Thank you for coming here to support my family and me. On March 12, 2012, they found what is believed to be a cancerous tumor inside my spinal cord. So our journey began.
I have what is believed to be a cancerous tumor called an astrocytoma or possibly an ependymoma inside my spinal cord. I have been having problems with my legs for 7 or so months and it was suspected I had MS. When they did an MRI of my thoracic spine, they found this mass. It is pretty rare. We traveled to IU, Duke, Mayo and Vanderbilt. We had conversations with Johns Hopkins and MD Anderson to gather opinions.
I am having surgery, but many of the doctors do not think it appears to be something that they can remove. (I pray that they are wrong.) If that is the case, they will remove the back of some of my vertebrae, and put a patch in my spinal cord to give the tumor more room to grow. Best case scenario - this will give me several more years of being able to walk and many more years of life. Worst case, it is an aggressive tumor and the prognosis would be much worse.
But the best, BEST case scenario is that they can take it out and I would be progression-free. So - here we go!
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