lifeofcancer

Patient F. Patient F’s life before his diagnosis consisted of bike riding, swimming, and scuba diving. He would venture to the outdoors, allowing his feet to take him three miles each day, then gathering his body atop a bike and wandering an extra thirty miles as long as rain didn’t hinder him. He was extremely active, letting nature and exercise enrich his body, however it took about three to four years after his diagnosis to even be able to walk right again. He found himself utilizing a stick or simply holding himself up with a rail throughout these tumultuous years. His work entailed fixing everything that could possibly be broken in a mill, given the title “Machine Operator A”. He spent his days driving heavy equipment, working in control rooms, doing everything possible to analyze and eradicate problems within the will. He never worked a single job within a day; he’d simply go in to see what was wrong and fix it.

 It was during his time at this job that he encountered his diagnosis. He didn’t have any prior symptoms that made him believe that he was ill. Simply one day at work, the company offered free prostate exams, and he figured at the age of 49, it was about time that he had his first one. It was there at work that they found a lump. They took a biopsy and wanted to wait because it wasn’t yet cancer. When all of a sudden, it blew up, bursting out parts of his prostate and spreading around his heart, spine and back. 

His doctors did not suggest any treatments, because his cancer was so far advanced that he seemed to have an expiration date tagged onto him. He had an operation to take the tumor out, and throughout the entire procedure he was not scared. He simply stated, “get it out of me”. And then the cancer came back. They decided that he was terminal and gave him 5 months to live.

One evening however, nurses visited his room and recommended that he try out an experimental medicine. He adamantly refused, noting that he did not want to exist as simply a lab rat. One of his friends came to his bedside to visit and said, “Look, I know that you don’t want to feel like you’re a part of an experiment, but you know that you’re terminal. You should try this drug and maybe it will help somebody else.” After thinking it over, he at last decided to take his friend’s advice, knowing that though he may not be able to help himself, there was still hope for others just like him existing within the world. 

It was at this time that his previous doctor left him from his treatment, and Dr. Islam stepped in. At first, he and Dr. Islam did not get along very well. However with time, he considered Dr. Islam a friend and not simply a doctor. Anytime that he has a headache or simple cough, he would call Dr. Islam and he would recocmend that he come in to be checked out immediately. One Christmas eve appointment, Patient F dressed up in a Santa Claus suit during his visit to the hospital and distributing candy canes to his nurses, doctors and fellow patients, laughing along with Dr. Islam despite their differences in religion. 

Throughout Patient F’s entire experience, his mentality on life and survival remained on an uphill trend. Though his son and daughter were understandably extremely frightened about his situation, he never really discussed it with him because he had learned to accept his fate. He would arise in the morning, sunlight beating down golden onto his skin and thinking, “So far so good. I’m still here.” He had been a traveler throughout his life, venturing to over 44 different countries, hundreds of islands and traveling throughout the globe. He could not complain, he was more than ready to accept that if he were to pass, his life had been a fulfilled one. 

Although he is not what he used to be in terms of physical shape, getting tired very rapidly and agitated by the lack of tenacity in his bones, he has accepted this aspect of life. He used to take part in Tai Kwan Do, teaching numerous classes and going to the gym on a regular basis. Nowadays he still works out, but he cannot fight with the same stamina as in his youth. 

During his fourth year into his cancer experience, he met a woman and ended up getting married. She ran a mission’s agency, a pious Christian who spoke four languages and worked as an English teacher in China for four years beginning in 1981. Patient F got baptized at the side of his wife, and began bicycling again and even arranging to scuba dive once again. For the next five years, they journeyed as a couple twice a year to China so that his wife could complete contracts for American English teachers to commence teaching at large Chinese academies. In this way, he was able to pursue his jubilation for travel once again. They stopped by Thailand and visited his son in Japan along the way, who was teaching English at a school there. He maintained an optimistic attitude throughout his entire journey through prostate cancer, never doubting that there was a plan for him. Although his physical life is nowhere near what he was used to, he believes that his emotional life, throughout his endurance with cancer, has been better than ever.

Patient E. E’s life before her acquisition of cancer proved to be one filled with jubilance and promise, as she had a dream to open a salon, supported fully by her husband and her two young children. She worked long hours, working toward this aspiration until the symptoms of cancer began to take over the life she once knew. It began with her loss of appetite, she could hardly keep any food down, and she became utterly fatigued and exhausted. As a result of this E made her way to the emergency room in which the doctors on duty admitted her due to her low hemoglobin levels of 6.4, and so began the various tests to see what the immediate issue was. E was 27 at this point.

Her career and her family life suffered, as would be expected as she was spending the vast majority of her time sequestered into hospital rooms. She slept a large amount and strived to handle business as well as her children simultaneously- a difficult feat as such a young mother. Eventually, she began to miss more and more work, stuck within the abyss of the hospital. The doctors eventually took her gallbladder out. Yet no one was aware of what exactly was wrong yet. She was forced to get blood transfusions and they did a biopsy after the gallbladder was removed. They isolated pieces from E’s lung as well as removed her lymph nodes and found that her white blood count was very high. At this point, her oncologist at the time recommended her to a rheumatologist, and she began seeing both simultaneously. 

She spent most of her time at the rheumatology department, as she began to wonder if she had acquired an autoimmune disease due to a large amount of joint pain she was experiencing. Her rheumatologist began treating her for Lupus. However shortly after treatment, she developed underarm lymph nodes that grew to the size of a baseball under each of her arms. At this point, the rheumatologist announced that it could not be Lupus and that she simply could not figure it out. E continued to lose weight as she remained unable to keep her food down. She contained no appetite, no strength, and no motivation. 

Eventually, E came to a point where she could barely walk she was so weak. She continued to lose weight and could not even manage to climb the stairs within her home. The night before Thanksgiving dinner, E announced that she needed to go to the hospital. She needed nutrients. So she returned to the hospital and the doctors performed another biopsy from under her left arm and removed the entire lymph node which came back positive. 

E’s parents and her aunt felt as if the doctors in Butler, Pennsylvania where she was at this point being treated were not doing enough, and so E was sent all the way to Pittsburgh in adamant hopes that whatever was occurring within E’s body could be mended. She was sent to Allegheny General Hospital to begin, and they performed some testing there, but in the same week she was transferred to West Penn Hospital, and then ended up at last at UPMC Shadyside. 

At Shadyside, E received three treatments altogether and beforehand had gotten a treatment at West Penn. E was misdiagnosed for an entire year. For this year she could not walk. She could not sit up to feed herself she was so weak. E was 98 pounds. She needed to get her heart stronger and receive more nutrition and get moving again. And this was where Dr. Islam came in. He got E started with nutrients that showed improvements and shrinkage of her lymph nodes. And he diagnosed her with stage four lymphoma. 

E started an AVBD treatment once her heart reached 60% for her cardiomyopathy, and at this point, her doctors believed it was necessary to start treating her cancer. Once she began chemotherapy, she began feeling much better, “which is weird because usually, you feel worse.” Nausea medicine helped her, and of course, she still became ill from the therapy. She was told that if she did not eat she would require a feeding tube, which got her much more motivated to retain these nutrients the natural way. E slowly started coming back to life. At first, it was difficult for E to eat or to swallow, and she would even need to water down her food in order to make it down her throughout. 

Once she began treatment she was in the hospital for three months. Her children were at the ages of 5 and 7 at the time. Her aunt served as her “power of attorney” because she could not make any decisions for herself. She was not married yet, but her fiance was simultaneously working and caring for her children. Her last treatment to this date was in September of 2016. She received a PET scan that showed that she was at last clear of cancer. Dr. Islam gave E the go-ahead to get pregnant, and so E became pregnant with her third child six months after being free from cancer- they were expecting their first girl.

Her pregnancy went flawlessly, other than the onset of diabetes during this time. She carried her to full term. “She was fine, I was fine.” Every six months E gets scanned and continues to keep up with her check-ups. E is expecting another child oy at the end of the summer.

However, the aftershocks of cancer continue to affect E, as they do with any individual diagnosed with such a fatal and terrifying disease. She continues to struggle from time to time with her energy levels, which she believes have not come back 100%. She gets tired very easily, and the chemotherapy has caused her ears to still ring every now and then. 

The struggles that she faced in terms of her relationships have mended as she has recovered, but the years of being cancer-ridden will always have their hold on her. Her two boys truly struggled with her diagnosis, though they did not show their trauma directly: things such as school or grades as well as speaking to teachers demonstrated it instead. For a long while, they were frightened every time she went to the doctor, asking “Why are you going?”. At the beginning of E’s journey, they were with their mother a lot, because she was being treated in Butler, where her fiance and her children resided. However, when she moved to Pittsburgh, it was much more difficult for them to make their way over towards the city. E states that she had a lot of family members come to see her throughout her time in Pittsburgh and “we’ve grown closer from everything.”

E says that at first she had such a feeling of gratitude during her time of chemotherapy treatment, simply so grateful that she was diagnosed and that something was improving. She was “high on gratitude”. But once that wore away, E found herself riddled with an onset of anxiety, constantly frightened that her cancer will return, that she will find herself immersed in bad news all over again. E states that this is her biggest struggle to date. 

Throughout all of E’s struggles through cancer, her father as well was struggling. He was diagnosed two months before E’s diagnosis, with lung cancer. The two of them began with the same oncologist in Butler. Eventually, his health had gone downhill very quickly, and he could barely breathe, a fact that his doctor did not acknowledge. The doctors listened to his lungs and did not give him any valid information, and E’s father found himself venturing to Pittsburgh, right alongside his daughter for different treatment methods. He also began to see Dr. Islam.

E’s finances suffered throughout her journey through cancer as well. She was forced to close her end of the salon business, as she had quite a few employees leave: a couple fled the area, one quit practicing hair, and one received a manager position. Not only did they all leave, but E herself was out of practice for more than a year and this crumbled the business she ran. She ended up selling all of the furniture, and the business remained there under a different name. She works there part time now.

Many individuals when diagnosed with cancer lose hope completely and lose the sense of religious ties that they may have grasped tightly previously. And some do the opposite, as E did. E believed that the most peace she ever felt throughout her life was during the times when she was most sick. She continued to stay positive, “trying to keep my faith up”. She believed that this itself got her through her diagnosis and treatment mentally; it made her closer to god. “That’s the only thing you have left at that point, the strength of your mind. Your body can’t do anything so that’s all that you have”. And with a mindset built off of these words, E made it through. She made it through successfully. 

A vibrant Italian woman knows much about the world and its entailments- but men are a weakness that all women eventually become mesmerized with. For C, she met hers immediately after the end of the second world war when she encountered a youthful American soldier. There seemed to be no other choice than to fall graciously in love with such an individual. And with this passion came a drastic change- the move to America.

And yet the seemingly impossible challenges of life often simmer into normalcy. C’s husband began a real estate business but that was not where the lengths of his business ended unfortunately. Money dissipated into thin air as he became immersed in the perilous quest of gambling. Soon their house was lost in the shambles of his filthy habit.

But obstacles don’t seem to travel alone. C became fatally ill and made her way helplessly to the hospital doors, only to discover her troubles had only commenced. Colon cancer was her next issue. And she would tackle it eventually, but not before more dilemmas spurted in her direction. Alcohol accompanies

Alcohol often serves as a coping mechanism in stressful situations such as these, and it did indeed serve as such to C’s husband.  His physical and verbal abuse spiked to a high during his drunken spouts causing more turmoil to C’s life when you add in the cancer aspect of it all.  Soon her cancer had spread into her lungs and liver and C was forced to visit the doctor as often as possible.  But one person refused to visit her during her times in the hospital- her husband.

Patient B.  It was May 17, 2002.  His body converged as he practically leapt towards the floor doubled over in frantic episodes of pain.  His wife reached for his convulsing body and dragged him to the emergency room.  Flashes of faces popped into his view, the calming yet frenzied expressions of doctors whirling by as they asked him questions, as their icy fingers probed at his body.  A day had passed and the doctors read the results of his suffering:  mass on the colon, spot on the liver and a spot on the lung.  Stage 4 colon cancer.

9 days passed by.  With each fleeting hour the lacerations of his illness consumed his every thought.  A foot of his colon was ejected from his body, his wife by his side through each jump in the process of wellness.  The oncologist would speak to B every time he entered the room, his focus inevitably on the sick man, and inertia lying on the hospital bed; yet he never even flitted his eyes towards his wife, something that deeply agitated her, and eventually tormented B himself.  They needed a new doctor.

B and his family had lived in Pennsylvania for the majority of their lives, yet their concerned daughter whose home was permanently Delaware was the one whose research was the most beneficial.  She called B with news of a successful doctor, Dr. Meyers; however, once the family had attempted to contact Dr. Meyers, it appeared he was busy during that exact hour.  This exact second in time, this non existent interaction had saved B’s life.

With Dr. Meyer’s unavailability, the next option was with Dr. Islam who was of a slightly inferior ranking at the hospital at that time.  B and his wife went to visit Dr. Islam, and at the moment they entered the premises, his wife came to congeal a fondness for the man, for with each word that he uttered, Dr. Islam would look equally from both B and his wife, his attention disseminated evenly throughout the room- a quality of immense importance for the Jammicky family.  And the first sentences he spewed were, “There’s an American way to treat this and a European way.  The European way is much more aggressive.”  

The immediate response of B’s wife was, “Let’s do it.”  Yet a complicated issue in the process was revealed when it was discovered that Dr. Islam was not quite authorized to complete the European procedure, as it had not yet been tested in America.  Yet both B and Dr. Islam came to the hasty realization that the testing would take more time than B had in order to maintain his life.  And so the process began.

Monday: Chemotherapy

Tuesday: Chemotherapy

Wednesday: Chemotherapy

Thursday: Chemotherapy

The schedule allotted for B’s life was utterly mundane and simply excruciating.  Dehydration was not uncommon for patients of this sort, and surely B received the same struggles.  A pill was given to alleviate the pains of the treatment- the many sores that erupted within his mouth were another symptom of his chemotherapy.  The pains of his treatment.  Isn’t it enigmatic how something that is fighting so fervently to keep you alive is actually inducing more pain?  But that’s simply how the battle throughout cancer proceeds.

Another CT scan showed zero activity on B’s liver and so his wife declared, “Why don’t we just have that dead stuff taken out of him,” and Dr. Islam agreed.  He created an appointment for B to be taken to the Allegheny General Hospital and there both his appendix and liver were removed.  Yet a fever abruptly struck him, and he was once again forced to spend a portion of his life in the abyss known to patients as a hospital.

The last time B had chemotherapy was May 31, 2003.  From that point onward he seemed to be fine, seemed to be in remission.  He would visit Dr. Islam twice a year, yet the port which he received chemotherapy from was still enclosed under the thin skin of his chest.  B, not usually succumbing to superstitious ideals, was taken by surprise and ultimate fear from a story he’d heard at a camp that as soon as someone had taken that port out of their body, they had gotten cancer once again.  So he kept that port captive in his chest, until a few years later when B became more dubious of the mystical powers of the port.  And so he ventured to the hospital to remove the port, and as he was getting it flushed out, the nurse said,

“You’re Dr. Islam’s poster child,” enhanced with a quick smile.  And that was when B came to realize that what Dr. Islam did for him was life saving in a completely new level.  Dr. Islam’s European method experimentation had in fact caused a litany of complaints from his superior, Dr. Meyers.  Dr. Meyers split from Dr. Islam’s acquaintance because of his audacity of trying out the untested method on B.  Dr. Islam had read the cancer patient files of Dr. Meyers’ which he had attempted to treat before meeting B, and he came to realize that all of Dr. Meyers’ previous cases had died within 8 months in the process of being “cured” through the American technique.  So therefore he elected a different approach- the European method.  And due to this method, B is living today.  Because of Dr. Islam’s bold method, this technique is frequently being used throughout his office at the very moment.

“The word cancer is one of the worst words I could have heard; it’s associated with people dying.  Yet how it affected me was a lot better than how it affected her,”  B confided about his wife.  The concept of cancer is disastrous to the people internally affected by it, it’s an insidious disease that fills one’s life with malice and interminable thoughts of denial and demise.  Yet to the people around the affected person, it is so much worse.  Because all the torturous pain that the cancer patient feels within their body, their relatives and loved ones are feeling the same sharp pinches of agony within their soul.  And this type of grief is perpetual.

Yet friends and family will continue to demonstrate their support.  When B was diagnosed, his entire family shipped themselves off to sea for a cruise, bringing their family ties and connections closer.  In some ways, illness can be beneficial to the harmony and concordance of a filial unity.  Similarly with friendship, B did not gain or lose any new friends.  He in fact simply surprised his bowling companions when he was able to continue the sport he so adored.  A myriad of them were old themselves, three of them burdened with hip replacements, four of them with surgical knees.  When B had arrived at Forbes Regional for his surgery, there were only 6 chairs destined for people waiting for chemotherapy.  Yet when he moved to other locations over time, he noticed that the number of chairs was rapidly increasing.  The cancer community is burgeoning, which is a blessing and a curse.  The blessing segment of it is simply that the unity of these individuals is growing along with the number, and the added number also adds to society’s understanding of the disease.

With added numbers comes added patients.  And with these added patients are people related to B.  B’s daughter suddenly discovered a lump on her breast.  He immediately raced her towards Dr. Islam’s office and Dr. Islam hastily ordered an MRI and had his prized patient’s daughter taken to Allegheny General.  However the fright was futile, because it was not cancer on her breast, simply cysts that could eventually develop into cancer.  Also, came B’s wife’s friend from Italy.  This friend had taken her present oncologist and her paperwork and sent it to Duke University, yet their efforts and results were not what she wanted to hear.  Therefore, B’s wife meets with this woman and says,

“Come to our doctor, he’ll cure you.”  And with this immense promise, comes a massive amount of responsibility and pressure on Dr. Islam.  And yet he is able to do it.

There are always experiences that can be analyzed as good or bad.  Yet the line between the two ideals is very thin.  Cancer is overall an experience tainted with malice and suffering.  Yet good can be extracted from it.  B’s “good” was that when he hears that someone has cancer, he knows exactly what they are going through.  Before actually physically experiencing the dilemma, you wouldn’t quite understand, but once you know exactly what is occurring, it makes a huge difference.  And B continues his journey through life, yet each step he takes, each breath he inhales is scarred by the fear of cancer’s return.  His life is forever haunted by his memories, by his experiences.  Yet he makes it through.  One day at a time.

Patient A.  Her sweating palms clutched the hand of the bathroom door as she barreled into the stall, bringing along with her, her coworker.

“I need you to come into the bathroom with me, because if I faint in there I don’t want someone to discover me passed out on the floor,” she whispered as her co worker helped her into the restroom, the door slamming shut behind her.  Her mind was fuzzy, head in circles as the dizziness overcame her.  Feeling slightly improved, she made her way slowly back to her desk, but the symptoms weren’t vanishing, they remained constant, the dizzy spells fluctuating in and out of her head.  The paramedics were called.  Flashing lights, people crowding about her.  A nurse informed her that her white blood cell count was increasing and greatly above the normal count.  And so she discovered that she had non Hodgkin’s disease.  A had cancer.

Bloomfield, PA was the birthplace of A, where she was raised and where she remained for the entirety of her life.  A sister, Linda was who she was given as company and her mother and father emerged their family into the life of religion, the life of faith and hope.  As Roman Catholics, A and her family attended mass every Sunday, her father in attendance more often than not.  And it was her father who also acquired cancer, non Hodgkin’s disease.  She grew up in close contact with her grandma who resided in a home adjacent to hers.  Cousins and friends were constantly surrounding her and she became close with her neighborhood acquaintances, one of them becoming a doctor, Dr. May.

A and her friend Carol attended church, and while sitting in the sacristy, Carol’s plush little white dog hopped next to A, its fur rubbing against her.  Since this was out of the ordinary, A was confused and asked what the diminutive dog wanted from her.  A week later she was diagnosed with cancer.  And when she returned to the church 6 months later, the little white dog refused to sit next to her.  A day later she received news that her cancer had disappeared.

And it was Dr. May who when he discovered the cancer in A, as she cried just once thinking of her fate, said,

“A, if you could have any type of cancer, this is the best one you could get.”  And with these words, A became hopeful and failed to go through the normal stages of emotional distraught that most cancer patients undergo.  Depression- not an issue.  Loss of hope- not an issue.  Everything that she believed in came from her religious scruples and she truly had trust in God that he would deal with the situation and there was no need for her to worry over something that was out of her direct control.

Dr. May gave her Rituxan and she began to shake and shiver, her appearance looking like ET in the basket; blankets were sprawled all over her and only her face was poking out from under the fabrics.  Dr. Islam tiptoed closer to her and A asked him,

“Are you scared?”  Dr. Islam replied, “No, are you?” and A nodded contently.

She made her way to the hospital and spent a singular night curled up on the hospital bed, nothing too drastic for what she could handle.  She was inserted with benadryl and adderall but the benadryl was the only drug which bothered her knees and therefore she was given adevine to mitigate those symptoms as well.

When she arrived at Mellon Bank the following work day, her coworker beckoned for her to come into the next room because she needed assistance with a faulty light.  A followed, but was specious of the situation and rightfully so, because as she entered the room, what she saw was a group of her coworkers sitting around a table and in the center an envelope with money stuffed into it.  They realized that A needed help and did their best to resolve her issue with their financial and emotional support.  However not everyone at work was as sympathetic.  Her boss was not very flexible, making it clear that no work was to be missed; it was A’s 25th anniversary with the bank so her vacation times were utilized for the time missed during treatment.  And there finally came a time when she was fired from her stable job at the bank.  But it was in her nature to persevere, to continue her struggle for normalcy and so she began working again at Ducane.

“Be careful you don’t get hit by a bus.”  These words spoken by a random guy on the street were the nine words A remembered best when it came to her fate.  Because it was true.  There could be so many things and events that could occur that could end one’s life, and to A, cancer was simply one of them.  She shouldn’t be worried about something that was fate, that was destiny and that she had absolutely zero control over.  And in this way A was special.  She did not go through the “normal” stages of cancer in her emotional realm.  It was simply in the hands of God.

While receiving chemotherapy, A and her sister Linda realized that the only hair that was exiting her head was the dark colored strands, but that the white ones remained in tact.  It was miraculous in the fact that her hair was not completely removed through the treatment and this was only a singular event in which her good fortune was displayed.  However death was an immense segment of A’s life and that was where her fortune halted temporarily.

She was living with her friend Carol, whose minuscule white dog had involuntarily predicted her cancer because Carol was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.  She resided there for seven months, but was forced to move out because while walking from the house, she tripped on the curb and got a hernia.  Linda and A lived there as Carol made her way to the hospital and eventually to her grave.  Yet even through the death of her friend, she was able to maintain her sanguine attitude.

One afternoon as they were receiving their treatment a woman was yelling towards the other patients around her, “They’re putting poison in us,” continuing to bark these hollow truths/lies.  Chemotherapy was a form of putting poison into the body, yet it was for the benefit of the patient.  A became irritated with the ungratefulness and simply the ignorance of the woman next to her so she made her way to the nurses and explained that they needed to put an end to her speech.

“These people are scared enough, they don’t need another person scaring them,” she stated.  And these sorts of little talks and lessons portrayed the true disposition of A and how she truly held her faith and hope in God and that the poison that was being injected into them would eventually bring them survival and ultimately life.

A was diagnosed with cancer in June of 2007.  She was free of it December of that same year.  Her ephemeral cancer brought her more faith in God and with it she realized the beneficence of doctors and medicine in general and in the true good work of God.