This is my best friend of 8 years and these are her real tears. Sarah has been battling flare ups from Crohn's Disease for several months now. Last week she was admitted to the hospital to receive treatment from a flare up and while several routine tests were being done they stumbled upon a new finding. At 25 years old Sarah has been diagnosed with Thyroid Cancer.
Nobody really knows what to say to a loved one when we hear the "c" word, let alone a 25 year old who still has her whole life ahead of her. Once the word became a reality for us I decided that we MUST turn this into a positive experience. Sarah has been kind and brave enough to allow me to document and share her journey with you all. She has given me permission to photograph her during the most vulnerable time in her life and is allowing you all to know her thoughts as she begins a fight through surgery, radiation therapy, recovery, and continuing her battle with Crohn's Disease. I know that I can ALWAYS ask and talk to her about anything, but I will admit that I was afraid of asking her to allow me to do this simply because it is such an invasive and personal situation.
Over the past 6 years my Photography work has been based upon happy emotions, getting people to smile for the camera, and making others look their best. This is totally different from anything that I've ever done. This time around we are entering a world where flaws are flawless, tears are beautiful, and raw emotion is perfection to get our point across. Here, everything is less vibrant and more black and white, which explains why I have chosen to photograph every image in such a way. I feel that black and white gives a much stronger presentation and visual image when emotion is involved.
There were many times after she agreed to do this that she mentioned that she didn't want people to get the impression that she's wanting a handout, a pity party, or sympathy. I totally get where she is coming from and out of respect I want to empathize on that for her. I am surprised that she allowed me to use the picture posted above, which I snapped as we were having a heart to heart. She doesn't wear her emotions on her sleeve, she's rough around the edges until you really get to know her.. Basically, she's a bad @$$, like myself (LOL). What she wants out of this is to educate readers about both cancer and Crohn's Disease and she wants to inspire others who may be suffering through the same thing. With that being said, let's begin Sarah's Journey together.
2 days after Sarah came home from the hospital I invited her over for lunch. I wanted to just talk as friends and she agreed to let me make it a part of her introduction as well. Sarah began having stomach problems shortly after December of 2013. After several ER visits and Doctor's appointments she was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease in May of 2014.
I won't go into a long definition and lecture on this particular blog, but for those of you who aren't familiar with this condition it's a is a type of inflammatory bowel disease that can affect the gastrointestinal tract from mouth to anus.[2] Symptoms may include: abdominal pain, diarrhea (which may be bloody if inflammation is severe), fever and weight loss. This also explains the skin rashes that had been coming and going several months before. She had good days where she felt fine and out of the blue the symptoms would hit her like a ton of bricks. This led her to feel that others thought she was exaggerating over the pain she was in. Between December of 2013 and her hospital stay last week Sarah has went from weighing 225 lbs. to only weighing 144lbs. Those of you who know Sarah know that she is not a small framed woman. I have never known my best friend to weigh this little and while I think she looks great it's not a good thing and it cannot go ignored.
When Sarah was diagnosed with Thyroid Cancer the Doctors told her that she had to stop taking her medication for her Crohn's before she could get surgery and radiation therapy otherwise it may interact negatively. This is another step back because the medication doesn't start working right away as it is, so once her battle with cancer is over she is back to square one again. Instead of worrying about all of that that I told her to come over and I would cook whatever she wanted. I made a yummy tuna casserole and bought some fresh bakery bread. I totally meant to take pictures of it, but we were both so hungry by the time that she got here, haha :) After lunch we took my studio lights up to my bedroom because it was time to talk and I wanted her to feel comfortable, knowing that I would snap my camera at any given time to show what the beginning of her journey looks like.
I asked Sarah how being diagnosed with cancer has changed her life so far in the beginning stages and this is what she had to say. She was originally diagnosed with a hyperactive thyroid during her hospital stay for her Crohn's flare up, so she thought that they were just running some additional tests on those results.
" It freaked me out just for the simple fact I got this biopsy done and when I talked to the nurses they pretty much told me that there was a 1 percent chance.. People don't get this. It's very rare cancer, so when I was in the hospital I wasn't taking it seriously because of what they said. A doctor came in that morning and asked if I got the biopsy results back from my thyroid and I told him no. He walked up to the computer screen and he said that he wasn't expecting this. He told me that the test came back positive for thyroid cancer with some masses they found. I was like, 'what does this mean'? He had like 4 different doctors in the room, so I wasn't going to cry with all of those people around. That's just not how I am. I told him that I didn't have any questions when he asked, so left and then I called my mom who was at work... I just started bawling, Sam. My grandpa just died of Colon Cancer in August, so Cancer.. the word Cancer just scares me. When I heard it I just thought chemo-therapy, gonna lose my hair, radiation..."
There are so many more things that we discussed during our visit. Some, I just don't feel are necessary to post out of respect for Sarah and some, I would love to save for future updates so that we don't fall off course with the topic of discussion for today. She has a Doctor's appointment scheduled for Thursday morning to get the ball rolling and you bet I will be there and I will be back to continuously update everyone through Sarah's journey ;)
Thank you, Sarah : For opening up to us. I know that this is way out of the way from how you are used to coping with your feelings. You are used to bottling things up (just like myself) and I appreciate and find it beautiful that you are doing it this way instead. I love you so much <3
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