I just lost my best friend to non-hodgkins lymphoma

nonnatoo
nonnatoo Member Posts: 34
edited March 2014 in Emotional Support #1
One month ago today, I lost my dear friend and employer of 34 years to Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. He was diagnosed in "05 when a small lesion turned out to be Non-hodgkins. He had the lesion removed and all tests -MRI's,Pet Scans following were negative.He went ahead with R-chop and rituxin treatment, and he had decided to go ahead with an autologous stem cell transplant, and contacted this site (Litespeed) for information about it. All was okay until last spring, when symptoms developed and a Pet Scan showed lymphoma cells had crossed into his brain. Radiation seemed to work with follow-up scans being okay, and arrangements were being made to go ahead with the stem cell procedure. But on 1/7/09 symptoms re-appeared and from there, in spite of additional chemo, he lost the battle.

It's taken me this long to even talk about it here. I know life isn't fair, and that some of us lose the battle but I wasn't prepared for Litespeed to lose hisl. I wonder why I survived endometrial and then kidney cancer and he lost. I know too that some of you on this site are struggling too. I loved him, and miss him. I hope that sharing this will help me fill the emptiness I feel. Thank you friends for reading this. Nonnatoo

Comments

  • slickwilly
    slickwilly Member Posts: 334 Member
    life
    Nonnatoo. I am sorry for your loss. When you have an employer who is also your close friend it makes for a pretty strong bond. To you he was proubly like part of your family. I had NHL in my face and did the chop+rituxin and 25 radiation treatments. My doctors were pretty straight forward with the fact that I would proubly get it back in my lymph system. But there are no gaurantees where lymphoma is going to show up. I also had a close friend that had brain cancer while I was dealing with my cancer. There is no way to describe how close we became while talking about our cancer, life, death, families and everything we still wanted to do. I would imagine you had this same close relationship with your friend. The pain will get better with time, but we never forget. I just try to make the best out of each day that he did not have. Bless you Slickwilly
  • nonnatoo
    nonnatoo Member Posts: 34

    life
    Nonnatoo. I am sorry for your loss. When you have an employer who is also your close friend it makes for a pretty strong bond. To you he was proubly like part of your family. I had NHL in my face and did the chop+rituxin and 25 radiation treatments. My doctors were pretty straight forward with the fact that I would proubly get it back in my lymph system. But there are no gaurantees where lymphoma is going to show up. I also had a close friend that had brain cancer while I was dealing with my cancer. There is no way to describe how close we became while talking about our cancer, life, death, families and everything we still wanted to do. I would imagine you had this same close relationship with your friend. The pain will get better with time, but we never forget. I just try to make the best out of each day that he did not have. Bless you Slickwilly

    thank you
    Slickwilly,

    Thank you for caring. It helps me to talk about it. It was a strong bond and he was like family. I will keep you in my prayers. RoseAnn
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