Help Trisha kick cancer's butt!
Donation protected
Last night I lay awake thinking about how to ask my family and friends for help. It's not an easy thing to admit that we're struggling and certainly not easy asking for help. For those of you who don't know my story, here is a brief look back.
Back in 2011 I was diagnosed with Stage 1b Endometrial/Uterine cancer. I had a full hysterectomy, including my ovaries because I had found out a few months before that I was positive for the BRCA 1 gene that gives me a higher chance of getting breast and ovarian cancer. So, I gave up on having kids naturally, so that I could live. Not an easy decision for sure. When the doctor in Seattle did the hysterectomy, he discovered that the cancer had started to invade the veins leading away from the pelvis, so I did 6 weeks of radiation to be as aggressive as possible.
Fast forward to April of 2013 and the routine CT scan finds nodules in my lungs, but they are too small to biopsy so we take a wait and watch approach. I decide to go ahead with my gastric bypass surgery with the go ahead from my doctors. Fast forward again to January 2014. I've lost a total of 130 lbs since the gastric bypass in June of 2013 and I'm feeling excellent! I finally get back on health insurance in order to get a follow up CT scan to make sure the lung nodules look okay. They don't. They have grown and I am super scared. Doctor orders a PET scan to determine if they light up or not. They do. I have two larger 11mm and 9mm nodules (roughly 1 cm each) and one smaller 5mm nodule in the right lung. The two larger nodules are situated at the top of my lung and the smaller one is at the bottom of my lung. The doctor recommends a biopsy to see if its the uterine cancer come back. It is positive for the uterine cancer, so the doctor decides to put me on Tamoxifen to stop my estrogen from feeding the cancer. I decide that I need to be more aggressive and ask to be started on Chemotherapy right away. I'm young and I can handle it.
Fast forward again to today and I've had my first round of Chemo. It knocked me on my butt for about a week and a half, with severe bone and joint pain, severe fatigue and its only going to get worse. I have infusions every 28 days and I've decided since its only going to get worse that I'm going to stay in school and finish instead of postpone. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I'm also in school to be a Dental Assistant. I graduate in June, but not before I have to do a 5 week externship at a dental office. So, there is the problem. The externship is a full time job without pay. With taking time off from work to get through chemo we've used up our small nestegg and then in 5 weeks I will be on externship without pay, so needless to say we need help paying rent and our car payment and probably will need help for the next 5 months or so since I'll be needing to take time off of work continuously. Chad has been working at McDonalds while going to school, so we'll have his income which will help. I've estimated my lost wages to be about 5,000 in the next 5 months, since I should be able to work part time while going through chemo.
I know some of you feel helpless while I'm fighting to beat this for the second time. Just know that your encouragement and support has kept me going and will keep me going in the months ahead. I couldn't do it without God and you amazing people that He put in my life. I love and treasure you all!
If you could please share this with your friends. Anything helps. Thanks for reading. To read more, visit my blog at http://previvortml.blogspot.com/
Back in 2011 I was diagnosed with Stage 1b Endometrial/Uterine cancer. I had a full hysterectomy, including my ovaries because I had found out a few months before that I was positive for the BRCA 1 gene that gives me a higher chance of getting breast and ovarian cancer. So, I gave up on having kids naturally, so that I could live. Not an easy decision for sure. When the doctor in Seattle did the hysterectomy, he discovered that the cancer had started to invade the veins leading away from the pelvis, so I did 6 weeks of radiation to be as aggressive as possible.
Fast forward to April of 2013 and the routine CT scan finds nodules in my lungs, but they are too small to biopsy so we take a wait and watch approach. I decide to go ahead with my gastric bypass surgery with the go ahead from my doctors. Fast forward again to January 2014. I've lost a total of 130 lbs since the gastric bypass in June of 2013 and I'm feeling excellent! I finally get back on health insurance in order to get a follow up CT scan to make sure the lung nodules look okay. They don't. They have grown and I am super scared. Doctor orders a PET scan to determine if they light up or not. They do. I have two larger 11mm and 9mm nodules (roughly 1 cm each) and one smaller 5mm nodule in the right lung. The two larger nodules are situated at the top of my lung and the smaller one is at the bottom of my lung. The doctor recommends a biopsy to see if its the uterine cancer come back. It is positive for the uterine cancer, so the doctor decides to put me on Tamoxifen to stop my estrogen from feeding the cancer. I decide that I need to be more aggressive and ask to be started on Chemotherapy right away. I'm young and I can handle it.
Fast forward again to today and I've had my first round of Chemo. It knocked me on my butt for about a week and a half, with severe bone and joint pain, severe fatigue and its only going to get worse. I have infusions every 28 days and I've decided since its only going to get worse that I'm going to stay in school and finish instead of postpone. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I'm also in school to be a Dental Assistant. I graduate in June, but not before I have to do a 5 week externship at a dental office. So, there is the problem. The externship is a full time job without pay. With taking time off from work to get through chemo we've used up our small nestegg and then in 5 weeks I will be on externship without pay, so needless to say we need help paying rent and our car payment and probably will need help for the next 5 months or so since I'll be needing to take time off of work continuously. Chad has been working at McDonalds while going to school, so we'll have his income which will help. I've estimated my lost wages to be about 5,000 in the next 5 months, since I should be able to work part time while going through chemo.
I know some of you feel helpless while I'm fighting to beat this for the second time. Just know that your encouragement and support has kept me going and will keep me going in the months ahead. I couldn't do it without God and you amazing people that He put in my life. I love and treasure you all!
If you could please share this with your friends. Anything helps. Thanks for reading. To read more, visit my blog at http://previvortml.blogspot.com/
Organizer
Trisha Powers
Organizer
Richland, WA