“My husband and I had been trying to expand our family for a while. I was eager to have another child, despite the weird little pains that had been cropping up since the birth of our first son. When I did get pregnant, though, I miscarried at 11 weeks. It was horrible.
My body was slow to heal, but eventually I was ready to try again. We went to the fertility clinic here in Manitoba. There’s only one. They scheduled a laparoscopic procedure to look inside my abdomen and see if anything unusual was going on in there. Something unusual was. It was cancer. And it was everywhere.
At first they thought it was ovarian cancer. Then gastrointestinal cancer. Then everyone was sure it was colon cancer. But the colonoscopy came up clear. I remember at one point a resident told me I was ‘a very interesting case.’ I told him I didn’t even know what that meant. It turns out, it’s not a good thing.
I ended up starting chemotherapy still without a clear answer as to what type of cancer I had. And after that it was surgery. Basically all the ectomies. They took out my gallbladder, my spleen, my omentum, and my appendix. And they performed a radical hysterectomy. At no point did I feel like I was involved in my own care plan.
It was only after testing all the bits they’d pulled out of me that they were able to determine it had been appendix cancer all along. From pregnancy, to miscarriage, to stage four cancer, to having my reproductive system removed, it happened so quickly, and without anyone asking me how I felt or what I wanted. I know my case was unique and urgent, and I’m glad I got the treatment I needed. But it could have been done with so much more compassion. And I know others are having the same awful experience. After all, every cancer case is unique.
My son is nine now and, as he grew, he had so many questions. When he asked me why he didn’t have a brother or sister, I took great care to explain to him why mom wasn’t able to have any more kids. And now, because he understands, he’s able to be happy as an only child. I only wish anyone had taken similar care to help me understand what was happening to me in my cancer journey.”
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