Angela A.

Diagnosis: Osteosarcoma of the left femur, metastatic to lung, August 14, 1996
Treatment: Chemotherapy (Methotrexate, Adriamycin and Cisplatin, Bleomycin, Cytoxan, Dactinomycin); allograft with donor bone; bilateral Thoracotomy

Diagnosis: Osteosarcoma in the lung, Sept. 16, 1999
Treatment: Thoracotomy, right lung, Oct. 12, 1999

Profession: Marketing Coordinator at Boston Scientific

In March I'd been to Aruba with a girlfriend. On the plane home, I felt like I'd pulled a muscle in my groin. I thought it was from dancing too much or riding waves. Eventually, the pain got worse and I began to limp. In July, I was playing softball. I hit the ball, ran to first base and felt a stabbing pain in my upper thigh.

The following Monday I went to my doctor who gave me a prescription for the pain. I took it for three days but the pain worsened. The doctor said to take a different pain medication but I decided to try a chiropractor instead.

Five weeks later I was lying in bed, massaging what I thought was a muscle strain, and I felt a lump. The next morning I saw my doctor's partner, Alan Cole, who immediately sent me for an X-ray. When I finished, the X-ray receptionist said, "Why don't you bring these up to your doctor." I knew that wasn't a good sign. Dr. Cole told me that there was an abnormality in the bone and that he wanted to do a bone scan and a blood test. I did that the next day. I could see on the monitor a big, white shiny area at my hip. The doctor said, "You're worried it's cancer." I had just turned 28. I hadn't thought of cancer. I said, "I guess." The next morning I had the MRI. That afternoon Dr. Cole called and said, "I made an appointment for you with Dr. Mankin at Mass. General Hospital." When I called to get directions to Dr. Mankin's, the machine picked up, and all I heard was, "Thank you for calling the orthopedic oncology department..."

August 14, 1996, my friends Kelley and Wendelin and I went to Dr. Mankin's exam room. I was sitting on the table; he had already looked at the films. He had his hands on my knees and he said, "It's bad. We're not sure what it is. Most likely it's osteosarcoma - but you won't lose your leg. The one thing you will lose is the knowledge that you're going to live forever, and at your age you shouldn't have to lose that."

Since I've been diagnosed, I've said that if anyone had to tell me I had cancer, I am so glad it was Dr. Mankin. From the minute he told me, he never let me think I would not survive. After all my tests, I went back to Dr. Mankin's office. He said, "It is osteosarcoma. I've set you up with Dave Harmon, an oncologist." Dr. Mankin said it was a form of bone cancer and he said, "Don't worry. We're going to take care of you."

My friends and I ran into Dr. Mankin again on the way out and I said, "Can I go have a drink or two?" He said, "Yes, just wait until later to take the Percocet." He took my face in his hands and said, "I'm not going to let anything happen to you; you're part of my family now." We went and got drunk at Harvard Gardens, a bar across the street, and gave it a new name - Chemo Bar. The next morning I went into my manager's office. He sat me down with disability papers and a box of tissues and said, "You've got to get well and whenever you want to come back to work, your job will be here for you." I was out for 14 months and they held my job. I never had to worry about my job. They had faith that I was coming back, and that gave me strength.

I was diagnosed on the 14th; on the 15th, I went to my office, settled everything, got a very short hair cut (in support, my friend Wendelin cut hers too), and on the 16th, I met Dr. Ned Sharpless, my oncology fellow, who looks like a young Harrison Ford. (To this day, that's what I call him.) He said I'd probably have nine months of chemotherapy. I started chemo the next day. Dr. Mankin said first they'd shrink the tumor with chemo and then I'd have the surgery and later, more chemo. My parents met my doctors and thought they were wonderful.

I did fine with my first treatment, but later I spiked a fever and had some other issues. My hair started falling out the day I was picking up my wig. My dad shaved my head with an electric buzzer. I showered, put a towel around my head and didn't look in the mirror. I put on a hat and still didn't look.

My wig was beautiful. Just after I picked it up, a friend and I were driving back home, two guys pulled up next to us, staring. I said to Suzanne, "What do you think he'd do if I took off this wig?" We cracked up. But I kept the hair on.

After my first treatment, I had a CT-scan of my lungs and was told I had multiple nodules on my lungs. I asked Dr. Harmon, "Am I going to live?" He said, "Yes, I think so." An ultrasound showed a mass on the supra vena cava, and that I also had a hole between the two sides of my heart, apparently there since birth. A scab had formed, broken off and gone through that hole and produced problems with my speech, like a mini stroke. They did another ultrasound right before my leg surgery and that mass was gone, which was probably the first sign to me that chemo was working and probably worth it.

I had the allograft surgery, when I got the donor bone on Nov. 1. I was in the hospital 18 days. Two days later, I was back in the hospital for chemo. By this time I had dropped 20 pounds, down to 102 or 103 and I'm five feet seven and 135 is my normal weight. I only wore baggy sweats so I didn't have to see how skinny I'd become. I went in for chemo expecting an overnight stay but it turned into a five-day stay. That was probably when I started my emotional decline. I was sick of everything. My nurses were great. They knew I couldn't tolerate the smell of food so they tried to put me in a private room or with someone who couldn't eat either. Saltines and Ginger Ale were all I ate, if that. I'd go home for three weeks and then come back for more chemo. I did that for six months. By February or March it was awful. I wasn't eating anything. Meg Storer, one of the nurses on Ellison 14, told me about Megace, an appetite enhancer. She said, "You have to start taking it and you've got to eat. And you need Prozac." I resisted both at first, but soon I started taking them. A couple of days later, I started eating. I probably gained six pounds in three weeks. Every three weeks when I came to the hospital, I was five, 10 pounds heavier than the last time.

In April, I started out-patient chemotherapy, BCD, which wasn't as toxic. I had my last treatment July 17, 1997. They operated on my lungs on August 29, 1997 and found no cancer but did find some scar tissue. I stopped taking all medication, and I went back to work. Although I was tired at the end of the day, I was energized by being alive and being with my friends, family and co-workers. A couple of years later, I needed a hip replacement. The femoral head was pushing through the hip socket. I had that surgery five months ago and now I'm walking almost without a limp. I had physical therapy, and I walked a lot. I won't ever be able to run because of the allograft. (But I was never much of a runner anyway!)

A few months ago they noticed a nodule on my right lung so they went in and removed it. It was osteosarcoma. When I woke up after the surgery, Dr. John Wain said, "We got clean margins; there was nothing else there." I used to lie awake nights thinking, "What if it comes back..." The night Dr. Harmon told me they had to take the nodules out, I slept like a baby, thinking, "Now they're going to take care of me."

I can't change what's going to happen. I do what I can for myself: I don't smoke and I try to eat well. And I go with the flow. I've always been a pretty happy person, and that hasn't changed. I don't say, "Why me?" Because, why not me? I've had a longer life than a 2-year-old who's bald and knows what methotrexate is. Why her? Of course I don't choose to have cancer. But I wouldn't change anything I've learned from this experience. Someone asked me how I felt when I turned 30, and the only thing I could say was "happy to be alive."