When did it start?
Looking back, I've been feeling sick off and on for about 2 years now. In February 2011 I finally decided that it was time to lose some of the weight I'd picked up over the years. I cut way back on sugars and figured I'd see what happened. I started to lose about 2 lbs a week, and decided I'd keep going until I got under 200 lbs. (I started at 224 lbs). I reached my goal by August and kept going. By February 2012, I'd dropped to about 185 lbs. and have been maintaining ever since.So don't diet- eating healthy can cause CANCER!
Anyway, around April 2011 I started having some weird stomach problems. I'd feel pretty normal throughout the day and then start feeling strong stomach cramps. They would last for a few hours and then go away. I had one episode in May 2011 that I went to the Emergency Room. Aside from the intense stomach pain, I started to lose feeling in my hands, then arms and legs. I found out at the hospital that I had been hyperventilating. They gave me some pain killers, sedative, anti-nausea drugs (which I promptly vomited) and did an MRI and some bloodwork. Looking back at the bloodwork now, the doctors have told me that some of my vitals were borderline normal. So some red flags were raised, but not enough that I knew to do anything. They could't tell me what was wrong, so I went home.
This is way too detailed. If you're bored, I'll try to use good headings to you can see where it gets interesting. If it does.
Later that year, around August, the stomach cramping episodes turned into violent vomiting episodes. I would throw up every 10 minutes for hours. This would occur every 2-3 weeks, then I'd feel normal again.
I went to see a gastroenterologist. He did an endoscopy on me in December 2011 and didn't find anything out of the ordinary. By January 2012 I stopped having the episodes (no vomiting, no stomach cramps), so I didn't follow up with any more doctor's appointments. I'd occasionally feel some light nausea, but otherwise felt normal. I'd lost a lot of weight, I was going on hikes with the Boy Scouts and generally feeling pretty good.
Looking back, Christina and I both wonder if all of that stress on my immune system either left me open to cancer or was a sign that cancer was coming.
In October 2012 I started waking up most mornings with sore hands and leg muscles. It felt like I'd clenched my hands all night. I thought maybe I was developing early arthritis and so I went to Costco and stocked up on Joint Juice, fish oil, and other vitamins. I started feeling nausea pretty frequently, so I thought maybe I had developed a gluten intolerance. I tried going gluten-free but it didn't seem to correlate to the nausea very well.
By December I was waking up every 2 hours to go to the bathroom, I was always thirsty, and I started to wonder if I had diabetes. I finally decided that my flailing around trying to find the right nutritional answers to my problems wasn't working so well, so I went back to my primary physician to see what they could tell me.
We ruled out diabetes. My bloodwork showed that my kidneys were really struggling, I was anemic, I had a low thyroid output and my liver was weakening. Still no diagnosis, but the bloodwork ruled out HIV/AIDS and hepatitis A and B. Whew!
Then things got worse. I was breaking out into sweats, feeling too nauseous to eat, not drinking enough water (though I tried) and spending all day in bed or on the couch answering Christina's questions in the shortest way possible and feeling miserable.
More tests on Monday February 4th, including a chest x-ray and a CT scan. I also mentioned to my physician about the lumps I'd been feeling on the back of my head.
Dr. Vaughn called our cell phone while we were driving home. He asked me if I was driving. I said no, Christina was. He told me he had bad news, that I had cancer and it was in all of my lymph nodes. Don't go home, turn around and go to the ER.
The end of the beginning.
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