Testicular Cancer Awareness

Testicular Cancer, just like almost any other cancer, is something you can’t mess around with. Any type of cancer is a serious issue and could be deadly if not treated in time. Cancer is a word that nobody wants to hear a doctor say to you or somebody you love especially when the words “you have,” are in front of it. Those words are the scariest three words to hear in a sentence from a doctor; I can tell you this from experience. Testicular Cancer is a rare cancer that is most common in men in their 30s and 40s, and some in teen ages. It can happen to men outside of that range, it’s just not as common. It is one of the most treatable cancers depending on how serious you take it. If you take action and do something about it while it’s still at an early stage, you can treat it pretty easily, but if you put it off it could quickly spread throughout your body. If you ever thought you couldn’t get cancer at a young age or it won’t happen to you, I thought the same thing. Then I got hit with this nightmare, it was one of the most gut wrenching things to know you have cancer. Always be sure to check yourself, make sure everything is normal and seems good. If you think something is wrong or not right go to a doctor. This paper will be telling you about my story some and things you should know about Testicular Cancer.Some people might not even know what Testicular Cancer is or anything about it. “Cancer that starts in the testicles is called Testicular Cancer” (What is Testicular Cancer?). Testicular cancer is a cancer that is not very known due to the fact that it is a pretty rare cancer. You can get this cancer at any age, but it is more common in teens, and middle-aged men.

Testicular Cancer, just like almost any other cancer, is something you can’t mess around with. Any type of cancer is a serious issue and could be deadly if not treated in time. Cancer is a word that nobody wants to hear a doctor say to you or somebody you love especially when the words “you have,” are in front of it. Those words are the scariest three words to hear in a sentence from a doctor; I can tell you this from experience. Testicular Cancer is a rare cancer that is most common in men in their 30s and 40s, and some in teen ages. It can happen to men outside of that range, it’s just not as common. It is one of the most treatable cancers depending on how serious you take it. If you take action and do something about it while it’s still at an early stage, you can treat it pretty easily, but if you put it off it could quickly spread throughout your body. If you ever thought you couldn’t get cancer at a young age or it won’t happen to you, I thought the same thing. Then I got hit with this nightmare, it was one of the most gut wrenching things to know you have cancer. Always be sure to check yourself, make sure everything is normal and seems good. If you think something is wrong or not right go to a doctor. This paper will be telling you about my story some and things you should know about Testicular Cancer.

Some people might not even know what Testicular Cancer is or anything about it. “Cancer that starts in the testicles is called Testicular Cancer” (What is Testicular Cancer?). Testicular cancer is a cancer that is not very known due to the fact that it is a pretty rare cancer. You can get this cancer at any age, but it is more common in teens, and middle-aged men. This type of cancer can be passed to you through your family genes, if somebody in your family had or has this cancer it is a possibility of you getting it as well. It could also happen because of a surgery or something you could’ve had as a baby. It is called an undescended testicle which you have to get pulled down surgically. If this happened to you, Testicular Cancer is much more likely to develop on that testicle; this happened to me. But just like any cancer a lot of times nobody knows how you got it. The cancer develops on one of your testicles or your lymph nodes connected to your testicle. Most of the time you are able to feel the tumor if it’s in a testicle because you can easily feel that area. In my case I could feel it and I knew something wasn’t right, but I didn’t worry much of it at first until the lump didn’t go away and I decided to tell my parents about a month after I first discovered it.

Testicular Cancer, just like any other cancer, has stages and types of it. There is seminoma and nonseminoma, both of which have subtypes and stages of them. Seminoma Testicular Cancer, is more calm and usually stays in the testicle and isn’t very likely to spread anywhere else. Seminoma cancer has more treatment options that are better suitable due to it being not so aggressive. This is the uncommon type of Testicular Cancer, and most common to men in their 30s and 40s. Nonseminoma Testicular Cancer is aggressive, and if not treated quickly could spread to the lymph nodes and up and throughout your body. With this cancer, you might have to go through really intense treatments depending on the stage of cancer. I have nonseminoma stage 1B Testicular Cancer, “In stage I, cancer has formed. Stage I is divided into stage IA, stage IB, and stage IS and is determined after an inguinal orchiectomy is done” (Testicular Cancer Symptoms, Tests, Types & Staging). I had to get surgery to get one of my testicles completely removed(the one with the cancer tumor on it). I now have to try to decide which treatment option I want to do, which I will tell you about in this informational writing.

With the two types of Testicular Cancer comes along a treatment option of some sort you have to do. “Treatment options and recommendations depend on several factors, including the type and stage of cancer, possible side effects, and the man’s preferences and overall health” (Testicular Cancer – Treatment Options). The first type of treatment you usually get is surgery to remove the testicle, sometimes they will give you chemotherapy first but it is very uncommon unless the cancer has already spread beyond the testicle. After the surgery, chemotherapy or radiation is recommended depending on which type of cancer it is. Once you get the surgery, the testicle will be sent to labs so they can perform tests and do labs on the tumor which will tell you what type of cancer you have. You will usually have a follow up appointment around two weeks to a month after the surgery. There the doctor will tell you the report on the tumor (what type of cancer it is, how big it was, what subtypes of the cancer you had). You will also get bloodwork in between that time to see what your tumor levels are, to see if they are back to normal.

Depending on the stage and type of cancer you have you will be recommended your treatment options. With nonseminoma cancer you will most likely be recommended the following options: chemotherapy, retroperitoneal lymph node dissection (RPLND), RPLND after chemotherapy, or active surveillance. With seminoma cancer your treatment options are: active surveillance, adjuvant radiation, surgery after chemotherapy/radiation, or adjuvant chemotherapy. There are positives to these and some negatives of all treatment options. The chemotherapy usually has a good cure rate and a lot of people will go that route if they have to; with chemotherapy also comes its side effects like, loss of hair, easy bruising and bleeding, nausea, tiredness and so much more. With the RPLND, it has the best chance of getting rid of the cancer entirely but the surgery is a huge incision in your abdomen and with that also comes along almost three months of recovery time. The side effects of that is possibly never being able to ejaculate again, internal bleeding, and infection. With active surveillance it has the highest chance of the cancer coming back because all you are doing is getting CT scans and bloodwork to just make sure the cancer hasn’t come back, the positives of that is no recovery time and you don’t have to go through anything very bad, the negatives are the chances of the cancer coming back are higher than if you were to do RPLND or chemotherapy. My cancer is Stage 1B nonseminoma cancer. My treatment options I get to choose from are: chemotherapy, RPLND, or active surveillance. I am not sure which treatment I will do yet, but it will also depend on what results show up in my CT scan and my bloodwork.

I’ve been told by a few doctors that “if there is a type of cancer you had to get, this would be the one you would want.” They say that because Testicular Cancer is one of the most treatable cancers that you can get. So with that comes the highest possibility of getting it out of your body or if it comes back, you can easily kill it off again, usually. Though I would rather not have had to get diagnosed with a cancer, I am glad that it was this one rather than a more serious cancer that would’ve been hard to treat. This paper is to hopefully teach more people about Testicular Cancer and make more people aware of it and what it can do. This is a small, rare, treatable cancer, but just like any other cancer it can be deadly and nothing to mess around with. No matter how young or old, how invisible you think you are, or think that something like this will never happen to you, never say never; I always thought the same thing but I was wrong and am facing a terrifying nightmare right now. Always check yourself and make sure everything seems normal, if something is wrong tell your parents or a doctor, don’t mess with your health. The doctors will do blood work and CT scans about a month after your orchiectomy to make sure the tumor levels in your blood went down and see if they can find any tumors. Sadly when they did this with me, my blood work showed that my trumor levels went back up to an abnormal level. This means that my cancer came back and I will most likely have to do three cycles of chemotherapy, unless it was a false reading and the next few blood work labs show it has gone back down. This is why you need to be responsible and do what the doctors say after your surgery, because if you don’t the cancer could come back without you knowing and spread to your organs and kill you. Always make sure of your well-being and make sure everything seems normal, if it doesn’t go have a doctor check to make sure it’s nothing to serious. I hope my story and information of Testicular Cancer is useful for you and those that surround you.

Work Cited

1. “Testicular Cancer – Treatment Options.” Cancer.Net, 6 July 2018, www.cancer.net/cancer-types/testicular-cancer/treatment-options.
2. “Testicular Cancer Symptoms, Tests, Types & Staging.” MedicineNet, 12 Feb. 2018, www.medicinenet.com/testicular_cancer/article.htm#the_following_stages_are_used_for_testicular_cancer.
3. “What Is Testicular Cancer?” American Cancer Society, 17 May 2018, www.cancer.org/cancer/testicular-cancer/about/what-is-testicular-cancer.html#references.