Sunday, July 27, 2014

Following Your Gut

A few days ago, I received the comment below on my January 27, 2008 blog post entitled, Had I Followed My Gut...(cont'd)

Her name is Kelly. I asked her for permission to share her comment as an actual post on this blog and she agreed. It's so very important to be our own advocates, with no rest. When listening to our doctors, Kelly & I both went against our better judgment. And we both paid for it. Our hope is that others will learn from our mistakes, instead of repeating their version of our mistake.

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I ran into your site from my stats page. What you have written, mirrors so much of how I felt. I was so angry. I had been vaginally bleeding for months and was seeing my gynecologist for months. I had a bump that she removed that came back showing I had HPV (Sept 2009). From various other ailments, I am immunosuppressed so like most of the population that "grow out of HPV" in a few years, my body couldn't. She did a procedure that removed the lining of my uterus which should have stopped the bleeding. It didn't. I am immunosuppressed due to Rheumatoid Arthritis.

Around that time, at 41, I was faced with a choice of a total left knee replacement or a hysterectomy. I talked to my gyno and asked if it was ok to put off the hysterectomy so I could do the knee replacement. She said it would be no problem and the hysterectomy could wait. So, in Feb. 2010, I chose to do the knee replacement first even though I was sick of bleeding, I was more sick of walking in constant pain. In May 2010, I had a hysterectomy. She wanted me to stay in the hospital for two nights and I begged for just one night. She relented. She called me the next evening around 5, she was in tears and told me I had cervical cancer. I was dumfounded and mad at her and myself. I knew better - I had been fighting arthritis for 15 years and knew you have to be your own advocate when to comes to health issues. I have never seen or spoken to her since - I have accepted the cancer after many sleepless nights.

Between the doctor not pushing me to do to the hysterectomy first, I wasted 9 months of being treated for cancer. I am a single parent of now 12 year old triplets and I have to live for them. I was furious - I had to let go of the anger. I was lucky that it was Stage 2 B and had not spread to my lymph nodes. I am in remission now. But I have had to have numerous procedures to laser away precancerous cells. Keep up your fight and may you stay in remission. You will be in my prayer.

LINK TO KELLY'S BLOG