Sue's Stupid Cancer

I had my oncology appointment yesterday. Good news in Cancer world! My official Diagnosis is Bulky Hodgkins Lymphoma Stage 2A. Let's get the bad news out of the way first. I still have Cancer and treatment won't be a joyride. But there is good news that makes those two things easier to digest. 1. I have Hodgkins Lymphoma which respondly quickly and successfully to chemo. 2. I am only stage 2, which means I only have 4 mo of Chemo followed by radiation(really anxious about that last part) 3.because the cancer didn't spread I do not have to do the bone marrow biopsy(I prayed hard about #3) My portacath will be placed on Tuesday 4/7. The portacath is placed under the skin, the catheter connects the port to a main vein. Starting Thursday 4/9 I will have a chemo cocktail ABVD infused into me thru the port IV every once every 2 weeks. This process takes 3-4 hours. Based off what the doctor and other lymphoma people I have talked to, I will start to feel tired starting on day 3 for a couple days. And the effects are cumulative, the tiredness and fatigue will get worse with each treatment. Also the doctor stressed to be very careful about staying away from anyone sick. My immune system will be at its weakest from day 5-10 after the infusion day. I shouldn't feel much nausea, there are so many anti-nausea remedies these days. I will have another PET scan after 2 months to see how well the chemo is working. I talked to the doctor about treating the Lymphoma naturally. She Said that natural treatments can be great for a lot of cancers. She strongly advices against it in the case of Hodgkins because it is so aggressive and this chemo is guaranteed to make it go away. The picture below is of my PET scan from last week. From the bottom up so you know what your looking at. Round circle is my bladder then kidneys then slightly to the right is my giant loving Heart and then above that all the black area below my Brain is the tumors. There is a lot of it! If you look the right of the bulky mass you can see 2 little round spots. That is 2 more starting to grow. So how do I feel about all of this? I feel calm, nervous, thankful, sad( that's for Judi:)) I take it seriously, knowing that I have to take good care of myself. I am nervous about the side effects of chemo and needing so much help with kids. I am thankful that there is a 98% chance that after this 4mo of chemo and radiation this will be gone and is unlikely to come back. I am so so thankful for all of my friends, family and clients for all the love, prayers and support that is being sent my way. I really am so blessed!i am sad that that I have cancer, I really wish I didn't. Mostly I feel strong and positive. And and incredible urge to plan out everything for the next 4 mo, yikes!