I felt cancer for the first time

I enter the examining room and see 2 women sitting waiting (elderly and mid-late 30's). Assumption is the daughter brought her mom in for the appointment. I do a quick glance at the charts, listen in to the doctor chat and quickly realize the silver-haired elderly woman brought her daughter for her regular weekly checkup for palliative care. Mom is carrying a clipboard that carefully documents the medication schedule and her daughter's daily treatment routine. Her frail daughter, first diagnosed at 29, has chondrosarcoma. The tumor is cartilage and has grown throughout her entire abdomen. Barely even able to walk comfortably, the daughter says to me with a genuine smile, "Yes, of course you can feel my stomach. It'll help with your learning."


I'd learned about it in my classes - the investigations, staging, treatment, services available etc. for cancer. It took nearly 2 year, however for me to actually feel it. I felt it in my hands as I palpated her stomach. I felt it in the room as we chatted.

The experience definitely left an impression on me. Sure, it tugged on my heart strings, but I'm not talking about the "must hide!!! man tears about to roll out" kind of impression. It hit me how easily a perfectly normal person can suddenly fall rock bottom because of something completely out of her control. This young woman was diagnosed at an age just a few years from where I'm bound, and the dead-end to her path is more or less already determined. Now I'm even more irritated by fat-asses that sit on their couch and don't exercise - at least diabetes and heart disease is preventable. But that's a rant for another time.

My patient also reminded me of how often I will be seeing this in the near future. This was my first "oh crap, this woman is going to die...soon" situation. It was no doubt a Mickey Mouse experience compared to what the few years will throw in my face, but you always remember your first time with everything, right?