Tonya Snodgrass Tonya's Take 2 for a Cure

On January 26, 2017, I left my unit as a pediatric oncology nurse and became an acute myeloid leukemia (AML) fighter. After induction chemotherapy and a month long stay inpatient, I received the wonderful news that I was in remission (3/3/2017) and would need to complete HiDac chemo and recover before returning to the job that I loved. I finished chemo and rang that bell on July 15, 2017.  On January 8, 2018, I made my triumphant return to my beloved job as a pediatric nurse, feeling healthy and determined to stay that way. As we followed my lab values carefully, my physician and I noted that my platelets had begun falling, but as all my other levels remained steady, and there were no blasts (or leukemia) cells in my blood, we remained vigilant to watch and wait. Then came 3/25/2018, while at work I noticed a lymph node on my clavicle was swollen, something that I knew could mean many things, yet it made me hyperaware of what it could mean. Only one week after being told that all looked well, but we needed to watch my levels, I was brought in for a redraw of labs that would determine that I had leukemia cells in my blood, and thus had relapsed or had some other form of blood cancer. And my world came crashing in on me...again.