I finally had a plan...If I chose to do the treatments at Sloan Kettering, I would pay out of pocket and probably be in debt for the rest of my life. So I headed back to the Doctor #1 because she was on my insurance plan. I knew from then on, I would be responsible for taking my health into my own hands. Previous to being diagnosed, I thought doctors knew all. Now I began questioning everything. Being proactive about my own health was one of many lessons I would learn on this journey.

My first chemotherapy appointment was scheduled for a Thursday at 4 p.m. I never thought I’d be spending a Thursday night at a hospital. Not knowing what to expect, I was on edge. I knew that the more preparation and fewer unknowns I had, the less anxious I would be so I asked the nurses to walk me through the process the day before. “First you will check in with Wally at reception, then he’ll send you to get blood taken. After that, you’ll go to Section C, also known as the chemotherapy room,” she told me taking me around the hospital. When the nurse brought me into the chemo room and I saw all the other bald patients getting their treatments done, I gagged. I ran to the bathroom where I threw up several times. I couldn’t believe that the next day, I would be sitting in the same room as these patients who looked like they were from another planet.

That night I went home and tried my wigs on once again just to make sure they were OK before I lost my hair. Mom arrived that night and would stay through the week to take care of me. Liz was still staying with me and loyally said she was would try to find a job in New York so she could remain in New York for the duration of my treatments. Tony drove from Boston, Molly flew in from Philadelphia and several other friends from New York asked if they could come to my treatment too. If it weren’t for the cancer part, it would have been a big party.

I woke up terrified the day of my first chemotherapy treatment. I lay in my bed for twenty minutes, frozen under my covers. I had been trying to remain so composed and positive around my friends, but I was scared. I didn’t like being alone because when I was, all my scary thoughts flooded my head. Could I actually go through with this? I didn’t know. I wanted it to be over so I could have my life back again. But to brush past this experience and be eight months down the road would mean giving up eight months of my life. That's not what I wanted to do. I knew these would be the toughest eight months I would ever go through but I hoped it would add a whole new dimension and appreciation for life. Eight months would be a long time. Gathering my courage, I looked at my ceiling and gave myself a pep talk. “I can do this and I am going to get through it with flying colors just as Doctor #3 said. I am ready for the challenge,” I announced to myself as I threw the covers back triumphantly. I was still scared but knew I could get through it.

I arrived at Section C for my treatment with my mom and five friends and because it was such a large group, I got a private room where I would be for the next four hours while the chemotherapy seeped into my arm. The room was fantastic – it had its own bathroom, a TV with VCR hooked to the ceiling and a fancy metal hospital bed. I would have to get used to this place quickly. We picked out two movies to watch, Tootsie and You’ve Got Mail. Uncomfortably, we waited for the nurse to tell us what was going to happen. My friends tried to ease the tension with their humor. “You know,” Liz said, “if you’re in here too long, we may have to wheel you out on the hospital bed to meet some men.” We all laughed nervously as the nurse entered the room.

From there on out it all happened quickly and much more easily than I had expected. It took her several attempts to find my vein. When she did, the blood came shooting out of my arm and into the tube. She hooked me up to an IV with a clear liquid. These were the steroids. After this bag was empty, she would put in another bag of clear liquid, the anti-nausea medicine. It took over two hours for these to drain into me. In the meantime, we watched You’ve Got Mail and were reprimanded several times by the nurses for talking and laughing too loudly. “You know, people are getting treated in here and they are very sick. Can you please keep it down? The laughter makes them feel bad,” the nurse told us. At the time I didn’t understand. How can they be upset at us for laughing and making this easier for ourselves?

Looking back, I realize I wouldn’t have been laughing so hard if I didn’t have such caring and supportive family and friends around me. Instead of being a lonely experience like it was for many of the others getting treated, the cancer brought us all closer together.

The nurse came in occasionally to check on me. My eyes were getting heavy from the steroids as the last drops seeped into my arm. Now it was time for the real thing — the Adriomycin/Cytoxin, or as “insiders” call it, The Red Devil. This was the hard-core stuff that would stop all the fast growing cells in my body. The result of this would be hair loss. Now I was scared. This was the beginning of the next year of my life. As she changed the bag to a red liquid, I panicked. “Wait, not yet. Are you sure this is a good idea? You’re putting poison into my body. How can this be okay?” She must have heard this all the time. “Instead of thinking of it as poison, I like to think of it as an army of red soldiers marching into your body to kill all the bad cells,” she calmly responded. This was a much better image and I reluctantly let her insert the tube.

Surprisingly, everything so far had been completely painless. This was going to be easier than I thought. I tried to keep my eyes open for the sake of my friends but at some point I must have fallen asleep. Two hours later, I heard someone say my name. “Asha,” the nurse said as she gently nudged me. “You’re all set. You can go home now.” Besides my nerves acting up a bit, I felt pretty good. My friends looked relieved. This would all change later that night.