A 22-year-old woman was surprised to learn her lack of fatigue despite not sleeping was a symptom of two cancerous tumors growing in her kidneys.
According to ABC News, Cristina Speirs was a senior in college when she began experience frequent urges to urinate in the middle of the night. Speirs was an active woman, who kept hydrated and exercised six days a week to keep her body healthy.
Speirs eventually started feeling like she had more energy than usual. The boost of energy didn't concern her, even though she wasn't sleeping through the night.
However, Speirs became concerned when her annual checkup in fall of 2012 showed her everything was normal, except her blood pressure was extremely high.
"That really freaked me out because them not knowing what's wrong with me -- they're doctors, you know?" Speirs told ABC.
Speirs heart was healthy, but a sonogram of her kidneys revealed she had one large, combined kidney instead of two "normal" ones. Upon undergoing an MRI, Speirs learned she actually had normal kidneys, but what the technician saw was a 10-cenimeter tumor, according to ABC.
Speirs was scheduled for surgery on Oct. 31, 2012, but Superstorm Sandy hit two days earlier and left New York City without power. Doctors canceled most of their surgeries at the NYU Langone Medical Center, where Spiers should have gotten hers, but her doctor William Inabnet scrambled to get the staff on her case.
"We had to really negotiate and find a team that could staff the case," Inabnet told ABC, adding that "he needed nurses, anesthesiologists and others to operate."
Inabnet was able to round up the necessary team to perform Spiers surgery, and was able to remove Speirs' stage 2 cancer tumor. Her cancer is called adrenal cortical carcinoma, and it is extremely rare. Spiers is now cancer-free since the surgery.
"I didn't even care that there was no electricity," Speirs told ABC about recovering in Sandy aftermath. "I was just happy to be alive."
Read Speirs full story here on ABC.
