Cosbie Hollenbeck

Day 4.

Got a call at about 10:30 AM that the doctor would be calling me within the hour on the results of the surgery and what they had found out. I have to be honest it was a total blessing that the doctors moved this fast and that less that 24 hours after surgery I was going to have the results of the biopsy. It was a mixed emotion of happy and sad and nervous to get to find this out. Honestly I knew what the doctor was going to say and I had decided that if I did not have it I would see it as a blessing and God had healed me.

So the doctor called, Dr.Andrews that is, this is the oncologist(or cancer doctor). He confirms with me and my parents that I have Nodular Scleorsing Hodgkins Lymphoma. So this confirmed that I will be going through chemo and possibly radiation over the next 6-9 months. As of right now I don’t know much about what all of this means. I honestly just am waiting to see what stage my cancer is in and go from there as far as how long treatment is.

Dr. Andrews gets off the phone and says I want to see you Monday. Be looking out for a call from my office in the next few min.

So not even 3 min goes by and I get a call on my cell from his office and they ask if I can be there at 1:00 that day to meet with one of the other doctors there to start getting the tests going. Granted it is about 12:15 right now but I am going to make this appointment and get this going. So we say we will be there and start to get ready to go.

Now you must understand that Caitlin(finance) is at work so I call her and tell her what has been confirmed and she basically was very sad but was very much we can do this and we are going to get through this. She finds a way to leave her school and meets me at the office to meet with the doctor.

So we get to the doctor and they run some tests and such and all is going amazing.  Nothing really hurts just standard blood work and that kinda stuff then they go we need to do a Bone Marrow Test. **Warning** if you get grossed out skip this part……..

So this doctor tells me about this process and such and says that about 95% of people do it without being put to sleep so I am like ok I can do this it cant really be that bad. I mean he is going to numb me and all. So I say go for it. So he starts to numb the skin then the nerves and then he numbs what he can of my bone. Next comes the hard part. he has to crack into my bone so that he can get the marrow out. At this point he is about 2.-3 inches inside of me and it hurts but I mean nothing I cant stand. This goes the part he said would hurt but I think I underestimated or he didn’t tell me how much it really hurt. I think he did the later but whatever….For a good 8-10 seconds he pulls bone marrow out of me. Lets just say I have never had a pain anywhere close to the level of this. And I had some words that I would have liked to say but didn’t. Worse part of this is that He has to do it twice………So the whole time I am txt messaging people to try to keep the thoughts out of my brain. So he goes again and honestly I have never felt anything that bad. It felt like he was pulling my insides out of me and creating a suction and in fact he was. So well that was the hard part. The rest was him breaking off a piece of my bone so that the can look at it. That hurt but I mean honestly that was not bad at all. It took him 3 times to get it but it was honestly not that bad.  So after he does this he gets this like 3 inch or more needle out of me. Let’s just say I am glad that was over.

I was not able to walk out that day because I was so lightheaded, so they had to take me out in a wheelchair because of the pain but it was done and that is all that matters.

So that night I went home and basically did nothing I was just in alot of pain and honestly just wanted to sleep and that is what I did.

Overall an ok day. I made it through. God was with me. I am going to defeat lymphoma with God’s help.

Surgery.

36 hours ago I would have told you I was going to be setting up for a show in Joplin, Mo with the band that I work for The Museum. I love working with these guys and we have a great friendship to say the least. There is no question that these guys love the Lord and they have been so supportive of me so far as I know they will continue to be.

Thursday Morning I wake up knowing that I am going into surgery to find out what is going on in my body. Up until this point I have been very strong and not really scarred but this morning it hit me.  After I got up and got a shower I just started crying. I just could not completely understand why God has chosen to put me down this path. I had accepted the fact that I had cancer and that this was something that I was going to have to fight.  I never doubted that God knows what He was doing. It is just really hard to know that you are going in for surgery. After a little while of praying and reading and crying I was finally kinda ok and just pushed through.  Around 10:30 Caitlin came over and we all prayed together before we left as this was definitely something that I needed. After that we went to the Hospital to start the surgery process. My pre-op was at 11:15 and surgery was at 1:15. We got there and got going and someone had cancelled so I got to go earlier and honestly I was really glad that I did.  So I went back for surgery and honestly it was one of the hardest things to do. I know I might sound like a wimp but it is hard to leave all of the people you love.

So surgery went for about 1.5 hours and from what I can remember it was not that bad and I made it home with no problems at all. After taking some good drugs I was able to eat a good dinner and talk with everyone. We had a few friends that came over to pray for me that night and honestly that was one of the biggest blessings.  I am so glad to have so many people that care about me.

So Wednesday was just a day of sitting waiting, praying, reading, crying, and just believing that God was going to choose the path that He had for me. On Wednesday I talked to most of my friends and the word started to get out. I will say one of the most powerful things that happened this day was the few people that took the time to pray with me on the Phone. Not to say that if you didn’t that was a bad thing but it was amazing to know that I was being lifted up by so many of my friends and family members. The one thing that I have hung  onto is that prayer works and that nobody is going to tell me otherwise. That doesn’t mean that God is going to heal me if I ask him to, it just means that He is going to be by my side through all of this no matter what.  Since yesterday I have had a peace about this. I am not sure why but I truly believe that God has a reason for having me go through this or I would not go though this.

Today  I talked to the Pre-Op nurse and got my surgery all ready to go. Tomorrow begins the healing process. Not sure what it looks like but I know God does.

All of this began about 6-8 weeks ago when my mom was shaving my neck and realized that my lymph nodes were very swollen on the right side of my neck.  I went to see my doctor and he put me on a basic antibiotic called Augmentin.  I went thorough a round of this and it did not help at all if anything it got bigger. So about 3 weeks went by and I went back to the doctor and they sent me to see the ENT on Tuesday Feb 15. Within a few min of me being in the doctor’s office he examined me and took a good look. I then looked at him and said so what are we looking at, and I just bassically told him to shoot straight with me and tell me what is really going on. He said ” I know you think the route I am going to take you  on is going to be fast, aggressive, and drastic and youI don’t know what it is, but you either have lymphoma, a tumor, or a very serious infection.” So from there he sat there and typed it all into the computer as I called my dad and explained what the next few days were going to be like as we tired to figure out what was happening in my body.  Basically this is how the conversation went with my dad.

Me:’”Hey Dad”

Dad: “Hey Son”

Me:” Do you have a few min I am sitting in here with the Doctor”

Dad: “Yes I do what is going on”

Me: ” So basically I have a serious infection, tumor, or lymphoma. He has looked at me and it makes since with all of me being tired and such. He wants me to go and have a CT Scan done today of my chest and head. He wants me to go get that done right now and then I have w to go back and meet with him in the morning to get more answers on what is going on with me. We are going to schedule for me to have surgery on Thursday to have a biopsy of my neck so that we know exactly what is going on in there.

So me and my dad go back and forth for about 7 min talking about this and we are both kinda taken back and not really expecting that this was what the doctor was going to share with us today, but it is at this point I am just  let’s do this and let’s get this done. I dont know why I have to go through this and miss out on going on the trip with The Museum as we were leaving at 2 that day but I understood that God had a reason for it.

So we set up all the appointments and I hang up with my dad and start to go home. I had sent Caitlin(finance) a text asking her to call me when she had a chance.  So she did and we talked but it was then I think that it finally hit me how serious this was but I was determined that this was not going to get me down and that no matter what with God’s help I could make it through this.  I honestly think that I was just in a push mode and not letting it sink in for me yet because I knew what I needed to get done that day and really didn’t have time to spare. So, Caitlin and I got off the phone and somehow she went back to teaching this day. Honestly not sure how she did that but I know that she did.

After this I leave the doctor and I am on my way home and I get my parents on 3-way and we talk about everything and I go through with my Mom for the first time what is going on and what is going on today. At the same time I am driving home so that she can take me to have my CT scan done that day. I had that at 12:30 that day.  So we talk and my mom cries and just is really sad but we all kept the attitude that we are not going to accept that it is lymphoma until the doctor confirms this. So I get home and basically we turn around and leave at that point.

I go and get the CT scan done and I had to have it done with dye. For all of you that know about this it is not that big of a deal unless the dye doesn’t set right with your stomach and well for me it didnt so I made it through but not without throwing up twice, but that is just part of it. I was glad to have gotten the tests done so fast.  It took at total of about 1 hour there to get all of this done. So,at this time it is about 2:00. They had just given me the CD of all of the results and I go back to the car with my mom and I was like Dr.Weiss(ENT Doctor) told me to bring him this disk in the morning, but let’s just go back and see if he will see my today.

When I get there with in about 15 min we are sitting down with the doctor again and he is looking over the results and showing me where my lymph nodes are messed up and what he is planning on taking out on Thursday at the biopsy. That it is 2-3 lymph nodes. We talk and basically I leave very excited and ready to get this process going. The one thing that I tried to just keep saying and honestly believe is that God knows what He is doing and He has a reason for this. I am not always sure what that is or why He is going to send me down this trial but I know He has a reason and that if I trust Him then He will be with me and Help me to the end. So then the doctor offered to call in and get my appointment with the oncology doctor for the next week and I accepted because I wanted to get stuff moving as fast as I could if this was in fact the road that God was going to send me down.

So at this point we Go home and honestly I just kinda left my house to go see Granny and talk to her but I also just needed to get out so that I could think on my own because alot had happened in this day so far but I was convinced that God knew what He was doing and that He was going to be by my side. I talked to Granny and Mike and prayed with them and that was a great time for me. One thing I have learned is to never forget the power of prayer through all of this.

Later that night one of my parents really good friends came over, The Dystarts. When they came over we just talked for a little while. After them being over for a while we all sat down in the floor and we took a few min and just prayed for me and for my family.

This is just one of the many people that took the time to talk to me and pray with me on Tuesday as I was just beginning to find out what was going on with me. I am so grateful for all of the people that are supporting me through this journey.