Ellie T. resides in the northern suburbs of Baltimore city, MD. She enjoys Tai Chi/Qi Gong, going for walks in nature, photography, writing, playing drums, and composing electronic instrumental cinematic dance music. Currently, she is working on an EP, which will be released in late 2024/early 2025.

Learning I had lung cancer 

In June 2022, I found myself getting sicker and sicker. I have a condition called Functional Neurologic Disorder (FND) that causes me to experience neurological problems when my body is under stress. Up to this point, however, I had never had significant difficulties. That changed when I started having increasingly severe mobility issues and even got to the point where I was using a cane or a walker to get around. I had several other strange symptoms, too: my eyesight changed, I had changes in my digestive system, I started gaining weight – particularly puffiness in my face, and my blood pressure was up. I had advanced-stage ovarian cancer as a child, and some of the symptoms I was having were reminiscent of that time for me.

I also started to have trouble breathing when I laid down at night. The only way I could sleep was if I propped my head up on pillows. One day, I started having chest pains, so I went to the emergency room, thinking I was having a heart attack. I ended up leaving before a doctor saw me because the wait was going to be many hours, and I was in too much overall body pain to sit there. I did have an X-ray while I was there, though, and it showed nothing. But even though nothing showed up then, I think that my body was trying desperately to tell me that something wasn’t right.  Ellie T.

My health continued to get worse from there. At the end of November, barely able to walk at all, I went to urgent care to avoid another wait at the ER. However, I was in such bad shape that the staff called 911 and sent me to the hospital anyway. At first, the doctors thought my symptoms were psychological and blamed it on the FND, but they did run a lot of tests on me, including another X-ray. And on this one, they saw something in my lungs.

I had a biopsy at the beginning of December, which confirmed that it was stage 2B (IIB) lung cancer. Shortly after that, in late January 2023, I had a lobectomy on my upper left lobe to remove the cancer.

Physical and mental recovery 

I really struggled after surgery. The pain was terrible, and I had a lot of trouble breathing, problems I still struggle with sometimes. I didn’t feel like myself again for a few months, and even now, I’m learning that I am much more susceptible to things like high humidity and illnesses since the surgery. If I get a cold, I go down hard.

My emotional recovery has been a little bit of a longer road. Learning that I had cancer again after having survived it as a child was devastating. It was a tough time for me. The thing that’s helped the most is turning more deeply into my spirituality. I pray more now and think a lot about what I want to accomplish with my time here. I had lost sight of some of my goals before my lung cancer diagnosis, but just being faced with the possibility of a shortened time here has made me more committed to accomplishing all the things I want to do with my life. I think a lot about what I want to leave behind, and for me, that’s music and poetry. I spend a lot more time writing poetry and writing and recording music than I did before my diagnosis. 

I also started a YouTube channel where I share my life with lung cancer, along with my music, because I have a strong drive to help others living with the disease. I hope that people will see some of themselves and their experiences in my experiences, and it will help them feel less alone and more understood. They can watch my videos and say, “OK, someone else has experienced this too.”

Finding support 

After my lobectomy, I searched the internet for resources and more information and GO2’s website popped up. I was struggling at that point, and I was looking for some help understanding whether what I was going through was normal. I signed up for the Phone Buddy program and was matched with the most perfect person for what I needed at that time. We only talked for an hour or so, but this person had experienced nearly exactly what I was going through, and they were able to say, “Yes, that’s normal. I also had those issues.” It was such a relief to speak to someone who could say, “Don’t worry, this happened to me too.”

Looking to the future

I want everyone learning that they have lung cancer to know that there is hope. There are excellent treatments now and hope for ever-improving treatments in the future. There is also hope for a great life. You can live well and have a normal life, even after you have a lobectomy like I did.

I get scans every 6 months now, and at my 1 ½ year checkup, the doctors found a spot on my lungs. They’re not worried about it yet, but they’re going to keep an eye on it. I am hopeful that everything will be okay, and in the meantime, I’m going to live every day to the fullest because what else can you do? I know that for certain.