Courage

September is Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month.

Sam, and Team Bury the Dragon, I dedicate this to you. You have a courage unmatched, and are such an inspiration to me. I wouldn't have made it through this without you. All my love.



As some of you know, I am a survivor of this disease.
In September 2004 I started to feel very sick. By October I was bedridden for the most part. I was going for test after test to find out what was making me so sick, with nothing coming up. My family doctor treated me for a bunch of possibilities ranging from gastroparesis to ulcers to mono while I was suffering, as we waited for test results to come back negative and searched for some clue as to my illness. In March 2005, we finally found a mass on my right ovary. A trip to a gynecologist and an internal ultrasound found that it wasn't a mass: my ovary had grown to 6" in size.

I was sent to the Tom Baker Cancer Centre here in Calgary, and more tests were done, but I had no cancer markers. A gyneoncologist was assigned to me so that, on the very slight chance it was cancer, I'd be taken care of. Right up until my surgery they were almost positive that it wasn't cancer.

I awoke after surgery to see a look on my mom's face that no one should ever, ever have to see. I had cancer. I was 22 and I had ovarian cancer. It took a while to find someone who was familiar with my very rare (3 in a million) type of ovarian cancer so that I could begin chemotherapy, but in January 2006 I finished 8 months of poisonous hell. Everyone told me how strong I was because I never gave up, never gave in, never let it get me down. I was pretty ill during treatments, but I was happy, I liked being bald, and I made some amazing friends. It gave me my art back, and my passion for living, but it was hard to get there. It was so hard, and it still is.

I... I want to say something profound about Ovarian Cancer. I want to say something that makes everyone sit up and take notice, makes them realize that any woman, from their daughter to their grandmother to the girl across the street, could get this disease. It kills more women than survive it. It's not just an older disease anymore, and the symptoms are the merest whispers that are so easily mistaken for other diseases or issues that a diagnosis is really hard to get. Especially if you're young. I was "too young for cancer." Who do you know who is too young for it, too? She could have it.

Sam and Team Bury the Dragon climb every year, raising funds for Ovarian Cancer. I am not a climber. I'm just a girl who likes to do art, and who wants to make a difference.

Please go to the National Ovarian Cancer Coalition's website (www.ovarian.org) in the US, or Ovarian Cancer Canada ([link]) in Canada to learn more about this disease and make a donation.

Its Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. Share this, and do something about it. Be part of someone's life.