User blog:Waldial/Living Life

Living Life with Multiple Myeloma really sucks, yes you are reading right I have Multiple Myeloma and the doctors don't know how a person gets this type of cancer. Normally your body produces White Blood cells to try and kill any infections that you might get, I could go on and on about it but it will just as easy to put in this post the definition.

Multiple Myeloma Definition

Multiple myeloma is form of blood cancer that develops in the bone marrow. In multiple myeloma, normal plasma cells transform into malignant myeloma cells and produce large quantities of an abnormal immunoglobulin called monoclonal protein or M protein. The monoclonal protein produced by myeloma cells, interferes with normal blood cell production. In addition, the levels of functional immunoglobulins are depressed in individuals with multiple myeloma. Although the process is not completely understood, it appears that the functional immunoglobulins made by existing, healthy plasma cells breaks down more quickly in patients with multiple myeloma than in healthy individuals.

Multiple Myeloma is considered a blood based cancer in which it softens up the bones in your body and in my case my neck, it caused me to break my neck and I didn't even know it for 2 months I didn't show any symptoms of a broken neck. I thought I just wrenched my neck real bad until I started to get to the point of having trouble swallowing food and a very slight slur in my voice. Not being able to handle the pain in my neck anymore finally went to my family doctor where he had ordered a CT scan of my neck which of couse the insurance company refused to pay for because my breathing wasn't being compromised, but they did pay for an MRI which we found out that the MRI is more expensive than a CT scan, go figure. After the doctor looked at the results of the MRI still not knowing what was wrong with my neck, with that he referred me to a local Neurologist, who did do a CT Scan and after reading the results came into the room I was in and informed my wife and me that I had a broken neck. No going home from there, the doctor sent me directly to the hospital from his office, NO CHOICE because one wrong move and I could have been paralyzed for the rest of my life or worse dead. The next morning going into surgery the doctors decided to run some tests on my neck to try and find out how it was possible to break my neck and that is when they found the cancer on my what you call the C2 Vertabrae which is the neck bone that your head swivels on. With Multiple Myeloma being a blood based cancer it compromised the C2 Vertabrae enough that I broke my neck just by turning my neck to make sure that the garbage can I was taking to the side of the road on trash day wouldn't tip over and having clean up a mess. Needless to say I have Multiple Myeloma which the doctors say is at Stage 3 incurable, in which you can only put in Remission with a bit luck and a Stem Cell transplant. I glad to report that I'm in remission and to keep it I have to have chemotherapy at least every couple of months and take a drug that costs $11,500, thank god between the insurance and the drugs manufacture I only have to pay a $25.00 co-pay.

Sorry folks I will finish this post at a later time the pain in my neck is starting to get unbearable, so I'm going to take some of my pain pills and go to bed. Goodnight and thanks for reading my post.