I have multiple myeloma, a bone marrow cancer. I do not think I should feel proud of that. I am not sure pride and cancer belong in the same sentence. Cancer came without warning. At first, I felt tired. Then I felt worn down. Before long, my body began to lose ground. A long time…
Read moreTag: CAR-T Therapy
Accepting Long Cancer Treatment Without Losing Hope
Hearing that treatment may last for months, or even longer, can feel like someone picked up your whole life and shook it. Acceptance doesn’t mean you like any of this. It means you find a way to keep going, one appointment, one week, one hard morning at a time. Depending on your diagnosis, long treatment…
Read moreOvercoming the Obstacles of a Chronic Disease
The doctor’s words hung in the air. Then came the silence. When you first hear “chronic disease” tied to your name, something shifts inside you. Overcoming obstacles doesn’t mean my disease vanished. It doesn’t mean I beat it with grit and green smoothies. The obstacles are real, and they stay real. I didn’t choose them,…
Read moreHi. I sit in a hospital room at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine. My bone marrow cancer returned. It chose now for another round. My counts stay low. Yet they trend up in a way that worries me. What cancer defies a cure but yields to steady management? We fight to keep counts down. That buys time with family and friends. Do you see the quiet courage there?
Hi. I sit in a hospital room at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine. My bone marrow cancer returned. It chose now for another round. My counts stay low. Yet they trend up in a way that worries me. What cancer defies a cure but yields to steady management? We fight to keep counts down….
Read moreCancer Patient Reflects: Was Six Years of Treatment Worth It?
Was it worth it? My palliative care doctor sat across from me with my chart. It held every treatment I’d had over six years of chemotherapy. The whole list was printed for her to review, page after page. It included the stem cell transplant, and the six months I got before the cancer came back….
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