DANVILLE — At 27 years old, Lyric Hicks found out news that would forever change her life after she was diagnosed with a Neuroendocrine tumor.
“It’s actually like they think it started in my pancreatic tail, it’s moved to my liver, my lymph nodes, and spine,” Hicks said about her diagnosis. “Initially, I had gone to the ER (emergency room) because I woke up one night with extreme pain in my side, like I could barely walk or stand, and I couldn’t do anything without it hurting, so I went to the ER.”
Hicks, who is now 29, said that the doctors and nurses did what you might expect: addressed the pain and used medical tools to see what was causing her pain.
“And in the ER, they gave me medicine to calm it down and took me for CT (computerized tomography) scans, and after the doctor came in, he was like, You have a liver mass,” Hicks said. “And he told me from there, it could be cancer, but we are not for sure.”
She said following that, she went to Carle Hospital for biopsies and scans, which were sent to the Mayo Clinic, and that is where it was confirmed she had cancer.
Hicks said she had maybe a few symptoms, but nothing extreme until her ER visit.
“I would say, I was throwing up if I was doing car rides or really early in the morning, I was getting sick,” Hicks said. “But I didn’t think that was anything out of the normal. It was once in a blue moon.”
When she was initially diagnosed, Hicks said her medical team was going to remove the cancer, but they ended up not being able to.
“My first treatment didn’t work, so it was off the table after that because it had grown too much,” Hicks said. “They pretty much told me that what they are doing is to prolong my life; they told me I would never be cured or in remission.”
With that, life has changed, Hicks said.
“It’s kind of, I have good days and bad days, a lot of the time I am just tired, and I have pains here and there,” Hicks said. “I see so many doctors now, it’s ridiculous. Going from not seeing a doctor, maybe once a year if that, to seeing them at least once a month now, it’s a big change.”
Her back will hurt, she said, or she will get fatigued quickly, much faster than most 29-year-olds.
While Hicks’ cancer is terminal, she still has hope.
“Right now, I am going through a recently approved treatment, it’s a chemo-pill,” Hicks said. “It is just trial and error to see what is going to work for me and what is not going to work for me — they said they don’t really have a time limit for me, especially since I just started a new treatment, they don’t know how it’s going to affect me.”
Before her current treatments, she said she did one in Chicago that just wiped her out every time she went.
“While it is going on, you just feel nasty and sick, and after you are not able to be around anybody,” Hicks said. “That was supposed to be the most promising treatment that they have me; it worked while I was on it.”
Hicks said, however, that it did not last.
“After it was over, they did 3 months of no treatment, and it’s supposed to stay and last in your system for over a year,” she said. “I didn’t even make it to my 3-month check-up. I ended up back in the ER with pains again, and then the ER doctor told me I need to get with my doctor in Chicago to get the scans, it had grown even more in the time I was off treatment,” Hicks said following an attempt that did not work.
She said the tumor in her liver, “goes all the way into my pelvis and across to the other side. It’s massive.”
All of this is incredibly painful, so she has palliative care to help manage her pain.
“I do a lot of resting and lying down, obviously. If it is hurting really badly, I am not going to eat because it plays into that,” she said about how the cancer impacts her day-to-day life.
Hicks stressed living your life to the fullest.
She said, “do all the things you want to do. Go to that concert, go to that party, go have time with your family. The small things in life, the people that make you mad, the silly arguments — it’s not worth it.” she said, “Because in the end all you are going to have is your family and friends supporting you.
“There is so much to see in the world,” she added, “the one thing I would definitely say to do is get out of the country, go see the world.”
Her cancer is terminal, so how she wants to be remembered is something that has crossed her mind.
“That’s what I want to be known for, Lyric was so kind,” she said. “Lyric was always the person to go to to talk to whenever I needed help or someone to talk to.”
She is also aware of how tough it is on her family, especially her mother, taking her to the doctor appointments and going through treatments by her side.
“Everybody comes to the end of their life at some point, and I would say that is the one thing that when this illness does take over and I have come to the end of my life, I never want it to hurt anybody else,” Hicks continued. “I don’t want people sitting there crying and the whole nine, I know it is a sad time, but it is something that you have to accept.”
All proceeds from the benefit will go to Lyric Hicks’ medical expenses.
The benefit is being held at the Westville Legion on Saturday, Nov. 22 from 3-7 p.m. with a silent auction and food. Hicks said the leftover food will go to the homeless in the area.