When we arrived home from the appointment I remember getting a medical book out to look up Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.    There had been just a tiny paragraph about what it was and who can get it and at what age.  My husband and I decided to tell the kids the doctor said I was sick and would be getting medicine.  I remember getting a hug from them and holding them as tight as I could.  I was beside myself and I was not sure what was going to be in store for me in the next couple of months.  I had to call my parents but, I was not ready to say the words I have cancer.  It was bad enough hearing it now I have to admit to it.  I did not want to upset there world.  I didn’t want my parents to get upset because there little girl has cancer.  I did however want to find out from them if anyone in the family had cancer.  I thought telling them over the phone was so impersonal however; I did not want to wait.  I needed them and I was scared.

My husband and my parents accompanied me to my oncologist appointment.  My kids were being watched by my in-laws.  My first visit with the doctor was in his office.  It was there that he proceeded to tell me about my treatment options. My doctor said the course of treatment for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma is radiation and or chemo.  The doctor said he would recommend I get chemo.  He said chemo goes right through the blood stream and radiation is done by radiating the area were the cancer is.   He told me chemo is given with a needle through the vein or with something called a chemo port.    The doctor explained that the port would be surgically implanted underneath my skin of the chest wall.    The port was described as a button that has a thin tube connected to it.  Instead of being stuck in the veins the nurse would stick the port with the needle and inject me with the medicine.  My doctor said the port saves the veins from your being pricked and becoming bruised, and sore.  He told me the surgeon who did my biopsy would be the one to put it in.  I agreed with getting the port although I was not happy about having yet another surgery.  Even though my doctor recommends I get chemo, he said he needed to tell me about a study his is involved in.  He told me he works very closely with the American Cancer Society to find what treatments help cure which cancers.    He stated that he asks all of his patients if they would like to participate.  He said this is not a paid study and the American Cancer Society will get to choose my treatment.  After I had asked more questions about the study I felt convinced enough to participate.  If this study was going to help future cancer patients I wanted to do it.    My oncologist said he would send all my medical information out to them so they could determine my treatment.   The doctor told me if they choose radiation it would be done at the hospital.  I would get radiation treatment five days a week for one month.  If I get chemo, the treatments would be once every three weeks for three months.