I'm 61. Last year, I was talking to a friend at a meeting and my voice disappeared. I went to the doctor and I was put on antibiotics for a week. Then I went to an ENT specialist and he said that one of my vocal cords was not vibrating. After a CT scan, it was found that I have cancer in my lung and pancreas. I stopped smoking about 40 years ago.

My husband who is 51 was diagnosed last November 2011 as small cell carcinoma (small cell lung cancer) extensive stage. As it started in his upper lobe of his right lung spread to his liver. He started chemotherapy last December and we are waiting for the first assessment in January. We found out when he went for chest X-ray after he coughed and spit blood. He was suffering from bad cough for very long time that never went away. He was perfectly healthy and active and never thought that he is a cancer patient until the day of the biopsy lab result came out. We have no choice but to go for the chemo and follow his ecologist advices. The treatment is too hard. He stopped smoking right before the first chemo therapy. He is in a denial state till this moment that he is a cancer patient.

On a yearly routine check up with pulmonary clinic, an X-ray was taken. After CTs MRI etc, it was decided to have small tumor removed. The tumor was as small as a thumbnail and not spread. Luckily there was no other cancer. I do not expect any more cancer because all was taken out. I'm now recuperating.

My husband is 68. He never smoked and was in good health. A routine blood test and follow up CT scan and X-rays found tumors on his spine and a tumor in his lower lung. A biopsy was done after a wait of one month. He has stage four lung cancer. He has no symptoms. He has a mutant gene. There is a group of people who have no symptoms and have never smoked. They all have this mutant gene. He just started taking a chemo drug you take by pill. The side effects are less and you take it at home.

I have lung cancer and I am tired all the time. I have no appetite and sometimes, it feels like my heart is going to jump out of my chest. I also have bleeding in my stools and achy bones.

My mom was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer on April 9. She passed away April 26. She had been in and out of the hospital so many times for two years, always for problems with breathing. Since she was a smoker who had been diagnosed with COPD, it seemed that was all they treated her for. When I asked the doctor (at the hospital, not my mom's primary doctor) how it could have gotten so bad and we never knew, given all the trips to the hospital, he told me about a CT scan that had been done 9 months earlier. It showed amass and the radiologist said that malignancy needed to be ruled out. No one ever told us about this test. No one ever followed up on it, even though she was back in the hospital at least once a month after that. Also, in January 2009 (16months before diagnosis) my mom had been visiting me in Chicago. She became ill and I took her to my doctor who ordered a chest X-ray. She recommended a CT scan and I had her send the pictures to my mom's doctor. I took her to see him and he said it was just a shadow. Of course we were relieved but obviously he ignored a chance to get a very early diagnosis, twice, which might have made a difference. My mom complained of all sorts of symptoms that went ignored - back pain, head pain, fatigue, etc. She never had a chance. She kept saying there is something wrong that they are not finding. It is awful. We took her home with hospice care and it was shocking how fast she succumbed. I miss her every day.

Three years ago (2007) I had a CT scan as a follow-up for a nodule in my right upper lung which was found many years ago. I had CT's every 3 years or so. A mass was detected and a biopsy was done and the pathologist in attendance said that it was cancer. I was told that it was a small mass and that they would resection the upper right lobe and that I would probably have chemo and maybe radiation after the surgery. The result was that they removed the right upper and middle lobes and the oncologist said that I did not need chemo or radiation. My only follow-up has been seeing my pulmonologist every 6 months when a chest x-ray is done and about every other visit a breathing test is also done. He told me early in the follow-up that if I had a recurrence that it most likely would not be in my lungs. He said, and put it in writing, that there is no recommended follow-up for lung cancer. I have a problem with that since all cancer organizations talk about "early detection." I was very lucky with my first experience that it was detected early and removed. I guess that now I have to just wait until it is detected when it is beyond treatment. I find it hard to believe that there isn't any kind of follow-up other than a chest x-ray. I still consider myself very lucky, but I just don't think that I'll be that fortunate the next time.