Wednesday, April 7, 2010

I shouldn't have done that

I broke my rule and looked at a message board for HL. Bad idea. I think I just had a mini panic attack. My heart started racing, I felt incredibly nauseous and thought I was going to pass out. I read about people's struggles and one person even announced that someone had just died from the disease. I came across one post about how will her marriage survive? I've thought that too, as my husband and I have been married for just 9 months. NINE MONTHS.
Then I came across some statistics about survival rates for the different stages of HL. I don't know what stage I'm in but I'm pretty sure I'm at least stage II, maybe stage III, but I pray not stage IV. According to these statistics, stages III and IV have worse survival statistics. My husband tells me that these things can be skewed, but still. To read 60 percent survival rate freaks me out. That's much worse than 95 percent.
In case you don't know, HL is broken up in 4 stages and two other types. Stage I the cancer is isolated into one area of lymph nodes; stage II it's in two or more lymph nodes above the diaphragm; stage III it's in lymphnodes below and above the diaphragm; Stage IV, it's gotten into your bone marrow and or spleen. You're also an A or B, depending on your syptoms. I'm pretty sure I'm an A. honestly, I'm praying i'm a 2A. I'd accept 3A, but 4A will crush me.
I don't know if it's stress, a result of the disease, or an allergic reaction, but I've had rashes over my neck and shoulder on the left side where the cancer is and now i just found a bunch of bumps on my right forearm. I'm kind of freaked out because I never get rashes. I called my doctor, who advised me to take a benedryl. She doesn't think it's related to the cancer.
OK I think I've calmed down enough now to get up. I really don't know how I'm going to do this.

1 comment:

  1. Bad cliche but hopefully it will make you laugh--figures lie and liars figure. So that's what I have to say about statistics :)

    Jeter

    ReplyDelete