Today I found out that I have cancer. Even if I say it a million times I don't know if it's ever really going to sink in that it's real.

About a month ago, in April, I found a bump on my neck. I had recently cut my hair quite short, to donate to Locks of Love, so my neck was more visible than its ever been. The lump was approximately the size of two big grapes. I hadn't noticed it before. It just seemed to show up suddenly. It didn't hurt and I decided to ignore it. I waited about three weeks, thinking it was an infection and that it would go away on it's own. Alas, it didn't and my mom's worried looks convinced me that I better go get it checked out.

The doctor said I needed to see another doctor to get it checked out further. He then arranged for a CT scan and an appointment to see this other doctor on the following day. When the second doctor saw it, he said the bump was pushing against my tonsils and he told me that we needed to take my tonsils out and do a biopsy to see if the bump was lymphoma.

My grandfather and another relative have/had lymphoma so the possibility of this type of cancer wasn't great news. Any kind would be bad though. The whole time I kept telling the doctor that I wasn't worried, that I felt certain it was just an infection. Boy, was I wrong! So, two weeks ago my tonsils were removed and my biopsy was sent to a pathologist. I was told that we would know the results in two days, but two days went by and still no call.

Well, I got a call today telling me that my biopsy had been sent to two different places and that the doctor had bad news for me, that I have lymphoma. All I could think of was how I had to go home and tell my parents that I have cancer. It was awful!

So, what now? Well, my doctor said another doctor would call me this week to arrange a time to meet and do further testing. We have to do blood work and CT scans or something like that, to find out if the cancer is only in my neck, or if it's all throughout my body since lymph nodes are everywhere.

I'm not sure how to feel right now. I don't have a clear feeling or direction of how things are going to go. I feel bewildered, a little sad, and a lot of denial. I keep thinking this is all a bad dream. For now I'm grateful for denial. I think it's helping me to cope.

I guess I've got to figure out how I'm going to tell everyone that I have cancer. For now, I think I'll just take an ibuprofen and close my eyes. Maybe this is a bad dream. I hope so.