I woke up to the sound of my breakfast tray being delivered. As my senses came to me, I was disappointed to find I wasn't in my own bed, and that the past week hadn't been some vivid dream. Unenthusiastically I picked at my toast, but the rest of the tray's contents had no appeal. This wasn't entirely unusual for me, I had never been one to eat much in the morning. However I did notice my appetite had started to wane, wether it was from illness or nerves (probably a combination of both). Looking around, the room seemed to mimic the way I was feeling. A dull and dated print was hung, as a frail attempt to brighten things up; the dreary beige paint was cracked and sloughing off the walls in places, as if it wanted to escape as badly as I did. It was worn out and tired, and so was I.
     
    I was scheduled to have a Hickman catheter put in later that day. Which is a semi-permanent alternative to being jabbed with a needle every time you need to be hooked up to an I.V. (when you're doing chemo that's a lot). Essentially they surgically insert a tube into one of your veins. Most commonly they put it in your chest and route it into a vein in your neck. It might not sound very pleasant, but it's a minor procedure; those things are a godsend when you think about the alternative. One small surgery that leaves a minor scar when they remove it.; compared to literally being stabbed with an I.V. needle hundreds of times, leaving an equal amount of scars all over your arms and hands.
    
    While I was waiting the doctor came to visit me, but not to explain the procedure to me like I had expected. Instead she told me that the oncologists from the Health Science Centre and the Janeway Children's Hospital had met and discussed my case. They had decided that since A.L.L. is primarily a childhood cancer and the Janeway team were more experienced in treating it, I would be transferred into their care. This news caught me off guard, I wasn't sure what to think. I would be going form being surrounded by mainly elderly people, to a place where most patients weren't even in high school. It didn't really seem like either place was a fit for me, and for the first time I started to feel alone.

    It's not uncommon for cancer patients to feel isolated. Unless they've gone through it themselves, it's difficult for friends and family to be able to relate to what you're dealing with. I think this is an issue that young adults with cancer deal with especially, because so few of their peers will go through the same thing. I can count on one hand the number of people I know who were within a few years of my age, and went through treatments the same time as I did; None of them  were from my group of friends in high school, so at times I did feel like a bit of an outcast. 

    However, there are programs out there geared towards helping young adult cancer patients deal with these feelings. I failed to take advantage of them until recently (mostly because I couldn't get up the courage to go), but now that I have it's actually helped me more than you can imagine. One example of an organization doing a lot to help out people like myself is Young Adult Cancer Canada, or YACC for short. It was started up by a guy right here in Newfoundland, Geoff Eaton in 2000. They have a number of programs that help connect young adults who've been afflicted by cancer with others like them. I recently attended one of these programs, and it was great to be surrounded by a group of people who really get it. So if you get the chance to take part in one of their programs or something similar, take the leap. You won't regret it, I promise. 

Thanks for reading this weeks entry, have an awesome day!

Jordan.