Here it is. The weekend that everyone anticipates every year. Memorial Day weekend, the kickoff to summer. It’s normally a weekend of so much joy and celebration to the start of a great summer for me as well, but this summer is very different. I’m not looking forward to this summer. I really wish that I could close my eyes and fast forward to the winter again, and I hate the winter months.
These past few days since my surgery have been filled with being in a lot of pain, needing 24 hour care with the kids and ultimately bad news most days. I attended a post operation appointment and was informed that 7 of 60 lymph nodes that were removed were cancerous.  The good news was the cancerous lymph nodes were all encapsulated and the bad news was I definitely needed radiation. I was referred to a radiation oncologist at John Hopkins who has the highest success rates on radiating the larynx and neck – his medical partners are in Australia! My doctor explained to me that some places are better than others and for my situation John Hopkins is where I need to be. I met with the oncologist for 2.5 hours and basically went through everything. I was extremely happy, impressed and satisfied with being referred to him. I have full faith he is going to do everything possible to give me the absolute least side effects with a great outcome. Of course it’s not going to be easy and there will be side effects, but ultimately I’m in the best hands. He reviewed statistics with me: considering laryngeal cancer is extremely rare in my age/gender/non-smoking history, it is 1-2% chance that this type of cancer would affect the lymph nodes on the same side, and less and 1% chance that it would spread to the other side…I’m that rare…unusual case. Therefore based on all of this, chemotherapy is in question. I meet with the medical oncologist next week to learn more about this treatment option in conjunction with radiation.
Fear, worry and stress are extremely high emotions right now but keeping those emotions somewhat grounded is having my three children that are full of energy and excitement for being outside and enjoying this beautiful weather. I may feel like crap and I may not be able to do much BUT listening to the boys run around like absolute maniacs, ride their bikes until their hair is a sweaty mess, swing on the swings high up to the sky and just laugh all day long is what keeps me going. Having moments of getting messy whether it’s dirt from the boys being outside or from Natalie spitting carrots all over me will be the moments I will treasure forever. Ultimately my health situation will pass, as I will beat this and it will be an absolute horrible memory that I can only hope will be covered with the amazing ones from my children growing up.