cml in family for Therese

[Guest guest]

Dear Therese,

I have family members with another type of leukemia but not

cml. My father had cll in 1976. He died in 1978 but of lung

cancer. The cll was under control. I was diagnosed with cml

in March 2000. 2 years ago my sister & a paternal cousin

were diagnosed with cll about 3 months apart. Also, my

father had a brother die of lung cancer, a sister die of

cancer(she had leukemia & ovarian cancer but don't know

which one caused her death) and another sister who had colon

cancer and cll. She died from the colon cancer. On my

mother's side I have a cousin with multiple myeloma--she's

had it for 20 years. Her sister was just diagnosed with mds.

Their father died of cancer in the 1950's.

I saw a geneticist last spring. He said there is no evidence

of hereditary factors with leukemia at this time. The

implication was that heredity may be involved but they can't

say. It's hard to believe that heredity isn't involved when

there's so much cancer in one family.

When I was in my 40's I observed that families were struck

by either heart disease or cancer. Well, it was obvious

which category I fell into. I'm in remission 8 yrs.; my

sister's cll & my cousin's are under control; the cousin

with myeloma is having a rough go right now, but she has a

miracle worker of a dr.; the cousin with mds is recently

diagnosed so don't know her status yet. So there's lots of

good news with my generation--we're in our 60's and the

myeloma patient is in her 70's, close to 80.

There's lots of hope in this group and lots of hope out

there because of dedicated drs. and successful research.

Hope you will be encouraged by all the successes and that

your response to treatment will always be good.

Best regards,

Ruth Marcon