I’d always been an overweight child, all the way through adolescence and into puberty, and it was only escalating from there. I’d also always had “issues” here and there, whether it was regarding my excessive sweaty palms and feet, which I had discovered was from my anxiety, or my abnormality as a growing girl. I started puberty well at the end of elementary school (5th grade), which had started a normal menstruation cycle, normal body hair growth, new bodily odors, which could be controlled with deodorant and showering. I guess you could say everything was “normal” all the way through middle school as well. I only started gaining weight as every year passed by. High school was when everything started going downhill. My weight was increasing, my anxiety worsened, my depression ate me up, will and all, I was in such a bad place mentally, and, little did I know, physically too. My periods stopped, even for an irregular menstruation cycle I was rarely ever getting a period, and when I did have my “period” there was hardly anything there. I started growing hair in places which might not seem “normal” on a girl,  and I felt so bloated and “full” all the time. Every time I went to the doctor with concerns or questions, I’d hear that I’m just overweight, until he “unofficially” diagnosed me with Polycystic ovary syndrome. I say unofficially because he never ran any tests, scans or ultrasounds. He only said that the more weight I lost, the better it would get, and for years that’s all I was told, and for a little bit it was true, until I really did lose a lot of weight, but I was still “swollen” in the stomach. I always wondered why I had lost weight, but my stomach still looked and felt huge. I couldn’t eat so much without feeling full, my digestive system was out of wack, and I couldn’t move, shake, or bend over so effortlessly, without feeling weak or in pain. For a long time, I ignored all these things thinking they were just symptoms of what I thought was Irritable bowel syndrome, lactose intolerance, or even just constipation. I put all possibilities aside, stopped playing doctor on myself, and finally scheduled another visit to the doctor since my last appointment years prior. I mainly avoided the doctors because I was tired of hearing how overweight I was,  but I put all pride aside and scheduled a visit. In my visit, he felt my abdomen, told me to stand up, lay down, breathe in and out, and lots of other things. In the end, he looked very concerned, and told us to visit the hospital because he was worried. As he was checking his chart, he seemed confused as to why I had been diagnosed with PCOS, but there were no tests or scans ran to back it up, I guess he had forgotten he was the one that diagnosed me years ago. My mom and I did as we were told, and went to the nearest hospital. Within hours and hours of waiting, they ran a CAT scan, and took some blood tests, and told us to wait for results. I should say that when we walked into that hospital, I pictured walking out, with good news, and ready to go about my life knowing I’m healthy and there’s nothing to worry about, but I started to suspect different when the results came back hours later, but I was asked to go into a room with 2 doctors and 3 nurses, that alone made me tremble, it was so hard not to breakdown crying, so I smiled because it was easier to hold than to cry in front of five strangers. The look on their faces didn’t help either. They told me they found something they’ve never seen before, “extremely rare”, they called it. It was a tumor. In my stomach, but it was a rare tumor they’ve never seen before. It was attached to one of my ovaries, and grew to be a heavy as over 7 pounds, and it took up the entire space in my abdomen. They said it had pushed a lot of organs out of place, and had probably been growing there for years, as it had calcifications on it, too. They didn’t find out until later that the tumor is called a Granulosa Cell Tumor, a very rare tumor, especially with my age. I had to have emergency surgery the next day to get this mass removed, so I stayed in the hospital for five days total. I thank God they found it in time before it could have gotten so much worse. They had also discovered that along with the mass comes a cancer type 1c. I had never heard anything so scary within a few days of my life. My surgeon took biopsies of almost everything she could possibly think of, and everything came back normal, but she told me that the tumor started leaking, and that could both be a risk for it coming back, and possibly even stronger. To eliminate any chance of that happening, they urge I get four rounds of intense chemotherapy. I am their first patient so young to come with a story like this one, I don’t know if that’s a blessing or a curse. All I know is that I’m terrified, worried, sad, mad for a little bit, and even confused. I was so many things before this happened to me, but now I’ve never been more willing to live in my life. For once in a long long time, I want to live, and I’m so happy that in so many ways this has changed me deeply. I thank God that now I know I’ve never seen life this beautiful before. My treatments start in January, my mom won’t be able to work for those three months because I’ll be needing her every step of the way, she is 100% my support system, especially that my dad isn’t involved in my life like that. She can’t do this alone like she has been my whole life, and as the oldest of her kids, I’ve witnessed her do anything and everything to make sure we have a roof over our heads, clothes on our back and food in our bellies. We love and appreciate all the help you can give, spread love and kindness, and happy holidays from my family to yours.