Yvette Norris’ Story of Fighting Multiple Myeloma

When I was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma in 2016, I was 8 months pregnant.  The news broke my heart.  The doctors were determine to get my little baby girl out and get me to start chemotherapy.  I was a very active, hardworking woman who was fit. The news took my whole family for a shock since I was the healthy one in the bunch.  Multiple Myeloma is a blood cancer that affects the plasma cells crowding over the bone marrow causing bone destruction among other things.  Multiple Myeloma is found in males over the age of 65 and more prone to African Americans, yet, here I am not fitting the description with this type of cancer.  While pregnant, I was still working full time in the body shop and walking my 6 miles a day.  They didn't understand how I was able to function with my hemoglobin being at 5g, which for a normal person it is around 11g and pregnant women 11-15g.  Again here I am not feeling anything different going through life with no worries.

Our parenthood start was not going to be easy dealing with cancer on top of it all turning our world upside down.  As a human one can only imagine the worst and fear takes over.  I was swilling to fight and learn all that I could to beat this for my little girl sake.  I took that fear and decided to become active doing research and learning all I can get my hands on.  We fought with the doctors on the decision of taking my little girl out early since she was healthy and I wasn't feeling bad.  They prescribe me dexamethasone steroid to lower my proteins since my cancer was critical 3.  I had two blood transfusions, one to bring my levels to norm and another one 3 weeks later before delivering my baby.  At 9 months I deliver my baby girl Alejandra, 5lb 4 oz.  I had a hemorrhage after but the doctor stopped the bleeding other than that we were ok.

After birth the doctors kept on insisting that I start chemo right the away and not giving me any other option.  I have always tried to keep me cool and not let my fears take over my emotions making it so overwhelming.  At the doctor appointments we would ask questions to better understand the process.  All these questions that we were asking seemed to irritate the doctor making him frustrated with us.  His tone began to change lashing out on me with harsh comments like “If you don't do this you will die!  How can you be so calm and not worrying about leaving your little girl behind without a mother?"  I could believe it he was using my daughter to install fear in me. By then I couldn't hold back the emotions and tears began to run down my cheek.  My husband and family had enough of this torture and we left.  We decided to get other opinions and found a doctor that would work with us.  He was able to do some more testing to make sure it was myeloma and then made a plan on a custom chemotherapy which we slowly began.  I was also able to do my natural remedies at home to easy the side effects of the chemotherapy.  7 months later I was drug free and slowly came to remission in 2017. I decided to skip the bone marrow transplant since my body reacted to chemo and I didn't see the need to wipe my whole immune system out.

In 2018 we moved to Atlanta Georgia where my husband is originally from.  I visited Emory for a quarterly checkup.  In March they came back with the results that my Ig levels were coming to a spike and that I would have to go back to chemotherapy.  I asked if there was a chance it could be something else but their response was not likely.  To better see what is going on I needed to do a CT scan.  Well, my insurance didn't cover the scan and I was not able to pay for one.  My Husband then designed to visit Doctor Cool.  He knew Doctor Cool for years now because he was treating him when he was younger.  My husband had mentioned him when I was first diagnosed but because we were financial in a bind and with a soon to have a new birth, traveling was not going to be easy or cheap.  God works miracles because now not only was I in the same state as Dr. Cool, I live 10 minutes from his office.  I called him and made an appointment to see him.  I told him my story and all that I have gone through with the doctors in Houston and he said to me, “Don’t worry, we can fix this.”  He was able to explain to me what Multiple Myeloma as well as Autoimmune Disorder were down to the cell, molecule, and the quantum level, and why I was lucky to be treated by Magipuncture, something that other doctors couldn't tell me.  He also shared with me how he had helped others with this cancer that were in worse shape and now they are walking with no pain.  He began to treat me once every week and in 6 months my MM levels began to drop.

One of the biggest reasons why we skipped the transplant was because we wanted to have more children.  We were just getting started when cancer came in to our lives.  Doing Chemotherapy is risking the ability to bare and doing the transplant is completely eliminating the chances of baring children.  Doctors were against the skipping of the transplant and said the chance of the cancer coming back was a higher percentage than without the transplant.  We prayed and gave it to God.  When I checked with the doctors in Emory about having Children, they advised against it.  Getting pregnant was going to risk the cancer to come back and they would have to determinate the pregnancy.  Fear again settled in and we began to think about adoption.  There was no more thought of having our own children in mind.  My little girl was 2 years old when I began to see Dr. Cool.  A few months later after many treatments, Dr. Cool said to me, "Are you guys planning on having more children?  You guys make beautiful babies."  I looked at him and said, "Dr. Cool I can't have any to do in my condition.  My cancer will come back and they will terminate it."  He said, "Nonsense, you will be fine and the baby will be healthy.  Don't worry about what they say they are just scaring you.  You are getting healthier so don’t be scared.  You are fine."  I couldn't believe it.  I told my husband about what Dr. Cool had said and our Hope was restored.

A few months later we were pregnant and I was still doing treatments with Dr. Cool.  My pregnancy was healthier than the first, because I was able to put on weight with this pregnancy unlike my first one.  I gained 20lbs.  My Ig levels spike a bit and my hemoglobin drop to a 7g but the doctors said I didn't need to have transfusion that I would be fine.  The birth of my son was normal with no complications or hemorrhage.  He was 8lbs 4oz, 21” inches long, a healthy little boy.  After the birth my hemoglobin came up to a 9g on the first month and I returned to see Dr. Cool for treatment once a month.  I thank Dr. Cool for helping us along this journey of ours and restoring our faith.  I thank God for guiding us to the right people in our lives and blessing us with an abundance.  Our family has still been planning in growing in the future.

Thank you for reading and God bless,

Sincerely, Yvette Norris