So here is how I got to my diagnoses...
It was the first week of October 2010 and I am sitting at my desk at work. I happened to touch my neck just above the collarbone on my left side. There was a strange lump there. I kept touching and comparing to my other side. It didn't feel right. It was hard and painless. I went to see our building nurse (Mary) she told me that it may be a muscle spasm to just take some IBprofin and put ice on it. Well I didn't agree with her prognosis but did what she said anyways. A week or so went by and I woke up one night soaked I mean drenched in sweat. I had to change my entire outfit. My sheets and pillow were also soaked. It was strange because I felt just fine no fever or anything. But I just ignored that and went on with my day. Also with in all this time I was feeling tired and just not myself. Well a month or so went by and the night sweats and fatigue continued. I looked up my symptoms on the internet and most signs pointed to Lymphoma. I finally decided to go to my doctor in the end of November. I told him all my concerns and he felt my nodes and said that I also had some swollen nodes in my groin as well. He did a blood draw to test my complete blood count. He told me that he felt I had a bacterial infection. I was told that I would get results the next day. Well two days later the doctor's medical assistant called and told me that I did indeed have a bacterial infection. And that I needed to go get cultures ran to see if it was in my blood stream. I asked about getting antibiotics and the MA said that she would have to get back to me about that. So another day went by I got the meds and my cultures ran. Cultures came back negative for infection in my bloodstream. I ask MA what I should do if meds don't seem to help. She said well I guess come back. Let me just say this whole situation with that doctor was very unsettling to me. He just did seem to take me seriously. Okay we are almost done....
So during this time I had a close relationship with a different nurse in my building than who I mentioned before. Her name is Elaine. She agreed my doctor was a quack and even called and told him so LOL.
She refered me to a woman named Dr. McCoy. I went to see Dr. McCoy on Decemeber 30, 2010. At this point I had lost 4 lbs in a month and had a strange deep pain in my chest. I went on to tell Dr. McCoy about my new and old symptoms. She too felt my nodes and she told me flat out that she was concerned it was Lymphoma. She scheduled a CT scan for me that night. So that was a Thursday and on Monday I got the call from the doctor stating that the CT showed nodules on my lungs, spleen, abdomen and my neck. She got me in to see a surgeon that night to talk about a lymph node biopsy. The surgeon's name is Dr. Grannon and he also agreed that I most likely had Lymphoma. The biopsy was done that Friday (January 7) and the following Monday is when I got the news. Dr. Grannon called me at 8PM and told me that I had stage 3 or 4 Nodular Sclerosis Hodgkins Lymphoma. Honestly I was happy to finally have answers and I had a gut feeling for a while that I had had lymphoma. I did cry when I called and told my mom. I cried a lot. It just sucked hearing that I had cancer....
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