By Sym Posey | The Birmingham Times
When Aniayah Brown, 24, began her graduate studies at The University of Alabama (UA) School of Social Work she was prepared for the challenges that faced many her age.
She knew the stress of being a college student and having a job as an employee for a retail store but there was something she wasn’t prepared for — a cancer diagnosis.
Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Cancer Awareness week is April 5 – April 11 and created to raise awareness about the unique challenges that AYA cancer survivors face each day and to show how their community can help.
That’s what Brown, who began UA’s graduate program during the summer of 2022, has been doing as someone who was diagnosed with, and survived, Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer that affects the lymphatic system which is a part of the body’s germ-fighting and disease-fighting immune system.
“It’s a categorized as a type of blood cancer. It affects your lymphatic system, your blood depending on where it is. Mine was in my stomach, my spleen, and basically underneath the right side of my body,” she told The Birmingham Times.
“There’s not much awareness about Hodgkin lymphoma,” she continued. “I never want to stop talking about blood cancers. They are very under talked about. While I was looking for loans and grants from different places, most of them targeted well-known cancers like leukemia. Where’s that help for other people?”
“Something Was Off”
Brown described what led to her diagnosis.
“Everything was good going through my first year (of grad school),” she said. It wasn’t until April 2023 that she recalled something was off during a school trip to Washington D.C.
“I had just celebrated my birthday. We were coming to the close of my first year and I remember had an anxiety attack at one the events … I come back, and I realize I’m super irritable, everything is getting on my nerves. Even the stuff that I deal with every day, it was really working my nerves. I started feeling really overwhelmed so I started talking to my therapist.”
In prior therapy sessions, Brown had discussed a potential ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) but then I started feeling super tired. I couldn’t finish a meal. I wanted nothing but water and I was falling asleep at the drop of a hat.”
After a fainting spell at work [my godfather] was like let’s just go to the doctor and make sure that everything is okay.”
“The first red flag came when they ask to do an EKG. My doctor told me that my heart rate was little elevated, and she gave me medication, and did my blood work.”
“My Blood Count Was Low”
Brown remembers she wasn’t even gone from the hospital for an hour when her doctor called and said “my blood count was low,” and her doctor personally called the ER.
“She said I need you to go today and tell them what is going on, so you can get a blood transfusion,” said Brown.
“I’ll never forget that day. It was Friday, April 21, 2023, I called my mom and a couple other people and told them what was going on. I packed a bag with all my school stuff because it was towards the end of the semester, grabbed some food and headed to the ER.”
“I get there. They check me in. They get me to the back, they talk to me, redo my blood work. They said I really needed a transfusion and fluids. Next thing you know, they’ve started IVs in both arms. One for transfusion, one for fluids.”
Brown was admitted into the hospital where she thought she would be just for a night but turned into a week’s stay in the hospital.
Within the week, Brown’s doctors would confirm the reason for her fever, rapid heart rate, and swollen lymph nodes — [Hodgkin] lymphoma,” said Brown.
Normal Life As Possible
By May, Brown was in her first rounds of chemotherapy.
“I ended up having to take an incomplete for all of my [grad]classes except for one.” Brown continued to live in Tuscaloosa despite being urged by friends and family to move back to Birmingham.
“Everybody kept asking was I going to take a break for school, and I said ‘no.’ I wanted my life to be as normal as it possibly can be. I didn’t want to just stop everything.”
Prior to her diagnosis, Brown worked at a furniture store part time.
“I stopped working, because it was just too much on my body, but I stayed in school. Over the summer, I had chemo every 21 days once a month for six months from May until September.
“My mom always came down every week I had chemo . She would stay with me for the entire week. She would help me prepare my house by making sure it was clean and that we had food before I had treatment because afterwards I wouldn’t feel good. “
After completing chemotherapy in September 2023 and a follow-up scan, Brown’s spleen was still enlarged. “It concerned my oncologist who suggested radiation for it,” said Brown
From October to November, Brown underwent radiation treatments.
“Cancer affects every part of life, whether you think it does or not. It’s frustrating because you don’t have time to get used to one change before another one is happening. I didn’t have time to adjust to the fact that I’m not working before I had to focus on the fact that now I have to deal with being sick from my chemotherapy and that my hair is falling out.
“On top of not working and trying to figure out where my next money is coming from. The entire time I was sick I didn’t have a job. I applied for disability in June of 2023. I didn’t hear back from disability about my approval until March 2024.
UA had special grants and things, other people were helping me out, my mom was helping me out, and refund checks from school. I never knew where money was coming from or where my next opportunity for cash was going to be,” said Brown.
Unique Challenges
Today, Brown still resides in Tuscaloosa. She is currently working as a mental health social worker and though she has some lingering symptoms she wants people to know about the unique challenges that Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) cancer survivors face each day.
“People aren’t used to seeing young people get cancer. Cancer in young people and adolescents are very underrepresented. Either you’re a child with cancer, you’re really old, or you’re a woman with breast cancer. There’re so many different cancers out there that effect so many different people,” she said. “I had stage 3.”
With Hodgkin lymphoma Awareness Month in September finding merchandise to represent what she was going through was proven difficult, she said. “Nobody really talks about it …”
Brown is doing her part during Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Cancer Awareness week by telling her story so she can bring more attention to cancer patients and survivors like herself.
