I had just turned 21 actually, about 6 weeks before. I went to see a dermatologist for the first time. I went because my sister had gone and told me the doctor was cute. Go figure.

SO...I went and assumed they would want to take this weird freckle off my shoulder, but I wasn't that worried, because a year (yes, a whole year) earlier, I had gone to my regular doctor to get a referral to a derm, and asked specifically about a freckle on my shoulder that had changed. It was flat and brown, but had become raised and pink. It looked like a pencil eraser, and was about that size. I specifically asked her if it could be melanoma, and she said no, it wasn't melanoma, and I didn't need to see a dermatologist. In fact, she went so far to say that the scar that would be left from having it removed for cosmetic reasons, would look worse than it currently did.

So a year later, about a week after I took finals and finished my junior year of college, I went to see Dr. Cassetty. He was cute. And he did take to thing off my shoulder. I was surprised by how much time he spent looking at my shoulder and how many questions he asked me. I almost passed out when they took it off, I had never had stitches or anything, but he was super nice about it, and even offered to drive me home (My boyfriend came and got me.)

About a week later I got the call. It was June 6, 2006- that would be 6/6/06. Creepy. I had melanoma, and it was 4mm deep. That was not good. Thats what the Dr. told me. They thought that it was stage two at that point, but said I needed to have a Sentinel Node Biopsy when I went in for a Wide Local Excision. Before all that, I had to have a sentinel node mapping- I had nuclear dye injected into my shoulder to see if it went up to the nodes in my neck, or down to the ones under my arm. It went down, which was good, because that SNB is easier.

In July I had my first big surgery, WLE and SNB. I was told that there was just a 20% chance of the cancer being in my nodes. The surgery went well, however the scar is a lot bigger than I was told it would be. Its about 8 inches across my shoulder, and at that point it was 1 inch under my arm for the node.

I had the next big surgery in August, I found out that the cancer was in the node that was removed, and so I would have all the lymph nodes under my arm removed. It was less than a month after the first surgery, but I insisted that they do it then, because I wanted to go back to school in September, when they suggested I have the surgery. At that point it was clear that the prognosis was not good; my cancer was no longer stage II or III, it was at least stage III, mybe stage IV. I wouldn't know if it was stage IV until I had a CT scan, which would be after the second big surgery, where the excision under my arm would be re-opened, and all the nodes would be pulled, leaving a 4-5 inch scar.

That surgery was rough; I had a drain afterwards, and had to do about 8 weeks of rehab to get the motion of my arm back, even then, it wasn't full movement. I also lost feeling under my arm and on the back of my upper arm and back. I was told that I would be at risk of developing lymphedema for the rest of my life. I was told I could never lift more than 10 lbs or do any kind of repetitive movements. But I went back to school in the fall. My sister went with me to classes the first few weeks before she started her new job in NYC. she carried things for me and took notes, since I had lost a lot of movement with my right hand.

Less than a month after that surgery, I had another, this time to implant a CVAC port so I could start getting interferon/immunochemotherapy. I was told that I should take time off of school, but I was determined to graduate the next May, so I just worked things out with my teachers so that attendance wouldn't count. I did all the work, and emailed things in during the first month of interferon when I was going to the hospital every day. My oncologist told me he has never seen anyone go through the induction phase as well as I did, so I assumed that once I was on the lower maintenance dose after the first month, it would be a breezy 11 more months.

Unfortunately, it wasn't. I got sicker, and sicker. My white counts were low and I felt like I was going to die. My hair started falling out, and I was miserable. The hair loss was a real kicker because interferon is only supposed to cause thinning of the hair, but mine was making tumbleweeds in my bedroom and made it look like I had been carrying a long haired cat around my neck. By December, I was having migraines with aura and neuropathy almost every day and had lost about half my hair. I convinced my doctor to let me have Prednisone on the days I injected interferon, and that helped, but the migraines made life terrible. I had to have an MRI when I started having stroke symptoms with them, because they thought the cancer had spread to my brain. Luckily it hadn't, and right around Christmas I started taking Topamax, a preventative migraine medicine- for ten glorious days I had no migraines.

I headed off to Montana to Camp Mak-A-Dream (if you haven't been there, you HAVE to go! they have a winter and summer session for young adult cancer survivors/patients, and its AMAZING) While I was there, I developed glaucoma, and went blind. I found out later that this is a listed side effect of Topamax. I also started losing my hair a lot then. I was scheduled to start student teaching two weeks after I came back from Montana, and at that point I didn't know how I would do that, since I couldn't see, was having migraines, and was losing my hair, but once I got off the Topamax, I started looking for other ways to get rid of the migraines. I started drinking gatorade, and figured out that my headaches were caused by a severe electrolyte imbalance caused by the interferon. So, that solved the migraine problem. I got a wig, which my roommates and I lovingly referred to as Sally, and I started student teaching.

Those months were the hardest. I would teach and sleep and that was pretty much it. But it was all worth it when I graduated in May at the top of my class. But it was bittersweet; the same week I graduated, my boyfriend of nearly four years broke up with me. He said I had changed, was a pessimist. The truth was that I was stronger than him, and he couldn't handle me being sick. He had been going to school in Georgia for a few months then, and I found out that while I was fighting cancer and finishing college, he was 'seeing other people'. That was really hard.

Now, I am glad I didn't stay with him. I got a job teaching, and work as a special education teacher in a great school. I finished treatment in September, and started dating again. I also joined a gym and started exercising. I ran my first 5k on Thanksgiving day, and am training to compete in a triathlon this summer. I work out 5 days a week before work, and am proud to say I lift a lot more than the ten pounds they told me I would. I also swim, which is a repetitive arm movement. (Its kind of like me sticking my tongue out at cancer and saying, "see, you told me I couldn't, and I can. So there!"

This summer I'm going to Colorado in August, to participate in First Descents, a week long camp for young adult survivors where I'll get to go kayaking, rock climbing, and hiking- and its free!

Cancer sucks, and for a long time I felt like it took so much from me. I still feel a little robbed, but I find that I can inspire so many people; I have inactive friends who are exercising, because they see I am doing it and can come back after such a bad experience. A woman work with was just diagnosed with breast cancer, and confides in me. I have a new boyfriend now, and he knows I had cancer and still wants to be with me, he tells me I'm amazing.

I'm proud of how far I've come, although I am still scared that it will come back. I think that if it were to come back, I would have an even better attitude than I did the first time, I'm stronger now, and I've learned to laugh when it gets bad. (My photo, the 'this must be my lucky day' sticker, was what I had on my chest when I went to have my port removed, two days after this past Christmas.)

So thats my story. There's more, of course, but thats the general overview.

LiveStrong,
-Juli