By Sonia Duggan
At the end of this month, Lucas resident Cathy Haden will get a new birthday. After 53 years of celebrating one at the end of July, Sept. 28 will now be a day she remembers. The day she receives her bone marrow transplant. The day she gets a new lease on life.
The journey began April 18 when Cathy was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia or AML. She begins phase two of the fight for her life this week when she checks into Medical City Hospital in Dallas to begin the process to prep her body for her upcoming bone marrow transplant.
Cathy has been on a roller coaster ride of medical ups and downs since that fateful day in April when she drove herself to an urgent care facility in Allen thinking she had the flu. She had fever, chills and fatigue. When her flu test came back negative, the doctor quickly ran blood tests. Unfortunately the results showed an extremely high white blood count often associated with cancer. That’s exactly what the doctor told her.
“My white blood count was so high that my doctor said the only logical explanation was cancer,” she said. “They sent me directly to the emergency room at Medical City Plano.”
Stuart Haden, Cathy’s husband of 27 years, met her at the Medical City ER and once the couple realized it could be a very long night, Stuart left to pick up their 16-year-old daughter Lindsay so she could drive her mother’s car home. During that time, the hematologist confirmed her worst fear. She had leukemia.
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