A Day that Changed My Life Forever

A Day that Changed My Life Forever

By Meghan Siddons

Bio

Looking back at all the events that I have experienced in the past two years of my life I have noticed a common theme. With every bad event comes something absolutely amazing followed by something worse than the bad event before. Starting with my diagnosis with Zollinger-Ellison Syndrome I am going to walk the reader through that experience and show how being diagnosed with ZES ultimately ended up shaping my future.

Through these experiences I have been able to become an incredibly strong individual. Although it may seem unbearable at times to put one foot in front of the other I know that there is a bigger plan for me and that all these events are shaping me into the person that I am supposed to be. With that I hope you enjoy my story. Although this is only a small insight to my journey through life I hope that it helps everyone and gives them the strength if they are going through any sort of difficulty whether it be medical or personal.

Part 1

It all started in January of 2010. I was lucky to get four hours of sleep a night from passing out from the extreme abdominal pain that I was experiencing. Growing up in a house where you did not go to the doctors unless your life was on the line I figured I was just sick and so I just sucked it up thinking it would go away. I was under a lot of stress from a breakup with someone I was convinced I was more in love with than humanly possible and balancing two jobs and going to school full time, I was on overload. In early February it became too much, I was sick all the time, experiencing severe diarrhea and throwing up every day. I was losing weight faster than I thought was possible. My OB/GYN even said it made no sense to him when I went in for a routine checkup a few weeks prior. I went to my family doctor to see what was going on with me. After running a few tests they could see that the gastrin levels in my blood were high so they referred me to a specialist to look into it further.

I had no concerns walking into the gastroenterologist’s office that day but that was the first of many visits that would end up leaving me much more concerned than I had been up to that point. Concerning blood work led to a series of ultrasounds and a gastroscopy then finally a biopsy that would end up changing my life. My blood work revealed high gastrin levels and an abnormality in my white blood cell count. The ultrasound revealed a perforated ulcer located on the bottom part of my stomach and also a mass. The mass was biopsied and it revealed that I had gastric adenocarcinoma, stomach cancer. Unfortunately, that was just the beginning.

On March 1^st of 2010 I went in for what initially started off as a laparoscopic procedure to remove the perforated ulcer that was causing a dangerous infection in my abdominal cavity and to also remove the malignant tumor they had found in my stomach. During my surgery my doctor discovered that tumors had spread into my small intestine. Upon this discovery the surgeon decided that more surgery had to be performed then initially assumed. A five inch incision was made going down the front of my abdomen where the lower portion of my stomach was removed along with seven inches of small intestine and 15 lymph nodes regional to my stomach. A surgery that was supposed to be almost routine in today’s healthcare system turned into somewhat of a nightmare for me.

I received two rounds of chemotherapy following the procedure to try and catch any cancer that still may be present, where I fell ill beyond belief. The side effects of the chemo drugs, streptoxocin, 5-fluorouracil, and doxorubicin were too much for my body to handle. The treatment was starting to compromise my health more than improve it. The treatment was attacking healthy cells in my bones, which left me almost crippled from the pain. I was basically a prisoner in my own body staying in bed for almost three months just to recover from the chemotherapy treatments.

During surgery my physician discovered that my cancer had progressed more than he anticipated and radiotherapy was the most aggressive treatment other than chemo that my physician had to battle my condition with. I was tough, but I did not know how much more I could handle. The point in your life when you have to actively decide your fate is surreal. The chemotherapy left my body feeling old and broken and I did not know if I was strong enough to handle more treatments. I decided to take my chances and not start any radiotherapy treatments. It did not mean that I was giving myself a death sentence, but it made the potential for a bad outcome more probable.

I decided that sticking with the most basic treatments was the best choice for me, I did not want to undergo anymore preventative treatments for cancer that might have not be there anymore after the surgery; I couldn’t imagine fighting something and having no quality of life in the process which I was experiencing with the chemo treatments. So I started on my proton pump inhibitor my doctor had prescribed to me, lansoprazole. Lansoprazole like all proton pump inhibitors are very effective in suppressing acid secretion. These worked well for me in suppressing my acid levels. Gastrin, a hormone that stimulates the release of acid in the stomach, aids in the breakdown of proteins. Too much gastrin can lead to high incidence of ulcerations. My occurrence of ulcerations in my gastrointestinal track started to decrease as I continued to take my proton pump inhibitors.

As things started to get better, I slowly weaned myself off my meds. I wanted to see if I could control what was happening to me myself. Of course that venture did not work out too well in the beginning. Eventually I started to figure it out. I kept a very detailed journal of everything I ate and when. I started to figure out what foods didn’t work with me anymore, but most importantly I realized that stress caused my symptoms to worsen. With a lot of practice I became very efficient in managing stress so that it would not affect me. The techniques I used to do this were nothing short of a therapist’s nightmare, but for me ignoring absolutely everything in my life that caused me stress was the only way I could cope. Of course I was not able to keep that up for long before it became too much stress for me to ignore.

Part 2

Getting sick changed me as a person. I was still the same old fun Meghan I had always been I had just aged years in the matter of four months. After experiencing death so closely, I realized what things in life really mattered. I did not get upset about the insignificant things and I did not make room in my life anymore for those that did not at least try to mimic the same maturity I had gained. Because having a family was now of highest importance to me I only had one thing in mind when I was feeling better, fixing things between me and Chad, the one person I felt I could not live without. As predicted things started back up between us and I was happier then I had been in a long time. In October of 2010 I ended up moving in with my now soon-to-be ex-husband. By the end of the month I was pregnant with my first child. Of course I would not end up finding this out till later on in February of 2011. After three months of pure bliss we hit a rough patch and for seven weeks I did not hear a word from Chad. He had virtually dropped off the face of the earth. This severe stress caused me to get sick, fast.

By the beginning of February my symptoms were full blown and finally I went to a very overdue doctor’s appointment. In September I was supposed to go in for a follow-up after my surgery, where my doctor would check to see if there were any more occurrences of malignancies. But because things up to this point had been going well I kept putting it off. Because of the stress I was under I had been losing weight because I was unable to eat from the abdominal pain I was experiencing. They ran the usual test they did at every checkup including a scan to see if the cancer had spread since the surgery. The results were puzzling.

The doctor walked into the room with his sidekick physician assistant. They both had an awkward look about them. The doctor sat down and at that point I knew something was wrong. He looked at me and said “Well kid, I have good news and I have bad news.” I looked back at him and said “Lets have it.” “Well, you’re pregnant. I would guess about 14 weeks along given the size.” As he held up the scan images I had just gotten pointing at the small mass located in my lower abdomen. He continued “It looks like there are some cancer cells on the head of your pancreas. This is something we are very concerned about. I want you to go see your OB/GYN so we can discuss options but in this situation I think the best option is to terminate the pregnancy.” I just sat there in my gown, overloaded. He asked “Are you going to be okay with this one?” I replied as I looked staring at my hands in my lap, “I always am.” As he stood up heading to the door, he looked at me and said “You’ll be alright kid. You’re the toughest person I know. Get dressed and come into my office.” Still staring at my hands I nodded and took a deep long breath before jumping off the bed and put my clothes back on. My doctor and I did not have your typical doctor patient relationship: we were buddies. I trusted his opinion considering he is one of the best in his field.

The drive home from Buffalo was absolutely daunting. I felt like I forgot how to think. I only had one release and that was bawling my eyes out. There was only one person I wanted to talk to at that point and unfortunately he did not want to talk to me. I was caught in the middle of a devastating situation. I had never wanted children until I met Chad, now I had that chance right in front of me but it might end up cutting my time with that child down significantly. I couldn’t even consider making the choice I was being asked to make, probably because for me there was no choice in this situation. I always put others before myself and this was no exception. The idea of creating something that was part of me and a part of Chad was the most amazing thing that could ever happen to me.

I was raised Episcopalian and despite being raised by just my father, I was still brought up in a traditional household. Being raised in a traditional household it was my understanding that the only other person that should be privy to the news of me being pregnant was the person I created this child with. Although the situation seemed impossible it wasn’t because I had no idea what I was going to do or at least to overwhelmed to understand it. The only thing I could do was wait. For what seemed like two endless weeks, I kept my silence until Chad came home.

Sitting at the kitchen table talking on the phone with one of my best friends Rachel, I was trembling as Chad pulled up the driveway with one of his buddies. I knew what was about to happen. I had become more understanding and tolerant of how people acted after dealing with my sickness, I knew that most of the time people’s questionable actions were due to their own immaturity and lack of life experience. For most people they will never have to deal with something like I had to so I was not about to hold that against anyone and in this case Chad was that person. As he walked through the door the mood shifted. It felt like I was sitting in the house of someone that I did not even know. I just watched him. I can only remember feeling complete hatred for the person I was looking at. I went into the kids’ room and sat by the giant giraffe I had spent the past two weeks painting on the wall in what would end up contributing to our jungle themed nursery. Chad followed me in there asking me to come into the living room where his friend sat waiting. I was terrified but at the same time calmer than I thought I could ever be in the situation. Before I even got a chance to sit down he turned around and faced me and said “Pack it up. Lets go. I would have thought you would have gotten the hint after seven weeks.” There it was, everything that I thought was going to happen did.

I was gone in about four hours. Chad had made it impossible with his buddy there to have a private conversation with him, so I could only think of one subtle way to let him know I was pregnant. When I left there was only one thing remaining there of mine, a yellow post-it note stuck to a bottle of prenatal vitamins that I had left in the bathroom. It said “If you want to talk about this you know how to get a hold of me. I have an appointment set up for a D&C Tuesday.” Moments before I left I got a very sarcastic comment from Chad “Psh, what’s a D&C?” I was offended that he was making a joke of it, but then again it should not have been a shock to me for him to act like that and I just said “I am not going to discuss this right now Chad.” Only because my brother was in the next room helping me move my things and up until what I thought was that moment Chad and I were the only two that knew I was pregnant. I told Tom, Rachel’s husband, to meet me at the gas station right up the road. Once we got there I finally broke my silence and told him absolutely everything.

As Tom and I left the gas station heading to his and Rachel’s house my phone was ringing, it was the police. The cop on the phone wanted to know if I had mail of Chads and the mail key to the PO box. Not thinking I said no even though I knew damn well I had it. I told the police officer that I had thrown the key and what mail I did have in the outside garbage. All lies. Immediately I called Tom telling him what just happened. He said that if I got the keys and the mail he would take it back over there. By the time Tom arrived back at Chad’s house the cops were there and the man I loved was trying hard to get me arrested for having his mail which is a federal offense. Tom quickly intervened explaining the situation and what was going on to the police officer. He explained that I had a scheduled D&C for Tuesday because I was told I had pancreatic cancer and that I probably was not thinking logically with the amount of stress I was under. At that point Chad jumped in asking what a D&C was. Tom looked at him and said “Meghan’s pregnant.” Chad looked at Tom and said that “We have not had sex in two months, it’s impossible.” Tom looked at him and said “It takes more than two months to make a baby.” Chad was shocked; it was at that moment that Chad actually knew that I was pregnant.

After hours of explanation of what was going on with me and my situation from Tom I got a text from Chad. It was a picture of the bottle of prenatal vitamins I had left behind and a small statement that just said “We need to talk about this.” At that point I was not ready to talk to him. He had just made a fool of me publicly. I had waited all that time for him to come home so I could do right by him just for him to treat me the way that he had.

Finally I agreed to meet with him on that Friday night after I got out of work. So we met in the parking lot of Toys-R-Us to talk. I was nervous because I did not know what to expect from him, for the first time I was actually afraid of him. At first the conversation was awkward but I answered the questions he asked. It eventually turned around, after all I was in love with him and we even ended up picking out a girl’s name given the chance that it was a girl, Adison Kay Colyer. I was excited and feeling good considering the situation. We together decided to go through with the pregnancy unless the risk was to high that something was going to happen to me.

Up to that point I was still potentially dealing with another battle with cancer. I had one thing on my side, ZES. Most of the time tumor growth is slow growing in ZES patients. That meant that even though I was potentially dealing with pancreatic cancer I maybe had more time than your average Joe dealing with it. I basically had to write off the fact I possibly had cancer, at least until the baby was born.

My biggest challenge would be controlling my ulcers; that meant no stress. I already had some mild ulcers and I had to make sure they did not get any worse. I could take my proton pump inhibitors but I wanted to do everything right for the baby I was carrying and that meant no medications. I knew I could handle any pain the ulcers could cause me.

After our talk I was ready to see my baby for the first time. On Monday I called my doctor’s office and changed the appointment from a D&C to a standard first appointment. So there I was on Tuesday morning and fully equipped with a folder of paperwork my gastroenterologist have given to me to give to my OB/GYN. This folder contained all prior diagnosis and treatments of my condition and what I was currently facing, more cancer.

On February 22, 2011 I finally got to see my son at 17 weeks. He was beautiful almost angelic like and looked completely like his daddy in every way. He was perfect. I remember when I heard his heart beat for the very first time, like someone had just thrown me from the top of a twelve story building I was just breathless. At that moment everything in my life changed, I was now a mom.

Unfortunately, it did not look like this was going to be the easiest pregnancy. After my doctor fully examined me and ran all the proper test he informed me that I had two conditions, placenta previa and placenta accreta. Placenta previa is a condition where the placenta grows low in the uterus partially or completely covering the opening of the cervix. In my case the cervix was completely covered. Up to this point any time Chad and I had sex I would bleed which I found out was caused by this condition. My doctor ordered me to be on complete pelvic rest which meant nothing could go into my vagina under any circumstance. Being diagnosed with placenta accreta was really lucky on my part. Thanks to everything else going on with me my OB/GYN ordered a long list of test that normally would not be performed for normal patients, but my circumstance was different and for that I was lucky because placenta accrete can end up being life threatening if it goes undetected before delivery. Placenta accreta is where the placenta attaches and penetrates completely into the myometrium of the uterus. I would have to have a C-section upon delivery of my son and possibly a complete abdominal hysterectomy. That meant that this could be my only shot at having a child so, I knew that this little boy would have to be my whole life and I would have to protect him under any circumstance.

After living with my parents for about five weeks and slowly trying to work things out with Chad I was finally at a point where I was willing to lay it all out on the line. I made it very clear to Chad what I was and was not willing to tolerate as we moved forward with our relationship and with our family. Although up to this point everything I believed in my life had been one giant contradiction I knew that this was what I needed to do. I told Chad that he had one of two options going forward. I could either stay living with my parents and I would raise our son there or we could get married and be a family. I knew that despite what Chad had done to me in the past I had to try and be a family for my son. I made it very clear to him that I was not ok with moving back in with him, which he had been bugging me about, without any commitment. I did not want to raise my child in an environment that had no commitment. I know way too many women that have babies to men that promise them the world after their child is born and nothing ever happens after the child comes. I was not about to be a mother that gave my child someone else’s name without any commitment, my child was going to have my name whether it was Siddons or Colyer.

Chad made his choice. He was ok with getting married. Although my theories of why he chose that are widely varied I will never know for sure the real reason he made that choice. So after finally coming up with a name, Colton Michael Colyer, we got married on the evening of April 8, 2011. It was just his and my parents. I wore a tea length wedding gown and he wore kakis and a blue flannelled shirt. It was small and intimate and honestly I would not have cared if it was just him and I. For me that day was about committing myself to the man that I would love and be with for the rest of my life.

Part 3

It was just two months to the day that I had first heard his little heartbeat. My husband was in Florida visiting his daughter from a previous relationship and I was a few minutes early to work like usual. As I walked into the store I headed to the back to talk to Tami, one of the managers, about the visit we just had from one of the district managers. As our conversation was concluding we walked towards the front of the store. Tami walked to the front of the store and I walked into the office to take off my jacket. Unfortunately, what would happen in the next few minutes would be one of the most horrifying experiences of my life.

There was a free standing locker tower in the office and somehow it ended up tipping over catching me on the arm but mostly I took the blunt of it right in the stomach. I was pinned in the corner against the counter. I remember looking down and seeing nothing but blood pouring down my legs. Unknown to me and the doctor that would end up delivering my son the impact from the locker had caused my placenta, that was literally growing into my uterus, to rip from my uterus which caused me to lose a lot of blood. Due to me having placenta previa, when my placenta ripped from my uterus it dropped right on top of my cervix creating a plug that would not allow my water to “break”. After that point I do not really remember anything but screen shots.

I was in shock. After getting the locker off of me I walked out of the store with a trail of blood following behind me. I got into my car and drove myself to the hospital. I pulled up to the emergency doors got out of my car without even shutting the door or taking the key out of the ignition and walked inside. At 29 weeks I was clearly pregnant; a nurse ran up to me as I walked through the automatic doors. Everything was numb but my face; it felt tight from the tears drying on my cheeks. As the nurse grabbed my forearms she yelled for someone else to grab a wheel chair. She looked deep into my eyes almost like she was searching for something, for life in my lifeless body. I was trying hard to talk but there was no sound. I was getting panicked. Finally in a low coarse voice I said “The locker fell.” As someone ran up behind me with a wheelchair the nurse helped me slowly sit down.

We raced to the elevator where they took me to the second floor. I had lost a lot of blood and what I was experiencing is only something I can relate to what you see in the movies. My life was flashing before my eyes in still shots. It wasn’t just things that had already happened in my life but all the things that were supposed to happen. I could see the three of us in our living room all on the floor as I was holding Colton up trying to balance him on his two tiny feet. That picture was perfection.

Going in and out of consciousness, they put me up in a bed where they performed an ultrasound. Everything in my body sunk. I was screaming but no words were coming out. I just kept saying “Where is his heart? Where is his heart?” over and over again. I became hysterical; in a fit of rage, I remember trying to break out of the bed as two people pushed my arms back to the bed. I was trying to reach the wand so I could find his heartbeat. One of the nurses slid the ultrasound machine back as the doctor looked at me and said “Okay hun, it’s time to start pushing.” One of the nurses had come up to one side of me and grabbed my hand she looked petrified so I turned the other way and stared at my wedding ring. I wanted Chad.

In what seemed like an instant I heard a clipping sound and the doctor quickly turned with his hands held up to his chest so his back was facing me. He extended his arms out to one of the nurses where I could see him pass off a tiny mass that seemed to fit perfectly in both of his hands. I fell back into the bed as tears streamed down both sides of my face. The nurse holding my hand asked me if I wanted to see him. I nodded. She walked over to the other nurse and picked up Colton wrapped in a blue blanket. She set him in my left arm. I rubbed his cheek with my forefinger. In front of me was a little gray baby. On one side of his face veins were very prominent, he looked cold. I held him close to me trying to warm up his lifeless body and I kissed his little forehead and whispered “I love you.”