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Courtesy of Damon Young

My mom ended up being identified as having stage 4 lung disease in November 2012. At that time, she was handed four to six months to live. But she held on for a whole year, maybe not succumbing into condition until November 2013.

The woman diagnosis, while devastating, had not been a surprise. She was in fact a smoker for more than 30 years—from the late ’70s until 2008, when she quit cool turkey after she discovered that she had chronic obstructive pulmonary condition and was informed, in specific terms, when she proceeded smoking, she'dn’t endure annually.

While her wellness performed improve after she stop, between 2008 and 2012, she made many trips to physicians workplaces, disaster areas and hospitals. The majority of them had been pertaining to this excruciating straight back pain she’d usually knowledge. Sometimes she’d hear that she had a need to stretch and exercise even more. (Which she did.) Occasionally she’d get advice on her diet. (After she give up cigarettes, she attained a noticeable number of body weight.) Often she’d be encouraged to take a certain number of Advil tablets. Then, occasionally she’d be recommended having similarly excruciating procedures done on the, the absolute most agonizing being steroid shots into her as well as a spinal tap—both which intensified her discomfort in the place of relieving it.

And, after four many years of this, she had been diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer tumors.

It’s already been two-and-a-half years since my mother passed. And a lingering concern in regards to the final few years of her life persists in myself. A question we can’t escape:

The reason why had beenn’t the woman disease discovered earlier?

I am (obviously) maybe not a health care provider, however it would appear as if this could (and, perhaps, should) were detected before it achieved stage 4. She had been seen by doctors frequently, had a history that could have appeared to recommend lung cancer ended up being a possibility and had the sort of right back pain in addition often associated with that type of cancer tumors. Of course, I’m extremely mindful a youthful detection could—and would—have had the same outcome. But this acknowledgment does not make that question disappear completely.