In January 2023, I was diagnosed with renal cell carcinoma-clear cell (ccRCC). If it wasn't for the kidney stone that wouldn't pass on its own, I would have had no idea that a tumor had invaded my kidney and had been there for years.
There are only about 82,000 new kidney cancer cases diagnosed every year in the United States. In the world there are approximately 432,000 cases every year. It's not a common cancer to have. Usually the cancer sits there and grows symptom-free until it is detected during a CT or MRI for an unrelated reason / medical concern.
I didn't have a clue what I was up against. I had to wrap my head around what ccRCC was. The only way I knew how to do that was to organize everything about my scans, medical terms I had never heard of, test results, and advice from my doctors. That led to putting everything into a document that led to a manuscript that led to a book that will be published after my 9-month surveillance exam in mid-November.
I started from scratch. Hopefully the book will help other kidney cancer patients as well as family members and friends understand this uncommon diagnosis and what the prognosis is.
Illustration by Adobe Stock
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