Wasnt sure if I wanted to talk about this or mention it. But its on my mind too much not to. Earlier, I got a phone call asking me to participate in a cancer research experiment. As many of you may remember, it was discovered back in 2009 that I had cancer (non-hodgkins lymphoma...and it was already in a later stage), and had to go through 8 months of chemotherapy in order to have at least a 50/50% chance to live. It was awful. I had to wear a picc line (a needle / catheter in my arm 24 / 7 the entire time). I had severe side effects, including kidney trouble, and the medicine they gave me to minimize the chemo medication gave me even more terrible side effects. I pretty much lived in the hospital for 8 months. I would get released for may a day then had to go right back in for the rest of the month. It went on that way till the end. The tumor was in my abdomen, and the pain was so intense that they had to give me doses of the pain killer, DiLaudid every few hours, from beginning of chemo to the final treatment. Im shocked that I didnt get addicted. But once the chemo was over, luckily, I felt no need for it whatsoever. I was VERY lucky that the chemo worked and got rid of the cancer completely. Theres been no trace in my body since. Getting back to the present...part of this research, if I were to choose to do it, would involve being given small doses of chemo medication again. They offered to pay me, but didnt say how much yet. The idea behind it, supposedly, to remove any risk of getting getting any cancer again in the future. But, again, it isnt proven to work. Its just an experiment, and it requires people who are still in their remission phase. I dont want to do it. I dont want to go through ANY of that to ANY degree whatsoever again. But even discussing this with them is bringing back those awful memories. Thinking this might help get the subject off my mind more, by facing it to an extent again, Ill post these photos taken during that experience, on and off during those 8 months. Im going to tell those researchers, No. Im not going to do it. Ive come such a long way since that experience. You wont see me without my hair in these photos. The first few I still have it because those particular photos were taken right the beginning before all my hair fell out. (My eyebrows started to go pretty quickly, though) After that, I wore wigs, because I refused to be photographed without hair. I covered up what little of my eyebrows were left with makeup to look as much like my own eyebrows did as possible. I did my best to NOT look sick, and to look more like my usual self. (One of them looked practically JUST like my real hair when I let if grow out more) Thats part of what kept me going - that even though it wasnt my real hair, at least I could still look somewhat like myself...especially when friends visited and during the times a film crew would come and film me for a documentary. I refused to let myself LOOK sick. However, when I got down to about 90 pounds and looked like a bobble-head, that part was unavoidable. Theres one photo here that REALLY shows that - on one of rare 1-days-a-month when I was actually out of the hospital till the next day.
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 05:33:22 +0000
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