Failure is Not An Option

An account of my experience with Hodgkin’s disease

The Story

Diagnosis (last updated 2/6/03)
Staging (last updated 2/24/03)
Choosing a Treatment (last updated 2/25/03)
Chemo (last updated 2/25/03)
Hiatus (last updated 5/3/03)
Radiation (last updated 6/13/03)
Aftermath (last updated 5/15/07)

Cast of Characters

If you’re here, you probably know us, but just in case….

Mike: my husband
Ben: my son, age 6
Emmy: my daughter, turned 2 in the course of the story
TiVo: where I work
Alana: my sister. Also works at TiVo.
Mom and Bud: my mom (duh) and step-father
Dad and Audrey: my dad (duh again) and step-mother

The Medical Personnel, in order of appearance

Dr. David Francisco: my usual doctor
Dr. Peter Naruns: the surgeon who did the biopsy
Dr. Peter Yu: the first oncologist I saw
Dr. Bill Loo: the Stanford Radiation Oncologist resident who works with Dr. Horning
Dr. Sandra Horning: the Stanford oncologist who will treat me
Sheila Breslin, RN: The nurse in Stanford’s lymphoma clinic
Dr. Brad Ekstrand: another doctor who works with Dr. Horning
Dr. Richard Hoppe: the Stanford radiation oncologist who will treat me
Dr. David Roberge: another radiation oncologist who works with Dr. Hoppe

Useful Links

Amusing quotes (last updated 3/25/03)
The Bleo Awards (last updated 5/3/03)
Some thoughts (last updated 10/8/03)
The National Cancer Institute’s Hodgkin’s page
Preston Hunt’s blog (Hodgkin’s diagnosed October 20, 2003, finished treatment March 12, 2004)

Written some time in 2006, committed to the blog in 2007: One day, during radiation, I hit a wall. The world, which had always seemed full of adventure and at least the possibility of joy, was deflated. The chemo and radiation were killing the cancer cells, but I thought that they were also taking away my spirit. I was going to pop out the other end of this thing alive, for sure, and able to go back to doing whatever it was that I did, but the joy would be gone. I knew healthy, and I knew sick (bearable only because it would end), but I feared that the best I could hope for after Hodgkins was no-longer-sick. Read the rest of this entry »

Friday, 6/27/03: Well, I didn’t get shingles, but that didn’t prevent me from some medical excitement this week. Starting last week, I noticed a big red blotch on my left shin - it looked like a bruise, but it itched like a weird mutant mosquito bite. A few days later, another one appeared on my right calf. Read the rest of this entry »

This advice is stuff nobody told me, and I didn’t find in any booklets from the American Cancer Society, from the social worker at the hospital, or anyone else. Hopefully someone will find it useful. Read the rest of this entry »

Tuesday, 5/6/03: Yesterday was another meeting with Dr. Roberge and Dr. Hoppe. They went over the information about short term and long term side effects that I’d heard at the first visit, and then it was off to a CT scan, this one with no fasting, pina colada stuff, or injections (if they keep taking indignities away, I’ll have nothing to write about!). Read the rest of this entry »

Tuesday, 4/29/03: Last week was my doctor-free week. By about Tuesday, I was feeling pretty much like my old self. By Wednesday, I was done with the Hodgkins-related diet restrictions. Salad never tasted so good. Read the rest of this entry »

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SARATOGA, California - Last night’s Bleo Awards ceremony, chemotherapy’s answer to the Oscars and the Emmys, honored the year’s best in side effects, medical procedures, and medication. Read the rest of this entry »