So Much More than Melanoma Survivor: December 14, 2014
It has been a whirlwind few week...: December 14, 2014 It has been a whirlwind few weeks starting with the Thanksgiving holiday. Thanksgiving is my all time favorite holida...
Sunday, December 14, 2014
December 14, 2014
It has been a whirlwind few weeks starting with the
Thanksgiving holiday. Thanksgiving is my all time favorite holiday…I love
everything about it. I love the cooking, baking and getting the house ready to
entertain my family and close friends. This year was especially wonderful. It seems that lately I have been comparing
all of this year’s joys and accomplishments to last year at this time. I truly
lost a whole year of my life. So, after just existing last year and not
participating in any family functions, this year I took back my life.
Thanksgiving was a complete success and I was so happy to
have hosted it again. Last year was one of the few years of not hosting Thanksgiving in the past 44 years. The
Thanksgiving weekend continued with hustle and bustle. My Norm and I attended a
wonderful concert by Mannheim Steamroller, one of my favorites. We went out for
dinner on Saturday night with 2 of my favorite people, my brother and his
lovely wife. Sunday was spent decorating the Christmas tree and the little
weeping cherry tree outside. I know that to most people who will read this will
not see anything outstanding about this very busy weekend. To me, it was a
sheer miracle. To once again be able to
accomplish this full weekend without having to take to my bed was nothing short
of miraculous. This is all achieved
while still keeping up with a very demanding full time career and taking care
of an eight room house.
Since Thanksgiving it has been non-stop hustle and bustle.
We have attended wonderful concerts by Celtic Thunder and Linda Eder. There
have been company Christmas parties and birthday parties. I have been so
grateful to be able to participate in all of these.
My focus of thought and reflection shifted on Wednesday of
this week. While on facebook, one of my melanoma support friends shared the
newest study on the efficacy of high dose Interferon therapy. This was the only
option offered to me when I was diagnosed 17 months ago. The wide range of
emotions after reading the findings was dramatic. First I must share that when
my Physicians discussed my options, Interferon was the only option after
extensive surgical excision and removal of lymph nodes. The findings of the
“mature” data of this very long study revealed that high dose Interferon therapy
did not improve survival from this dreaded beast and only delayed recurrence in
those that would have been genetically predisposed to recur by a mere 6-9
months. To say that I was devastated is an understatement that cannot be put
into words.
As most of you know, I have had 5 wide excisions and SLNB in
a time span of 10 months. I got through all of these without a problem and
without any disruption of my life as a whole. I continued to work full time and
to perform the duties needed to keep up a big house and a happy husband. That
is, until starting the Interferon. Let
me share with you what Interferon stole from me. It stole away my independence.
It stole my health. It stole my strength. It stole my hair. It stole my
balance. It stole my memory. It stole my thyroid and almost stole my liver. Now
to find out that I did it for nothing is almost more than I can bear. We all make decisions according to the
recommendations of our Physicians. These recommendations are based on the
latest technology available at the time and the staging of the disease. My
Physicians gave me their best recommendations at the time with the information
available.
Some of the precious human functions that Interferon stole
have been restored to some level. Some have returned fully and some will never
return. My hair has been restored to its full pre-interferon state. My liver
function has returned to pre-interferon status thank God. My memory loss will be permanent as will the
death of my thyroid and my balance. This was never so more apparent than during
my office Christmas party. Those who know me well know how much I love to
dance. Pre-interferon I would spend a wonderful night like our Christmas party
dancing the night away. My pre-Interferon schedule included 3-4 nights a week
taking Zumba classes. Interferon has robbed me of the ability to dance due to
its greedy taking of my balance. This problem is worsened when I am fatigued.
So, walking like a drunk when I don’t drink can be embarrassing and
dangerous. And some of you that read
this discourse might remark that it is a small price to pay for continued NED.
I would agree 100 percent if it weren’t for the new knowledge of allowing such
a toxic treatment for absolutely no gain.
So, yet again, there is new information to assimilate and to
own and to move on. I will never waste precious time by thinking of the “what
ifs”, but like any other losses, this will take time to process, to own and to
successfully mourn. The one and only “what if” I have engaged in was to realize
that if I had just allowed the surgeries and not the interferon, my life would
not have changed to any degree. This is the issue that I am grappling with. Did
I inadvertently cause my degree of health loss by misinformation. And my biggest regret is submitting my
precious husband and my family through an absolutely nightmare of a year.
The “new” me is different than the “old” me. But I will be
forever grateful for the chance to experience the wonders of life, the beauty
of the seasons, the love of family and friends albeit a little less than the
person I was.
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