The Backstory, part three

Post-diagnosis, I put my life back together.

I worked a night job at an offsale to make room for my new treatments, but also, frankly, because I was still a little nuts and completely unfit for anything real and daylight related, as I had proven earlier in the year.  It had been a dark time for me, and I came pretty close to throwing everything away.

But I didn't.

And slowly, day by day, I fixed myself.  I had ridiculous amounts of help from my wonderful friends and family, but it was still a slow process.  You don't just snap out of depression: it takes a while.

So I went back to school, three classes a term, to pick at my chem eng. degree while I was beating cancer.  I got eighties, I even managed to work nigh-full time for my first year back, until my treatment regimen got more intensive.  I still got eighties, even while on the heftier medical stuff.  It made a good story. 

Unfortunately, good stories need twists and turns, and I am currently supplying some. 

I developed a cough and a sore throat last December.  It was a really low level thing, but after it stuck around for a month, I got worried and went to a clinic.  I'd have just gone to my GP, but it was Sunday, and they were closed.  The doc I saw was excellent, discounting strep and mono immediately, but still swabbing for both.  We discussed my cutaneous T-cell lymphoma, and he ordered a battery of blood tests and ordered me to see my GP and my Dermatologist (Dermo, from now on) as close to immediately as possible, which I did.

I went to an Ear-Nose and Throat (ENT) specialist with two letters from my GP and Dermo, both urging him to do a biopsy immediately to rule out lymphoma.  He did not.  He took a look at my throat, told me he didn't know what was going on, but that it was probably viral, and to come back in two months if it still bothered me.  When I pressed him regarding the biopsy, he told me that he "saw no evidence of lymphoma."  He had done nothing but a visual inspection, and one cannot identify lymphoma on sight.  He did not schedule a follow-up.

I'm leaving names out of this.