Diana Santaiti

I was diagnosed with Thyroid Cancer in March 2005. Before this I was a healthy 30 year old I even had a routine physical and nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

It’s funny how things work. I was in a small fender bender in late February 2005 and I went to see a chiropractor to check out my sore neck . . . when he was adjusting my neck he felt a lump and he asked how long I had this and I had no. I sat in the room thin idea I even had a lump.

The next couple of weeks I as in a haze going through the motions but not actually there. I had met with so many doctors and had sonograms and a biopsy and finally surgery not once but twice since the first time they thought it was not cancer. I can’t explain the feeling I got when my doctor said it was Thyroid Cancer! I don’t think I heard anything else he said after that I just remember crying and saying to myself I might die!

I don’t think it really hit me until I was sitting across from my radiation oncologist saying wow I have an oncologist. I think the next part of this was the hardest I need to take a small pill and sit in a room for a couple of days away from my husband and baby. I sat in the room thinking I can feel sorry for myself or I can fight . . . I choose to fight. I was fortunate enough to have great friends and family to see the good in all this bad.

Today five years later I still wonder why this happened to me and how. I always thought it had to do with something environmental but I could never corner on what it was. After reading Joe’s article I feel like I have an answer on what has plagued me for five years. I hope that further research and studies can possibly wipe out a disease that no one should have.

Diana Santaiti