Yvette Young-DeCosta

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting. Below is Yvette's story to catch you up and keep you informed.


When Yellow is not Mello…

 It started a sunny day on Sunday March 18th I was driving to visit my longtime girlfriend Michelle Carroll upon arriving at her house I was putting on some lip gloss and looked at my eyes in the mirror. Thanks to the natural light I could really see how yellow my eyes were. I asked my kids they agreed that they looked a little yellow.  This was confirmed by Michelle who said not only my eyes were yellow but my skin looked yellow . . .we laughed because I said well I am yellow but this was YELLOW like jaundice yellow. I was concerned and committed to go and see my GP Doctor the next morning.  For a little background I had had an upset stomach for about 4-5 weeks but it got worse and I had seen the Doctor on the 5th of March and got Prilosec and an order to get a stool sample (yikes) after a week of first constipation and then loose stools, weird clay colored stool (I know TMI But not normal) and dark urine I was concerned and my skin was itching.  All this had to do with the jaundice but was actually symptomatic of much more.




The Spring Nor’easter-Get thee to Hospital…

Immediately (What the Heck?) (Tuesday March 20th)  On That Monday I went to the Doctor got a thorough blood work up and an order to get and ultrasound of my abdomen on Tuesday.  By God’s grace I immediately left the Doctor’s office and got my blood work done.  I have been quite noncompliant in the past as busy Mom’s can put themselves at the bottom of the care list. Tuesday, I got the Ultrasound and came back home I then got a call from the Drs. Office that my liver enzymes were high (Actually crazy high but at the time I had no context to what this meant).  Got to the hospital ASAP. I called Michelle to tell her and she offered to take me.  It was just starting a winter mix of rain and snow.  I also called my ex-husband Gerald to keep him in the loop that I was going to the hospital.

 

Michelle and I arrived at the hospital at 1:30 pm were put in a room with a lovely super sweet nurse named Chris at 4:30- who was very excited to have me as her patient-she was so totally awesome and the happiest nurse ever. (Another token from the Father as the journey was just about to get really real and R-U-D-E). 

 

The Ghost of Husband past…

I’m in the room in the ER and they take me to get a contrast CAT scan.  I come back we are waiting and in walks Gerald...  Michelle and I are speechless and shocked because he was in North Carolina. He drove up because he was concerned.  Sugar, Sugar Sugar, my glucose level was over 300 and everyone was assuming I was a diagnosed diabetic.  Not so, at that moment moving forward I am not Type 2 but a situation type I like to call Type 3-7 Pi. Soon thereafter the ER Doc comes in and says you have a mass on your pancreas and spots on your liver.  Tears crying, me, Michelle and Gerald, it was all so weird, surreal, shocking and mind-boggling.

 

 A stint in the Storm…

At this point, they tell me they will go in arthroscopically and put a stint in the pancreas the help resolve the Jaundice and will do a biopsy of the liver. 4 days in the hospital monitoring blood sugar getting insulin, monitoring my blood pressure.  I would get the results of the biopsy in 3-5 business days. And the doctor says stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer, metastasized to the liver. Michelle, Leah and I cried, cursed, cried more, prayed and told inappropriate Jokes. Got a port put in the upper chest right under the skin on Friday, March 30th. Starting Chemo April 4th.  (Really fast huh? Wait to hear about fun and games with your health insurance.) I am checking my blood sugar 6 times a day and giving myself shots of insulin 3 times a day, just to keep things interesting!

 



God has a plan…. for each of us and as my Sister Lisa Striggles told me Jehovah has the final say.  We are walking by faith and expecting miracles from our Father who can do all things. Stay tuned . . . and pray without ceasing.