How It all Started

On July 2nd, 2009 after months of stomach pains that progressively had gotten worse, I decided that I could not take that pain anymore. My husband had come home for his "home time" as a truck driver and I asked him to take me to the local clinic. He was happy that I finally wanted to go to the Doctor as he had been urging me for since March, but I hesitated because of insurance issues.

I was seen at the local clinic, but because of all of my symptoms and not having the right equipment they urged me to immediately go to the ER at Banner Estrella Hospital. I made arrangements for my kids to be watched (except for Tyler who came with Daddy and I) and we headed off to the hospital. I was feeling my worst ever by this time and very scared of what was wrong with me.

We were seen very quickly in the ER because of the symptoms I was having and the fact that my heart rate was so elevated. Last I heard, it was 147 upon being admitted. The Doctor started his exam and mentioned that I had a defect in a hernia that I had repaired in 2005. I thought that that was all it was. They gave me some medicine for the pain and ran several blood tests before sending me in for a CT Scan.

They came back and said I had earned myself a room and I was so scared. They moved me to an ER room and I waited for the Doctor to come in with the results. Tyler was hungry, so Scott took him to the vending machines. While he was gone the Doctor came back in and said, "Your CT scan shows a real mess..we are not sure what is going on..you have some spits on your liver that we think are cancer..we are going to have to do exploratory surgery to figure this all out". He then went on to tell me that I was really lucky that I came in to the ER. "You probably would not have made it here". Boy does that make you feel blessed!