12/25/04, 12:47 PM
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Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Arkansas
Posts: 19
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Wanted to share my Christmas Gift
I am new to this list but wanted to share what has happened to me in the last 2 months and hope that it may help a woman reading this.
I am 41, active, don't smoke, drink, no family histories of cancers, the "not at risk" type.
I haven't had an annual exam in the last 4 years. Hubby had asked me to and finally in November, he said he would get a vascetomy if I would go. I made the appointment that day! The nurse asked how long I have had a puffy belly. I responded that it was just middle age spread. She sent me for a mammogram and an ultrasound anyway. The pap and mammogram came up clear. The ultrasound showed large masses in my bladder and uterious, but that the ones in the uterius were just benine fibroids. I was sent to a urologist who confirmed that I had nothing in my bladder but it was in my uterius.
The gynocologist said I didn't have to have surgery because the fibroids were common, not causing me any pain or problems, and they would shrink with memopause, but since they were large, we should go ahead and take them out.
I had surgery on Dec. 21st. After I was in surgery only 15 minutes, my husband got a call that it wasn't what we thought and one ovary would have to be removed, could the doctor remove the other one? My husband said yes and after surgery, he was hit with the bomb shell that I had nothing in my uterius (the person who read the ultrasound was totally wrong!) but I had ovarian cancer. While the doctor was there, he did several biopsy's of different areas inside me. We got the blessed news that all came back clear!
So far, it seems that the cancer was totally incased in the ovary and I am cancer free. I will have to go to an oncologist to make sure and keep a check.
God was with me in all this. I am writing to warn all of you. Please keep a check on yourself. I had no clue, no idea how close I was to disaster.
Looking back over the last 3 or 4 years, I did have a few things but put them off to memopause onset and middle age......Skipped periods, belly getting bigger, accidents when I cough, occasionally a tingling sensation on my right side under my rib cage like a butterfly was inside me, sometimes I would catch myself walking like I was pregnant and would think "what am I doing?". But these were nothing to concern a doctor with. My belly was firmer than it was supposed to be, but I didn't know it. It wasn't until after the nurse told me and I started feeling of it and other people's bellies that I did notice I had a hard spot.
I'm sore, can't go to the barn to see the girls, can't lift, drive, etc, for a while but I'm alive only with God's intervention.
Please, please ladies, do some research and keep a check on yourselfs. I never thought I would face the "c" word. I am the lucky one. Make sure you are too!
Merry Christmas to all!
Leslie
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