February 14, 2011 was the date of my biopsy and now forever the date of my biopsiversary…biopsy-versary? 🙂
I spent the morning telling hospital staff Happy Valentine’s Day and the rest of the day slightly drugged and hosting my dad and little brother who had come up for my surgery.  My mother, an oncology nurse specialist, had died only 2 months before and interacting with the nurses in the pre-op and post-op area made me feel sad and unnaturally out of control.  The biopsy was supposed to rule out what we “already knew”…that the lumps in my neck were not cancer.  Two days later, I had a diagnosis of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.  Every following appointment with the Ear, Nose, and Throat physician always included a medical resident in tow to palpate my neck and feel what “wasn’t supposed to be cancer.”
Wasn’t supposed to be cancer, indeed.
While months later, (sometime in July?), I was marked as cancer free, the date I choose to celebrate is the date of my biopsy.  That date when one of the lumps in my neck that had been ‘weird and lumpy bumpy’ for months, was taken out and examined.  The date when I took the next step towards my life completely falling apart so that I could spend the next several years building it back up.  The date when cell mutation ruled over reason and at 24 they found cancer in my body.
Six crazy years later and I’m here, standing up and fighting back. Â Fired up, ready to go.
Happy Biopsy-versary to Me!
