It was two weeks after my husband and I celebrated his birthday when I had a nagging, sharp pain in my belly. Pains like this don’t happen on a weekday, 9 to 5, during regular business hours. Pains like this happen at 3 a.m. I headed to the emergency room while my husband and 7-year-old son slept.

I told the doctors that we had friends in town to celebrate my husband’s birthday, and I had eaten a series of decadent meals. They took some blood and gave me warm blankets. The best thing about the hospital is warm blankets. If it were 100 degrees outside, I’d still take a hospital warm blanket. They did all the lovely, awkward pelvic exams to ensure I had no gynecological issues and then chalked my belly pain up to “age-appropriate” indigestion issues, likely heartburn. They gave me some acid reflux pills and sent me on my way.

I felt stupid going to the ER for something over-the-counter meds could have alleviated. A little voice told me, “You don’t have indigestion or heartburn. You don’t need those pills.” So I threw them away. But that little voice could never have prepared me for the news I got two weeks later.

I kept my diet bland for the next week, but the pain persisted. Maybe this pain was a pulled muscle or a result of too many yoga contortions? I backed off my daily exercise regime. The pain got stronger, hotter, and more consistent. I headed back to the ER.

“Weren’t you here two weeks ago for the same thing?” a doctor asked.

“Yes,” I yelped in between belly jabs.

“I had my appendix out when I was 30, so I remember what that felt like. If an appendix could grow back, this is what it would feel like,” I told the doctor, as I doubled over in gripping pain. The pain was unbearable.

So onto a bed I went, hoping the meds they gave me could quell the misery. Another pelvic exam. Another two or three blood vials. Another test. Another, another, another. The pain persisted.

The doctor finally ordered a scan of my thoracic cavity and pelvis. Into the whirring, dizzying machine I went, holding and releasing my breath intermittently. Little did I know that this would become a routine I would become very familiar with.

All I remember next is the doctor coming back to my room and saying they found nothing wrong with my heart or with my reproductive or digestive systems. He mentioned that it was likely that the tumors in my lower left lung were creating referred pain in my belly.

“Huh? Did you say tumors in my LUNG?” The tears streamed. The trip down the yellow brick road had begun.

“It’s likely not cancer since you’re so healthy,” he said.

Two days later I found out it was, indeed, cancer.

“It’s likely an early stage since you’re so healthy, and you have zero symptoms of lung cancer.”

Five days later I found out it was stage 3 adenocarcinoma non-small cell lung cancer.

Here’s how my diagnosis unfolded: My husband and I met with a general oncologist, while my sister listened in via speakerphone.

“What’s the prognosis?” my sister asked.

The cold, no-bedside-manner, resting-bitch-face oncologist shrugged her cashmere-covered shoulders and said, “Hmmph. Maybe two years.”

My husband slumped over in a defeated posture. I could hear my sister’s whimpers through the airwaves.

I looked Resting Bitchface in the eyes and said,“It’s cancer? I have cancer?”

“Yes,” she said, expressionless, emotionless.

“Ha ha ha ha ha!” I started laughing. I laughed right in her face. I laughed right in her permanently stuck, frowning face and said, “Well, you’re wrong. In two years, my son will be 9 and I’ll be dead? That’s not an option.”

Resting Bitchface showed a look of shock as I gathered my things and walked out.

Like Dorothy on the yellow brick road, I walked out of that doctor’s office determined to fight all the wicked things in my way. First things first, I fired Resting Bitchface.

That monumental day at the office of the Wicked Witch of Oncology happened in August of 2015. Six years later, I proved her wrong. Chemotherapy, attempted surgery, halted surgery, more chemo, surgery, and then radiation with simultaneous chemo. I trudged through the woods, the dark, the night, and ended at the gate of survivorship.

Cancer is a twisted road of feelings, characters, experiences, triumphs, and defeats. I hope I can carry you into the whirlwind of my experiences so that it may help you or anyone you know get to the Emerald City and know there’s hope, heart, and courage beyond the storm.

MyLungCancerTeam columnists discuss lung cancer from a specific point of view. Columnists' articles don’t reflect the opinions of MyLungCancerTeam staff, medical experts, partners, advertisers, or sponsors. MyLungCancerTeam content isn't intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.