     My dad and I made the drive up to Cleveland for my early morning appointment. I was excited to see Dr. Shin and get the news that I was clear of cancer and did not need to come back for six months. Little did I know that I would be getting bad news.
     We arrived a few minutes late and Dr. Shin called me to make sure I was still coming. Once we got into the office, I was taken back immediately to be evaluated. Dr. Shin instructed me to lay back on the ultrasound table so she could examine my neck. Not nervous at all, I hopped up on the table. Dr. Shin began performing the ultrasound and was taking longer than normal. She had the ultrasound on the left side of my neck for a long time. I didn't think much of it, I thought she was just being thorough. She began to tell me that their was a suspicious area but she would be very suprised if it was cancer because all of my blood work looked normal. At this point I started to get worried but not to bad. My blood work was fine so I was hoping it was nothing.
     Dr. Shin decided to preform a biopsy just to be safe. I HATE BIOPSIES! A giant needle to my neck is not the way I wanted to start off my Christmas break! The biopsy was complete and Dr. Shin told me I would hear from her tomorrow about the results.
     My dad and I left the Cleveland Clinic in shock. I thought I was clear of cancer, this was not the news I expected to hear. A million things were going through my head on the drive home. I was upset, I had a feeling it was going to be bad news once I got the phone call. I was just so frustrated, did the radiation not work? Did I go through the low-iodine diet and no synthroid for nothing? I just wanted answers but had to wait a full 24 hours.
    24 hours finally passed and  I got a call from Dr. Shin saying the cancer was back and I would need a modified radical neck dissection. The modified radical neck dissection would consist of removing lymph nodes from the left side of neck and a drain would be placed in my neck during surgery and would remain in my neck for a few days after surgery. I could not have surgery until after the new year due too the holidays ahead. I did not want to wait to long but I also did not want to get it done right away because I needed to be able to go back to work. Cancer was really getting in the way of my career.
    Dr. Shin, my parents, and I decide that I would have surgery the last week in January. I would be able to go back to work for a few weeks and then come back to Ohio once again to go under the knife, hopefully for my last surgery.

   

Radiation

On October 24, 2013 I made the trip up to Emory Clinic Nuclear Medicine department for my counseling visit with the doctors. I did not know what to expect when I entered the doors of nuclear medicine. I had heard stories and watched YouTube videos of thyca patients going through radiation but I still was anxious to get it over with.

I went to Emory Clinic alone because I thought I would be taking the pill the next day and would not be able to be around anyone. I met with the doctors and discussed my options or rather, lack of options. The options we’re

                           - Take large does of RAI

                                             or

                           - Do nothing

Being 24 years old, I wasn’t just going to wait around and do nothing so I went with option 1.

During the counseling with the doctors I found out that I would be taking a tracer dose the following day and not the full dose. From reading the papers the doctors send me in the mail, I thought I was getting the full dose on the 25^th. The doctors told me I would be getting 150+ mci of radiation on the following Monday after the whole body scan pending the scan went without any surprises. The doctors gave me a nausea medicine prescription and I was told to go to the lab to get blood work done.

After getting my blood work done, I left the hospital and checked into a hotel so that I would not have to make the 2-hour trip again the next morning. I was ready for this stage of my treatment to be over. I wanted off the low-iodine diet. I craved pizza more then anything!

I arrived bright and early the next morning armed with my nausea medicine and a giant bottle of water. I was only taking the tracer dose but I was not taking any chances on getting nauseas.

I took the tracer dose and headed back home to Columbus. I was happy because I was able to have my dog, Cheerio, with me until Monday when I took the large dose. I did not have to be in isolation for another few days! Although, I felt like crap and didn’t do anything for those few days, I was able to have visitors without exposing them to radiation.

On Monday morning bright and early, my friend, Chad Witzel, drove me to Emory to take the large dose RAI. We arrived at Emory and I was called back to the “dose administration room” to take my pill. The pill came in a lead container and I was instructed to not touch the pill and drink the whole glass of water. I was told to ask any questions now because once I took the pill I would need to leave the building immediately and that my car would be waiting

for me.

So, I took the pill and left the building. I was instructed to sit at the farthest seat away from Chad as possible; I sat in the back seat of the car on the passenger side. I was not feeling any symptoms from taking the pill but I was just extremely tired, due to being hypo.

I made it home and took a nap for about 2 hours. I woke up feeling tightness and pain in my neck and jaw. The nausea also started to kick in. My mouth was so dry that I could barely swallow. I fell asleep with my heated blanket and a water bottle in my bed.

As the days went by, I started to feel better. I still was extremely tired but I was going to be able to start taking my synthroid in a few days so I was optimistic. I was also able to eat a normal diet in a few days! I FINALLY COULD HAVE THE PIZZA I SO DESPERATLEY CRAVED!!!

When the day came that I could eat normally food, my friend, Jon Born and his girlfriend Lauren, went to the grocery store for me with a long list of foods that I had been craving. When I got the food, nothing seemed appetizing. My craving for pizza was gone.

On my last day of isolation, I was so sick of being stuck in my apartment; I went to the laundry room and washed all my clothes and sheets. In the laundry room I met two wonderful men, TJ and Tim.

We started talking and realized that TJ and I were neighbors. I literally lived just one apartment above him. Living in Whisperwood, the dryers often times do not dry our clothes in an hour. TJ and Tim had a few clothing items that still were not dry so I offered to put them in my dryer and take them to them when they were done.

I brought their laundry to them and they invited me in for dinner and to hang out. I was excited to finally be able to hang out with people. Being in isolation was so lonely it was nice to be able to hang out with anyone.

I was having a hard time eating sense radiation so having someone to eat with made it easier. We ended up hanging out for the rest of the weekend and even found out that TJ and I go to the same church here in Columbus! It was like God had send TJ and Tim into my life as a reward for making it through my cancer treatments.

We went to church on Sunday and hung out the rest of the day before I

drove up to Atlanta to pick my mom up from the airport. TJ made what now is, one of my favorite meals, round steak, tomato, and onion and sopa, for dinner.

After picking my mom up from the airport we checked into our hotel. The next morning we drove over to Emory Nuclear Medicine to get my whole body scan. I laid there on the table and was able to watch and see where the uptake of the RAI was. It was nerve wracking because I saw uptake in the neck and the hips areas. The neck area was normal but the hip area was not. I was starting to get nervous. After the scan the doctors told me I needed to take a laxative to clear myself out and try and get rid of the RAI left in my body. The uptake in the hip area was in bowels. I was relieved that it was not a sign of my cancer spreading.

I was happy that the radiation was complete and that I could go home and relax and have a fun time with my mom.

Move to Georgia....1st Emory Visit

The day of my post op visit I moved down to Georgia to start my new job. My dad and I packed up the car and we’re on our way for our 13+hour journey. My wiener dog, Cheerio, was along for the ride as well.

We were going to try and push thru the long ride but realized we would not be able to do anything or move anything in if we did not get some rest along the way. Just outside of Atlanta we stopped and got a few hours rest in a motel.

We arrived in Columbus, Georgia around 9am, perfect timing to move into my new place. Thankfully, I had helpful neighbors because I was not allowed to lift anything heavy for another few days. We got all settled in and I was able to rest for a while.

I started to feel a lot better, just tired. I think the new excitement of moving to a new place and starting a new job, helped me mentally conquer some of the affects I was having.

As the days went by, my mom got on me about finding a doctor down here. It was frustrating trying to find a doctor because I needed someone that specialized in thyroid cancer. I found plenty of endocrinologist but not many that specialized in thyroid cancer. When I did find a physician, she was located at Emory Clinic, which is 2 hours from Columbus.

I called Emory and could not get an appointment for over a month! I don’t understand why it takes so long to get appointments in the south.

As the month went on, I grew more and more frustrated. I was constantly tired and would revolve my life around sleeping. My typical day would be:

8am – Wake Up

8:30-9:30 – Crossfit

10:00 – 1:00 – Sleep

1:00 – 2:30 – Lunch and getting ready for work

3:00 – 7:00 – Work

7:30 – 8:00 – Dinner

8:00 – 9:00 – Sleep

9:00-10:00 – Homework

10:00 – Bedtime

My life was miserable and I didn’t have family or close friends around to help me. I did have one friend that helped me out tremendously, Liv Duncan. I met Liv last year; she was an athlete at Newberry College. Liv lives down here with her husband who is stationed at Fort Benning. Liv would do anything for me and helped me get through some of the rough times I’ve had here in Columbus.

The month finally past and it was time to make the trip up to Emory. Liv came with me as my support system. We tried to make it a day of fun. We planned to have lunch with one of my college friends, go shopping, and make a trip to the indoor trampoline park, Sky Zone.

After having lunch with Sabrina, we headed to Emory. The doctor was friendly but I didn’t feel as great of a connection with her as I did with Dr. Shin. She told me that I would need to have a radioactive iodine treatment (RAI) and that I would have to go on a low iodine diet and stop my snythyroid before I would be able to take the pill. She told me I would get a call from nuclear medicine. She didn’t give me a time frame just that they would call me.

That’s about all the information she gave me. I left will very few answers and I felt frustrated and upset. Stopping my synthroid would make me even more tired then I was already experiencing. I couldn’t imagine sleeping anymore then I already was.

I waited and waited for a phone call from nuclear medicine. I must have called at least twice a week. Finally, after about two and half weeks they called me with an appointment time. They told me they would be sending me more information about the specifics of what I needed to do regarding the low iodine diet and stopping my synthroid.

I got the information in the mail and read over it. The low iodine sounded so horrible! I wasn’t allowed to have anything with salt, no dairy, no eggs, no seafood, no bread, and no chocolate and that was just to name a few. I was lost. What was I going to eat? I went on to the thyca website and found a cookbook that had a ton of recipes.

I decide I would get all the ingredients that I would need and make all my meals on Sunday’s.  The first week of the low iodine started and I made my meals on that Sunday for the week. Some of the meals were not bad but most of them were bland.

For the first week, I did great with sticking to the diet. When the next Sunday came around, I had absolutely no energy to do anything. I was sleeping more and more each day. I still had 2 more weeks of this stupid diet!

I stopped eating. I had no energy to prepare anything and any foods that I could prepare fast and easy, I couldn’t eat because almost everything contained iodine. It was so frustrating! I broke down and cried several times during the last 2 weeks.

I became very cold being off my snythyroid and being hypo. It was awful. I slept with several blankets and a winter hat because I was so cold. I felt so alone at this time. 

On the last week before radiation, I went to the store on Sunday and could not remember why I was there. When I finally got home, I couldn’t even take Cheerio outside or bring my groceries in. I had to call my friend to help me out. It was rough.

I was having a hard time trusting God. I was so miserable!

Thyroidectomy

It was the day of surgery and the nerves started coming. I was ready to get this horrible disease out of my body. I feared the surgeon would not be able to get it all. I feared it had spread. I feared the ugly battle scar the surgery would leave behind.

I arrived at the Cleveland Clinic bright and early. I was taken back to pre-op to get prepped for surgery. I changed into a hospital gown and slipper socks. Then, I got the best thing of being in the hospital, the warm blanket! I sat there in the hospital bed anxious and nervous about my surgery. The doctors finally gave me some medications to calm my nerves and I started to feel a little more at ease.

My family and friend Suehad were able to come back and see me before the surgery. I guess the medication made me act a little loopy. I had a stuffed animal flamingo and began to talk to it and pet it. Drugs are a powerful thing; it’s crazy how much they can affect your mind.

So, after some time with my family, I was wheeled off to surgery. I was put on the operating table and hooked up to several different machines. I was then told to count backwards from 10.

The next thing I remember is waking up in recovery. I woke up feeling extremely anxious and in pain. The pain wasn’t too severe but, the anxiety was what bothered me the most. Anxiety is probably one of the hardest things to deal with. It feels like you’re having a heart attack and your going to throw up. I just wanted to go back to sleep and wake up when I was at home in my bed.

The nurse came by and asked how I was feeling and gave me medication for pain. My mom and dad were able to come in and see me once I was fully awake. I kept asking for my sister, I just wanted to see my sister but she was not allowed to come back until I was in my room. I asked the nurse if she knew if I was going to have to get radiation. She told me she did not know and that I would have to ask the doctor. Being in the drugged state, I got mad at the nurse and told her she was no help. My family tells me that I offended the nurse but I honestly don’t even remember talking to her.

I was taken to my room for the night, which, was basically set up like an emergency room. I did not have my own room or even a room shared with just one other person; just curtains separated the beds. It was really frustrating at night because they could not turn off lights. They gave me an eye mask and headphones but I just wanted to get out of there. I had to keep using the restroom every 5 minutes and I would kick my slipper socks off every time so the nurse had to keep coming to get me to take me to the restroom and put my socks on. I left bad but I can’t sleep with my socks on.

I was supposed to have a bunch of my gymnastics friends come visit me but the weather was crazy that day so none of them made it. My family and Suehad were there for a while but then they had to go. I had a hard time sleeping with the lights being on and my anxiety of being in a different place was a killer.  I was ready to get out of there. I was happy to wake up in the morning and see my daddy there. (I am such a daddy’s girl) J

I finally got discharged and was told that I would need to take a calcium supplement and tums for a while because; when you have a thyroidectomy your parathyroid glands get messed with. This causes them to shut down and makes your calcium levels low.

For the following days after surgery I did not feel much pain. My neck was sore but, the pain was minimal and I was able to get off my pain medications right away. The numbness, tingling, and fatigue were the worst part. As the days went by it continued to get worse.  I called Dr. Shin several times and she told me to keep taking the supplements and tums and she promised it would subside.  Now, I hate tums. I hate them so much I want to gag from the smell of them. The numbness, tingling, and fatigue became so great that I was taking these like they were candy.  It was miserable! I was moving to Georgia in a few days and I did not want to deal with this.

Thoughts of moving to Georgia kept my mind occupied and the hope that I wouldn’t have to get radiation helped as well. I felt useless. I couldn’t pack. I couldn’t lift anything over 5 pounds. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t workout. I just wanted my life to be back to normal and I not have to sleep 15+ hours a day in order to function.

I needed prayer and I needed guidance. I was being stubborn and not trusting in God. 

Post Diagnosis

Following my diagnosis with the big “C” word, I was lost. What was going to happen next? Chemo? Radiation? Surgery? Homebound? And I hate to say it but, death? All of these thoughts were running through my head as I stepped out of the doctor’s office and into my car.

When I got into my car, I didn’t know what to do. I sat there for a few minutes and then text messaged some friends and family the simple words, “It’s cancer.”

Soon the text started coming in. My mom was the first one to call and said she would be there right away. I sat there in my car, in front of the doctor’s office, just in awe of the news.

My mom got to the office and we hugged, cried, and talked about the next steps. I called Cleveland Clinic and was told I wasn’t able to get in till the following Tuesday. I began to cry on the phone, explaining to the lady that I was planning on moving to Georgia for a job and that I was upset because I thought that I would have to turn down the job and stay at home. She explained to me that I would be able to have surgery the following Wednesday after my original appointment and I could do further treatment (if needed) in Georgia.

I was overjoyed with excitement that this would not ruin my plans to move to Georgia and pursue my master’s degree. I would have been heart broken if I would not have been able to move.

So, after going on a family vacation, which we had to rearrange because my time crunch, I went to Cleveland Clinic for my pre-op visit and to meet my surgeon.

The day started off with the hour and a half drive up to Cleveland. Once we got there it was a maze to find each of the “desks”, as they call them, for my appointments. My first appointment was a blood draw. Nothing big, no big deal there. I guess I knew I was going to have to get used to it with the big “C” diagnosis. Then I had a chest x-ray to make sure I was okay to have surgery and that the cancer had not spread to my lungs. Following the x-ray, I had an admissions interview which was basically just paperwork making sure I had insurance. Finally, I got to meet with my surgeon.

Dr. Shin introduced herself to my family and I. She was very upbeat and friendly. I had a lot of questions for and she was very understanding. She reviewed my lab work that I had sent over from the previous doctor, and then performed another ultrasound. She noticed some enlarged lymph nodes and needed to perform a biopsy on them to see if they were cancer as well.

Unlike the biopsy performed at Salem hospital, Dr. Shin did not numb my neck before performing the biopsy. It takes a lot for me to cry from physical pain but this brought tears to my eyes.

Once that was over, we talked more with Dr. Shin about my surgery and what was going to happen afterwards. She explained that I would have my entire thyroid taken out and that I would need to take thyroid hormone pills for the rest of my life. I also may need radiation following my surgery but we wouldn’t know for sure until we got the pathology report.

So, we left Cleveland Clinic with some answers and of course some questions left unanswered until after surgery. I was optimistic about the outcome of the surgery. I was ready to kick cancers butt!

During this whole experience before surgery I questioned God continuously. Why me? Why now? It’s hard to say it, but I became angry with God. I stopped praying. I stopped going to church. I stopped reading my bible. I knew that’s not what God wanted, he wanted me to trust him fully with all my heart and not stray away from him during this hard time but I couldn’t put my anger aside and trust in his plan.