Living with Hope

On May 9, 2013, my life changed. I have always heard your life can change in an instant. It is true. It was after school on a Thursday before Mother’s Day weekend. I was in my classroom working with my colleague and friend preparing materials for the next day. We were reading specialists who worked with students who needed extra help in reading. We had found a Mother’s Day poem that the students could write on cardstock and present to their mothers. As I was driving home, I began to feel extremely tired to the point I thought I would have to pull over and have my husband David come and pick me up. I got off the highway and continued home on a side road and finally made it. As soon as I arrived, I sat down on the couch and fell asleep. David had been visiting his mother at a rehabilitation center where she was recovering from pneumonia, so he didn’t arrive home until a couple of hours later. When he found me on the couch asleep, he knew something was not right. He said my face was flushed and I was disoriented. He took my temperature, and it was 103.4. He wanted to take me to the ER at the local hospital, but I said let’s wait and check my temp again in thirty minutes. Don’t ask me why I thought that would make a difference; it didn’t. My temperature was still 103.4, so we went to the ER where they began running various tests to see what was going on. I had not been sick, had not had a cough or cold, and had felt fine all day at school. Whatever was going on with me had come out of nowhere. After a few hours in the ER, my blood pressure began to tank, eventually reaching 32/28. I was rushed to the ICU and the medical staff began fluids and antibiotics. I was also given steroids at one point. I began to improve after a day or two. Later, the doctor and nurses told me they thought they were going to lose me in the ICU as my organs were shutting down. I continued to improve and after five days I was dismissed from the hospital. I was visited by a hospitalist as I was packing to go home. She said my labs looked good except there was a protein spike in my blood and I needed to be retested by my primary care doctor in two weeks. She said it could be something called MGUS. I had no idea what that was but started to tear up because it sounded serious. She immediately said, “Stop that! There are people I see who are a lot worse off than you.” I was shocked at what she said to me but was unable to reply because it was so unexpected. After recuperating at home a week, I was able to return for the last of school due to my quick recovery. As a follow-up to my hospitalization, I returned to my primary care doctor for the blood tests that were needed. When she received the results, the protein spike was still there. She referred me to a hematologist for further tests. My husband and I drove to the address the day of the appointment but were shocked to see “Cancer Center” on the building. Thus began my cancer journey. The following is an account of my journey as I posted it in my Caring Bridge journal. My intent was not only to keep a written record of my experiences but to inform and hopefully help others who are on their own cancer journey. Chapter 1 The Beginning July 24, 2013 At the end of the school year, I had pneumonia that came on very quickly. They did several blood tests while I was in the hospital. When I was given dismissal instructions, the doctor casually mentioned I had a spike in the M-protein levels in my blood. She said it could be caused by the infection or by some of the strong medicines I had been given. She said I should be tested again in a couple of weeks during the follow-up with my regular doctor. After school was out, I went to my regular doctor and she repeated the tests. It showed I still had the spike in my blood and that I had MGUS. That's when things stepped up to a higher level. I was referred to KU's Overland Park Cancer Center and a hematologist there who ordered several tests (24-hour urine collection, full skeletal X-rays, and a bone marrow test). I went back to the hematologist on Monday and that is when I was told that my bone marrow showed 67% immature white blood cells - which isn't a good thing. She said my diagnosis was multiple myeloma - not MGUS, not smoldering myeloma – full-out multiple myeloma - which is a type of blood cancer. She referred me to KU's Westwood Cancer Center that deals with stem cell transplants. I will meet with a team of doctors there on Thursday, July 25th. The hematologist said they will probably start chemo soon to cleanse my blood of the immature white blood cells and then harvest good white blood cells to transplant into my body at a later date. I'm a little scared and don't know what the future holds. David and I are trying to focus on taking it a day at a time. Your prayers and positive thoughts are appreciated. Lou