Probably...

This is my first blog and I do not know where to start so I guess I will just go and see where we end up. This blog is about my fight with Hodgkins Lymphoma. When I was told I "probably" had Hodgkins Lymphoma it really helped me by reading all the blogs out there, its a comfort knowing you are not alone and that others are going through or went through the same thing as you.

As of right now I am not sure where my story really began. About a year ago from today, lets say the end of 2012, I was getting swollen lymph-nodes occasionally that would come and go and doctors told me "not to worry," "you're just sick it will go away." I believed them not thinking much about it other than the occasional joke to a friend "its probably cancer." Then in August 2013 I had one lymph-node swell and it was not going anywhere. I went to the doctor again, I was a self proclaimed Hypochondriac, the doctors finally took notice and decided to do some testing. A thyroid ultrasound showed a few slightly inflamed lymph-nodes in my neck. From there I went and saw an ENT. At this point I was moving from southern California to Seattle Washington in about two weeks, this puts our date at mid September. The ENT recommended two weeks of antibiotics but I advised him that I was moving and couldn't do that so he said "Well lets just do a needle biopsy right now then." He pulled out a GIANT needle and proceeded to stick my neck with it a few times and suck out whatever was inside. It was an odd feeling, as if I were an inflatable mattress and my air was being sucked out by a vacuum and then got shocked by electricity. Needless to say a few days later my Doctor called me and left a voicemail saying it was negative and if it got worse to see a doctor in Seattle. So I forgot about it and focused on uprooting myself from my life long home and starting a new adventure two states away from everything I had ever known.

When I finally settled down in Seattle Washington I started setting up my life again. I needed to find a doctor so I could set up Physical Therapy appointments for my knee. (3 months prior I had ACL reconstructive surgery) While at the doctor he did a physical and noticed the swollen lymph-node on my neck and got curious. At this point I had a really bad cold as well so he prescribed antibiotics for the cold and the lymph-node. As soon as I was done with the antibiotics the lymph-nodes on my neck got pissed off to say the least. They got bigger, harder, meaner and started taking over my whole neck, my collar bone had disappeared. I went back to see my doctor and he was definitely curious so he had me do a chest Xray right then and there. When I walked back to the room he was there with the Xray and said it looked like I had some more lymph-nodes in my chest. From there he ordered some blood tests and a CT scan. Before I left that appointment he gave me a word to google. That word was lymphadenopathy. Let me tell you as soon as I got out of the office I pulled out my phone and googled it. The results were nothing good. Anyways, I got my blood taken that day and the next day he called and said my blood tests were suspicious. A few days later I had my CT and the day after that my doctor called again and said I had a bunch of swollen lymph-nodes in my chest and even in my abdomen from what they could see. At that point he said to me "It doesn't look good." At this point I blacked out for a little while and didn't hear much of what he said till he said "It looks like Lymphoma," after that I blacked out for the rest of the day.

I have cancer? I HAVE CANCER! How, Why, What?? I had so many questions. His nurse came on the phone and told me she set me up an appointment to have a biopsy done to confirm. A few days later I had the biopsy done. (Which hurts for days after.) That leads us to today. Today, after 6 days of wondering and waiting it was confirmed that I have Hodgkins Lymphoma. I am hoping to get an appointment with my Oncologist sometime this week and get more details on my cancer and what is next. I am pretty familiar with the process as for almost 2 weeks I had known I "probably" had cancer and googled the heck out of everything.

I knew I wanted to do a blog since the moment I started researching and I figured today was just as good a day than any to start my journey with the C word.

Before I go I want to discuss my symptoms because this was really helpful to me when I was researching. First of course was the swollen lymph-node. I also itched REALLY bad for a while. So bad I would make myself bleed and leave scratch marks all over my body. I also had night sweats, to the point you feel like someone dropped a bucket of water on you while you were sleeping. And I was really tired all the time. All these things I just thought had obvious reasons, like I sweat because the heater was too high, I itch because my skin is dry and I'm tired because I work all the time. Until I started doing my research and realized those are all symptoms of Hodgkins Lymphoma.

In conclusion of my first post I just want to say that I never thought it would happen to me. I would never get cancer I am healthy, I work out and play sports and stay active, I don't smoke, I don't do anything that would give me cancer.... But here we are. I am ready to fight this thing and win. Cheers to the start of an epic battle with Hodgkins Lymphoma. FUCK CANCER.