Thursday 11 November 2010

So I'll start at the begining.....sort of

So there I was enjoying life living and working in Sydney, Australia when Cancer came into my life like a hurricane.  Shaking everything up and leaving devastation in it's path.

Life really was good, my boyfriend J and I had moved out to Sydney in 2006 with his job and we'd fallen head over heels in love with the lifestyle Australia was giving us.  I found the perfect job, we had great friends, we played tennis, went running and we got to spend hours and hours in the ocean snokelling, surfing and swimming.  Oh and the weather was glorious! 

We'd started planning our future, we both wanted to stay in Australia and start a family.  We were going back to the UK in June 2009 for 2 weeks as I was going to be a bridesmaid at my cousin's wedding, so we  decided we would start trying for a baby when we got back from our trip.  Very exciting and scary!

It was great being back in the UK and seeing our families and friends.  We had a hectic schedule as we were only home for 2 weeks and we wanted to see as many people as we possibly could.  The wedding was fantastic but 2 days after the wedding I started to get back pain.  I just put it down to sleeping in different beds, so I just popped painkillers and said I would go and see my physio when I got back to Sydney.  I did have one night where I was hot and sweaty but I just thought that was because of the pain, little did I know!  The pain was getting quite strong and the thought of a bad back on the 24 hour flight back to Sydney didn't seem like much fun so I went to see a chiropractor, he cracked me and I felt OK again.

The flight was fine and I wasn't in much pain.  We arrived back in Sydney on the Wednesday and we both went back to work on the Thursday.   I felt like crap but put it down to jet lag.  Then during Friday night I woke up shivering, J and I decided I should go to the GP in the morning.  Yes Saturday and I could go and see a GP, nice one Australia!

My GP prescribed anitbiotics just in case it was a Kidney infection and told me to come back Tuesday if it didn't improve.  It didn't improve.  I went back and she sent me to have a CT scan as I was told before I had a small kidney stone.  So the next day I arranged to have a CT scan in my lunch break.

The next day I woke up and didn't feel great so I called work and said I wasn't going to be in that day but I should be OK by tomorrow.  I took the scan results to my GP at 11am.  She looked at the results and said it looks like it could be Lymphoma, as my spleen was huge and there were other enlarged lymphnodes in my abdomen.  The GP then went on to tell me she had a few friends who'd had Lymphoma and they were fine. I was shocked but didn't think she was right as my spleen had been enlarged for a few years due to an immune conditon I had so I wasn't worried.  The GP and I decided it was best if I go and see my Immunologist Prof F so he could decide what was really wrong with me.

So off I went and phoned J in work to say get yourself home we're off to the hospital to see Prof F.

To be continued..............

2 comments:

  1. Keep writing Emma. It is so cathartic when you do! I keep an old school diary as well and looking back at it give strength, plus, the blog helps others too!

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  2. Hey Lymphomaboy, you are right reading other peoples blogs has helped me so I thought I'd share my experience, it is a form of release too :)

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