We meet with Dr. Johnson the medical oncologist on Monday the 17th.
Jeff, Kaci and mom went with me. It ended up being an 1-1/2 hour
appointment. He detailed my chemo schedule. He also told me that the
chances of re-occurrence based on the pathology report are quite high.
There is a low, intermediate and high category. I am one point away
from being in the high category. Therefore the chemo treatment is
really necessary. Also it is based on tumor size and my was a 3cm.
Anything under 2cm you can usually not have to do chemo. I feel with
this whole experience I am getting the worst case scenario with everything. I honestly felt when I was in
surgery on November 3rd I would wake up and would be cancer, just like
it was but I thought Megan would be able to get it all out and I would only
have to have radiation. Now it is invasive lobular carcinoma stage IIb until they can determine my lymph node status. I have no
choice but to take both breasts due to the lobular diagnosis which was fine with me because all along I said to myself if it is invasive I will take both so I don't ever have to deal with this again. I have to do chemo for 6 months and
radiation for 5 weeks every day. So my chemo schedule he gave me is the
AC aka "Red Devil" once every three weeks so basically 3 months for that
treatment. After that then I go once a week for 12 weeks (another 3
months) for Taxol and that is given for 3-1/2 hours at a time. My hair
will not even begin to come back on Taxol. It won't start growing until
I am all done. So looking ahead because that is what I do, I should be
done with chemo around June 15th and then 5 weeks of radiation after that. That is good news because then we can start
our camping up to Sourdough. We may not be able to make our deck or
extend our lot this year like we had planned but at least we can get up
there and camp. That is what makes me the happiest. I am looking so
forward to summer and hopefully all of this is behind me. I am super
optimistic that this chemo will take care of any traveling cancer cells
and I will be in a full remission.
I am getting more nervous by
the hour and with each day that passes to go in for surgery on Monday,
November 17th. This is going to be hard to lose my body parts.
However, on the bright side I am glad it is not an arm or leg because
losing my breasts still gives me full mobility and won't change my life
at all. Sure it might be hard to look at the new me in front of the
mirror or in the shower but when I am dressed I will still look like
me. It might take some time to get used to the prostheses but in no
time I am sure everything will feel normal.
After I am all done
with this journey then I will decide if I want reconstruction or not. I
feel that this is not the best time. I need to beat cancer first and
not worry about the discomfort from the expanders and rush into this
without really feeling that it is what I want to do. Reconstruction can
be done at any time and there are women who wait years to do it. I
feel that this is the best thing for me. My family is super supportive
and loves me no matter what. All of this is a personal choice. A choice to even
go in for surgery, to do chemo, to do radiation. Of course I am going
to follow what they are suggesting because I am only 40 years old and I
need to fight for my family. I need to watch Kaci grow up. I want to
be there as she grows into adult hood. I want to be there for her
wedding and birth of her children. Because of that I am going to fight
with all I got. I also want Jeff and I to grow old together and take
all the trips that we have talked about. I look forward to retirement,
we are working so hard for that goal.
Tomorrow we meet with
Megan to detail everything with the surgery and she wants to talk to me
about my decision regarding plastic surgery. My mind is made up to
delay or possibly never do it but I do want to hear what she has to say and she wants to make
sure that I am comfortable in my decision.
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