My Life as a Jimmy Kid

Usually when people hear the word 'cancer' they think of death, or something along those lines. They assume that if someone has cancer that their automatically going to die from it. Sometimes that is true, others it is not.
I am one of those cases. Last year, around November 9th I was diagnosed with Hogkins Lynphoma, a type of cancer that is common in teenagers, and young adults. I was only fifteen years old.
When the doctors first told me, I was shock. I had a feeling that they would end up telling me this. Two days before I was diagnosed I had an x-ray and a CAT scan. Both these showed that there was a mass in my chest cavity. I had a feeling it would probably be a tumor, but when they told me two days later, it was still a pretty big shock.
The first thing that came to mind was 'I'm goinf to lose my hair,' the was 'Am I going to die?' Later I found out that many teenagers first thoughts were wither of those too, majority thought of loseing their hair.
My doctors told me that Hogkins had a really high curability rate, so that chances of me dieing from it were very slim. And the fact that they found out when they did also helped.
Soon after I started to go through chemotherpy. There were two types of treatments I could have gotten. One was with six months of chemo, and about three months of radiation, or one with about three months of chemo, and three weeks of radiation. I ended up going with the shorter treatment.
Those three months were long, I didn't go to school during most of them because the treatments made my immune system weak, and I tired easily. I ended up getting some of my schoolwork sent home, and had a tutor come to my house one a week so I didn't fall too far behind. My teachers also only graded me of the work I actually completed, so i managed to pass the ninth grade.
During my treatment I made a lot of friends through the clinic I went too. Our nickname for ourselves are the Jimmy kids. Since the vlinic we go to is the Jimmy Fund clinic, (the JFC) and there are toddlers, kids,preteens, teenagers, and young adults who are patients there we feel that it fits.
Whenever I went to the JFC once a week for chemo, it would always be painful to see the little toddlers and kids there for treatments. It always made my heartache. And for those of us who REALLY know what they go through its even worse. For those who aren't/weren't cancer patinets, don't truely know what they have to go through. They may be able to guess, or imagine, but they would never be able to truly know.
I always feel worse, because I feel I got off easy compared to others. There was pretty much no threat of me dieing, while others, some can't/couldn't be completly sure. In fact, back in September one of my firends ended up dieing. I knew he wasn't doing really well the last few times I asked about him, but still, hearing that he was gone was a shock.
All us Jimmy kids consider each other family. So losing one of them is like losing one of my siblings. We're one big extended family, and the JFC is our second home.
But there are some joys of being a Jimmy Kid. Every year there is a trip for the teenagers. They send about 20 or so teenagers down to Florida for one weekend for Spring Training. We get to meet some of the Red Sox players, get a private autograph session, and got suite seats during the game. Then in July they send about 20 teenagers to Detriot for a game.
While of treatment each teen gets to go on two trips. while I was on treatment I got to go on both of these trips, and many of the same people went of both trips with me, so there were a lot of friendly faces.
Through the Jimmy Fund I also get a lot of movie passes. One time I even got tickets for a Bruins game for my family.
I also got to go to a really great camp. The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp. That is one weeek I will never forget as long as I live. There are also serveral other camps for kids who have had life threatening illnesses.
Even though we have to go through a lot, there are always things to look forward too.
I didn't get to go back to school until after Spring Break near the end of April. It was hard going back to school after missing half the year, but I quickly got used to it.
Finally in May I was declared in remission. I was cured. For the rest of my life I will have to go back to the JFC for check ups know again. For the rest of my life I will be watched for signs of the cancer returning. Hopefully, it will never happen.
Now a little over a year later, I'm trying to help people understand us cancer patients better. Trying to tell people that we aren't much different from them.
Even us people in remission will somethings be treated differently. Some people treat us with sympathy, other do not know how to react. They assume the worst most of the time.
I can't speak for my brothers and sister from the JFC, but always hated it when people only talked to me because they felt sorry for me. It seemed like they were only being nice because they thought I was going to die (or something around those lines). It always annoyed me, and still does.
I guess it's true. In times like those you really do find out who your realy friends are. My real friends never treated me different. The worse they got was asking me if I needed to rest (If we were doing a lot of walking).
They didn't always asked how I was feeling whenever they saw me. whenever people I barely knew at school asked how I was doing I always wanted to glare and respone "Well, I'm here, so I must be feeling pretty good," "No, I feel horrible! that's why I woke up at six AM to come to school!" or something else like that.
I've been through a lot this past year, and it all hadn't been easy, but thinking back on it now, I can't help but be proud of myself. Now I've been trying to do whatever I can to help the Jimmy Fund, and to hel people understand us Jimmy kids, what we go through, and just who we are. I want to show people that we aren't really as different as some think, and that many of the assumtions they think aren't always true.
All in all, I'm proud to be a Jimmy kid.