"You have Lupus."..."What's that?"

Lupus is an autoimmune deficiency disease.  In loose terms it means that my white blood cells can't distinguish the difference between an actual infection and healthy cells and organ tissue.  In my case I had strep throat.  Oddly enough, the strep throat virus cells resemble the kidneys.  So after the infection was killed, my white blood cells turned on my kidneys.  At that time, I didn't know what that meant to me, but by the look on my mom's face it wasn't promising. 
The explanation of what was happening immediately turned into ideas on how to treat and live with it.  I was scared at the idea that there is no known cure, just methods of control.  The first of which was chemotherapy and steroids.  The steroids weren't all that big of a deal, but the chemo was a totally different story.  For some reason, it made feel like I was gonna die soon.  I wanted cry on the spot, but I couldn't, I was numb at that point.  Not even a month out of the hospital, I have a disease called Lupus, and I'm facing chemotherapy. The treatments were once a month for three months, and then once a month every other month for six months.
Going to the treatment center was a rough mental workout.  I only smiled to keep from crying. Everything in my body screamed run.  "I don't wanna do this", "I don't wanna do this", "I can't do this."  That's all I heard in my mind.  One time I sat in my car and bawled my eyes out, cause I just didn't wanna do it.  But, I did it anyway. Each time was harder than the last, especially when I started going by myself.  Mom was there the first time, but after that it was just me. An 18 year old kid sitting in a chemo center alone, afraid, and angry.  That place stole and that process made me bitter at life.  It stole my will to point that I SERIOUSLY thought about suicide.  I eventually came to the conclusion that my death by my own hand would cause more pain than relief.  So, I soldiered on.