Journal entry by Patrick McCulloch —
Quick question - what do Rocky Balboa, Deadpool, and I have in common? I know, it's a difficult question to answer. So many options pop out as potential answers. All three of us are dangerous when it comes to hand-to-hand combat. All three of us are incredibly hilarious (yes...I'll argue until I'm blue in the face that Rocky is hilarious...). And finally, yes, all three of us have cancer. I'm sorry, I'm sorry - if you haven't seen Creed yet, Rocky finds out he has lymphoma - I always assume everyone has seen every film in the Rocky trilogy.
So...yes...I have cancer. I was officially diagnosed on January 3, 2019, but the story of how I got there starts months and months before that. I'm going to make this first post pretty straight forward and just give you the facts. Then I'll get in to the fun stuff.
It all started early in September 2018. I woke up one more with two bumps right above my lfet collarbone. I had never seen them before. They didn't hurt. Just felt like two big marbles underneath my skin. I didn't think much about them, but figured if they didn't go away in a week or so I'd call my doctor. After about 5 days they had gotten a little bigger, so I called the doctor and made an appointment. I went in on September 19th. My doctor looked at them and told me that lymph nodes sometimes get big - some people just have large lymph nodes, sometimes they go away, sometimes they don't. She told me to put a heating pad on them and that might help them go down.
So for the next 2 weeks I slept with a heating pad on my shoulder and there was no change. September crept in to October and I started noticing that I was feeling a little off. I was having some pretty gnarly acid reflux. My stomach was getting what I could only describe as a 'full feeling'. I'd eat a little and immediate feel like a gorged myself. It was incredibly uncomfortable all the time. I felt tired all the time, but not like sleepy tired, just exhausted. The last of the big symptoms was most likely the worst - the night sweats. And when I say night sweats I don't mean a little perspiration...I mean, full on clothes drenching, outline of your body on the mattress, sauna like sweating. Horrible.
I knew something was wrong, so I went back in to see my doctor. After a short exam, she decided that I had GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease). She prescribed my Protonix and it took care of the acid reflux immediately. Unfortunately, every other symptom I had was still going strong, and in some cases getting worse. A few knew bumps had popped up on my neck, on my upper chest and in my armpit. I knew it wasn't GERD that was doing all of this, so back to the doctor I went. At this point she ordered a ton of tests - blood, breath test, urine sample, chest x-ray and a CT scan. My insurance denied the CT scan - for some unknown reason, so she ordered an abdominal ultrasound.
Slowly, the results started trickling in. Blood test showed that my white blood count was abnormally high. Normal range is between 4,000 - 9,000, mine was almost 12,000. My red blood count was abnormally low. Ultrasound showed that my spleen was enlarged. Chest x ray looked clean. By this point I had been doing a lot of Google research. I was pretty convinced I had cancer. Every symptom and marker was pointing that way. At least I thought so. I even asked my doctor if she thought lymphoma or leukemia were a possibility. She was not concerned for either diagnosis. Instead she thought I had Mono. Which was odd because I had already had Mono when I was 13. So, the next steps were to see how things played out for the next month - come back in to the lab and get tested again in December and see how my numbers change.
Meanwhile, my symptoms were still around - my appetite was non-existent, I'd already lost about 12 lbs, I was sweating so bad at night I was ruining sheets and pillows left and right - just getting through the day was a nightmare.
I went back in to the lab on December 20th and got more blood taken. The morning of December 24th the doctor's office called to let me know that my white blood count was still up, my red blood count was done even lower and that the new diagnosis was an ulcer. They were going to schedule me for an endoscopy. I knew they were wrong, but I had no way of getting around it. I was a bit discouraged, but I put in the back of my head because it was Christmas. I finished getting ready for the day and headed over to Michelle's house. We had a night planned of movie watching and food prep. Little did I know...the night had other plans.
Michelle and I were standing together in the kitchen. We were right in the middle of a conversation and then, out of nowhere, WHAM! I hit the floor. Passed out cold. I didn't see it coming - no early warning system, no queasy feeling, no spinning room...just BAM! Down. I felt like I was dreaming and I didn't remember falling asleep. I remember waking up with Michelle holding my head telling me to 'wake up!!' and having no clue what happened.
This is where 'the facts' ends and 'the hospital' begins.
So...yes...I have cancer. I was officially diagnosed on January 3, 2019, but the story of how I got there starts months and months before that. I'm going to make this first post pretty straight forward and just give you the facts. Then I'll get in to the fun stuff.
It all started early in September 2018. I woke up one more with two bumps right above my lfet collarbone. I had never seen them before. They didn't hurt. Just felt like two big marbles underneath my skin. I didn't think much about them, but figured if they didn't go away in a week or so I'd call my doctor. After about 5 days they had gotten a little bigger, so I called the doctor and made an appointment. I went in on September 19th. My doctor looked at them and told me that lymph nodes sometimes get big - some people just have large lymph nodes, sometimes they go away, sometimes they don't. She told me to put a heating pad on them and that might help them go down.
So for the next 2 weeks I slept with a heating pad on my shoulder and there was no change. September crept in to October and I started noticing that I was feeling a little off. I was having some pretty gnarly acid reflux. My stomach was getting what I could only describe as a 'full feeling'. I'd eat a little and immediate feel like a gorged myself. It was incredibly uncomfortable all the time. I felt tired all the time, but not like sleepy tired, just exhausted. The last of the big symptoms was most likely the worst - the night sweats. And when I say night sweats I don't mean a little perspiration...I mean, full on clothes drenching, outline of your body on the mattress, sauna like sweating. Horrible.
I knew something was wrong, so I went back in to see my doctor. After a short exam, she decided that I had GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease). She prescribed my Protonix and it took care of the acid reflux immediately. Unfortunately, every other symptom I had was still going strong, and in some cases getting worse. A few knew bumps had popped up on my neck, on my upper chest and in my armpit. I knew it wasn't GERD that was doing all of this, so back to the doctor I went. At this point she ordered a ton of tests - blood, breath test, urine sample, chest x-ray and a CT scan. My insurance denied the CT scan - for some unknown reason, so she ordered an abdominal ultrasound.
Slowly, the results started trickling in. Blood test showed that my white blood count was abnormally high. Normal range is between 4,000 - 9,000, mine was almost 12,000. My red blood count was abnormally low. Ultrasound showed that my spleen was enlarged. Chest x ray looked clean. By this point I had been doing a lot of Google research. I was pretty convinced I had cancer. Every symptom and marker was pointing that way. At least I thought so. I even asked my doctor if she thought lymphoma or leukemia were a possibility. She was not concerned for either diagnosis. Instead she thought I had Mono. Which was odd because I had already had Mono when I was 13. So, the next steps were to see how things played out for the next month - come back in to the lab and get tested again in December and see how my numbers change.
Meanwhile, my symptoms were still around - my appetite was non-existent, I'd already lost about 12 lbs, I was sweating so bad at night I was ruining sheets and pillows left and right - just getting through the day was a nightmare.
I went back in to the lab on December 20th and got more blood taken. The morning of December 24th the doctor's office called to let me know that my white blood count was still up, my red blood count was done even lower and that the new diagnosis was an ulcer. They were going to schedule me for an endoscopy. I knew they were wrong, but I had no way of getting around it. I was a bit discouraged, but I put in the back of my head because it was Christmas. I finished getting ready for the day and headed over to Michelle's house. We had a night planned of movie watching and food prep. Little did I know...the night had other plans.
Michelle and I were standing together in the kitchen. We were right in the middle of a conversation and then, out of nowhere, WHAM! I hit the floor. Passed out cold. I didn't see it coming - no early warning system, no queasy feeling, no spinning room...just BAM! Down. I felt like I was dreaming and I didn't remember falling asleep. I remember waking up with Michelle holding my head telling me to 'wake up!!' and having no clue what happened.
This is where 'the facts' ends and 'the hospital' begins.
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