The Diagnosis

One diagnosis would not be good enough. My mom went through so many Doctors and tests. Initial lung doctor told us it was lung cancer and she should start chemo right away. We did the widely useless needle biopsy that revealed nothing and put mom through pain. If you are going through this opt out and let them get a bigger chunk because it is never enough to make a diagnosis. Three sticks and a biopsy later we are at Moffit Cancer Center and she doesn't have cancer but some lung infection. Symptom free at this point and shrinking. My family and I were ecstatic. We cried with joy. Our prayers had been answered. She was going to be fine. This nightmare was over. Not! Some stupid Doctor gave her a steroid. She started having problems with it that were ignored and shrugged off. Nothing was done. No one thought it would be cancer again but it was. We all believe she would not have had it if it wasn't for the prednisone. If you are going through something similar or your loved one is... Do your research, listen to your body, and be the squeaky wheel. Never be embarrassed to ask questions or make the Doctors listen. Everyone is in such a rush and that Doctor rushed my mom into non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. We had been taking natural substances and eating better. The scans showed a decrease in the infection. But after the steroid was introduced and then took forever for her to be "weaned" off, it was too late. With her immune system shot, these things could grow and did. Since then it's been a whirlwind of treatments and diagnosis. To get to lymphoma we had to consider other much scarier cancers. Then only to get the call from my mom saying its stage 4 lymphoma. She was an hour away from us but we all went to her bedside. Doctors explained it more and we realized stage 4 In lymphoma is not like other cancers. Chemo could kill it. And so began the chemo journey.