Hello, my name is Meilani! Welcome to my cancer journey story. I'm very appreciative that you're interested in hearing about my life!

As a few of you may already know, cancer (lymphoid blast crisis phase Chronic Myeloid Leukemia) abruptly entered my life in November 2023 (but I could've had it 1 or 2 years prior without symptoms, I'll never truly know), but I wasn't diagnosed until June 12th, 2024. Some of my symptoms were night sweats, no appetite, feeling off balance, lightheadedness, extreme bloating, very swollen ankles and legs (made it hard to walk), shortness of breath, fast heart rate, double vision, and left side 'rib' pain (enlarged spleen pressed my stomach closed). I also had bacterial pneumonia at the time, starting from April, which I thought was a really awful cold that wouldn't go away (I had stuff coming up my throat a lot / phlegm, nausea, watery eyes, fever, stuffed nose, congested head (felt like my head was going to implode), etc.).

I spent over a week living in the hospital (on lots of pills, IVs, chemotherapy) to flush out the 580k cancerous white blood cells. I was then put on a TKI pill called ponatinib and given steroids, given 2 months/cycles of 24/7 IV immunotherapy called blinatumomab, then high-dose chemotherapy, 8 sessions of total body irradiation, and a bone marrow transplant on December 6th, 2024 (discharged on the 23rd of that same month). Between all of that, I had no progress in September 2024 due to blood counts being dangerously low, many more pills, tons of hospital inpatient stays, much medical trauma, and mourning of my pre-cancer life.......

Whilst it's only been a bit over a year since the time of this posting (August 24th, 2025), I've lost a lot. I had to say goodbye to my career, people I thought cared about me, my hair, my freedom before not having to take any meds, not having chronic and random pains, not getting frequent infections nor sicknesses (it takes a while for the donor blood cells to create a normal immune system).

I don't normally ask for help, but I'm kindly asking, for those who can, to please help me recuperate financial loss, support me in getting my vaccines back (transplant wiped those), letting me get my last ever bone marrow biopsy soon, and ease my mind when it comes to continuing the maintenance phase of this process. If you can't, I understand and would hope that you do share my story. Thank you in advance!