Hello. After reading a lot of comforting responses I decided to join the site. Ill give u a little about me before I go into my cancer. I was 23 right before finding out about my tumor. I was going to school but still unsure about what I wanted to do with it, I wasn’t in a rush to get a degree like most my friends. I’m a really happy person and it was hard for anything to put me down. I was working on becoming a demo artist. Meaning I love writing songs but didn’t want to be my own artist. I want to be a song writer for artists who don’t write their own songs such as Britney Spears, flo rida, Katy perry, Justin bieber, taio cruz etc… I love classic rock, metAl, rap, oldies and country but there is something about pop records that make me feel magical and happy. All my lyrics are somewhat rooted from my perfect very fun first 23 years of life. I grew up in Los Angeles CA and had a childhood that couldn’t of been more of a positive experience. My teen years were the best! Lots of writing, tennis, music, drinking slurpees in front of Von’s and begging adults to buy me alcohol, running around malls, beaches and Hollywood blvd. I had two loving hard-working parents and three siblings. My dad raised me to appreciate what you have and to just be an all around good person and that everything to come needed hard work and that if you want something you need to just go and get it. I saw my nephew pass from neuroblastoma at age 3 in 2010. It broke my heart and I couldn’t believe it. When I found out I had cancer I knew it was fine because I’ve lived such a great life and not everyone can say that. I would be SO selfish to ask why me, especially when my nephew passed at only two. Even if I do pass synovial sarcoma will never be able to touch the blast I had with my life for 23 years. My nephew didn’t even get to experience life for 3 years! I know that everyday thousands are diagnosed and for me to be sad or upset that its now my turn makes my stomach turn because to me that’s being very selfish. Of course I’m human so I have my days where I want to scream at the top of a mountain and jump but usually on those days I write away.
I was at the gym when I was 19 and I noticed a sharp pain behind me right eye. I was thinking maybe it was caffeine because I was pretty big on energy drinks for weightlifting. Some friends had that same problem and told me it stopped once they quit the energy drinks. So I did and sure enough it started to go away but never did fully. I was freaked out after a couple months so I had an MRI done. I was going to Drs prior but they just told me it was stress from school and the gym. The MRI came out clear so I was like COOL! 4 years go by and the pain gets really bad. Sometimes I would sit and cry all night. Kaiser was pretty much telling me it was all stress and I was starting to believe I was just one of those unfortunate people who have bad migraines. JEEZE I WISH LOL. Anyways, so I was at work and I noticed tingling in my right arm and cheek. I remember having a bad feeling about it. So after getting another MRI they found a 7 cm tumor in my head/neck. It wrapped around the arterie that sends the blood to my spine. It also slightly got into my skull and neck bone and was pushing into my spine. In other words I was ****ed. I had two needle biopsies but both weren’t big enough but Kaiser and UCLA said it was a benign tumor. I went through 2 seizures, 1 diagnostic angiogram, countless trips to ER, and then on march 22nd got 80-90% removed during the 8 hour surgery. They scraped off bone, and got it off everything successfully. There was still a remaining 10% but it couldn’t be taken out without death. 2 weeks later I was diagnosed with synovial sarcoma. I started radiation on my 24th birthday and chemotherapy right after. I am currently on day 29 of 37 for radiation. My second round starts on sept 1. My dad wasn’t comfortable with kaiser so fought to get me into UCLA for Chemo. So I go to UCLA for chemo and am so grateful to get the best treatment out there. My drs have all been pretty hopeful. They found that my tumor was present in 2010 at the same size. Dr just missed it. They are pretty hopeful because it didn’t grow or spread in 3 years. They told me I was lucky to have it grow above the neck and not below it as it usually spreads like crazy. I sure don’t feel lucky. Overall this has put my education, job and social life on pause during its best time. I have taken this free time to perfect my song writing and am somewhat happy this has happened. It has showed me who my true friends are and my writing has so much more emotion. When this happened a lot of my friends went into hiding. It made me realize that my dad was right when he would always tell me that the only ones a person can trust to be there no matter what are your parents. Overall I am upset but I am also understanding. If kids can battle cancer with smiles then so can I. I obviously would prefer to not have this cancer BUT some of the pros outweigh the cons. I hope the best for everyone!!!
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