Moffitt at first resisted saying things to me like "what difference does it make (meaning I was a non smoker and casual drinker) you have the cancer." Well it did make a difference to me finding out what and why I was being attacked. Back then HPV was as hard to find as a 3 legged snake. It was not even mentioned by my Moffitt team as a possible cause so I went thru the entire Tx wondering why I had a cancer caused by heavy tobacco use combined with heavy drinking. They even referred to my cancer as the "Old Foggies Cancer" describing it as attacking someone in their 70's who sat in bars all their life drinking and smoking. Their description, not mine.

So after I started to walk out of my Tx tunnel I for the first time went to the web and found another OC website and started asking questions. This site would take DAYS to get a response posted. UGH Then one day Brian e mailed me and said "Come to my site, it's better." I did and even though I was appx 3 weeks post Tx, found this site to be wonderful. It was also here that I was told of a poster's husband who was similar to me and tested positive for HPV. I was like...What is HPV and what does it have to do with his cancer. He was being Tx at Johns Hopkins and we traded e mails and the rest is history. Even before a recent study concluded that there may be advantages (stupid word here) of HPV+ vs HPV- SCC I felt relieved to know that my decision to quit smoking 40 years ago was not wasted. After discovering the facts about HPV I wanted to get on my soapbox and tell as many people as I could so that they would not have to go thru what I did to find out what was trying to kill them.