Yes, I know I have not blogged for quite a while. I think this time has not been as rough as the time period where I had the double mastectomy, reconstruction, and chemo. I am in the middle of radiation now to my left breast, center and upper left lymph nodes, and skin. I am actually at 20 of 28 sessions of radiation. The radiation will give me more benefit then the chemo. Hard to believe but true. The characteristics of my breast cancer and it being a grade 1 (non aggressive) form is what has made radiation so important. If my breast cancer was a grade 2 or 3 more aggressive, then the chemo would have played a more important part of my treatment. Chemo is for fast dividing cells or aggressive cells. Because my cancer was not made up of fast dividing cells the chemo had some benefit but not as great as one would think.
Radiation on the other hand is more important to me. If the cancer were to return in this area (left breast area) it could appear in my lymph nodes or chest wall or less likely but in the thin layer of tissue behind my skin. This is serious stuff if it were to return. It is more difficult to treat if it is on the chest wall and has greater chance of spreading to other internal organs. If it were to reappear in my lymph nodes there is the possibility it can spread to other parts of the body. If it appears in that very small bit of tissue under my skin, it could be more easily detected, which out of the 3 scenarios, is the one I like the best! My tumor was 11 cm large (can we say huge!) and was a type of breast cancer called Invasive Lobular Carcinoma. Refresher course here.....it does not form lumps but spreads through the breast tissue like fingers. It is not detected by mammos but primarily by ultrasounds. Once the fingers have criss-crossed enough a shadow can appear on the ultra sound, which is what happened in my case. Both UCSF and my local hospital confirmed the size before surgery to be between 3.5 cm to 5 cm. Well they were wrong! I also had micromastectic sentinel lymph node involvement with 5 aux nodes clear. Anytime you have lymph node involvement it's a game changer.
So anyways....back to the subject, why did I choose chemo and double mastectomy? I wanted to be as aggressive as possible. It was a very difficult decision to do chemo knowing it was going to give me the least amount of benefit. Double mastectomy reason....2 cancers in 3 years. That was good enough for me.
So here I am in the middle to end of radiation. Do I regret any decisions I have made in the past year? No. I think I have been aggressive in my actions to stop the breast cancer and stop it from spreading to other parts of my body.
A secret I will share is that in 2008 when I was dealing with my 1st breast cancer (DCIS stage 0 ), there was something inside me that said, it will be back. I chose to ignore my "gut" feeling. This go around, I don't have that feeling. I know I am done dealing with cancer. There are peole I know that are diagnosed with various types of cancer and did not act aggressive in the beginning and their cancer spread. Yes, they did have other types of cancer besides breast cancer but the key was being aggressive early. I feel I have done that. I also have changed how I live my life now. Hardly any alcohol, exercising, eating really no meat, juicing...I've become a hippy other then I don't smoke pot. My son does still ask when I'm getting my medical marijuana card-and like I'm going to get stoned with my son??? Ah, no.
Radiation has been OK. My skin is really starting to have issues. It's red, small blisters and raw. Hurts to the touch. I ache inside. Not a bad pain just an ache. I am however very tired. I can feel the exhaustion at night. I could go to sleep at 7:00pm and sleep soundly all night, which I have been doing. I still have 8 sessions left and I am worried at how my skin is going to hold up to the end. I am using Cortisone for the itch and soothing lotions to help but it is going to reach a point, that none of this is going to help. What does it feel like? Well, imagine you have a slight case of poison oak with a really bad sunburn and it is about 2 inches in diameter near your center chest and then spreads over your breast but not as bad as that one high dose area. Uncomfortable.
I will get through it and keep moving forward with my treatments, Lupron shots and my final exchange of my reconstruction surgery from saline implant to silicone implant. My hair is coming back, thick and grey. I spike it occasionally just to make me think I have more hair then I do. Whatever makes me happy as my husband says. I'll keep everyone posted on how things are going but as I've said before I'm keeping my life busy and things are good.
Keep me company as I travel thru my journey facing breast cancer again.
Why would anyone want to read about someone else's problem when you have plenty of your own? Maybe one day a loved one, a friend, or you will be diagnosed with breast cancer. My blog might offer insite into cancer resources, thoughts, questions to ask, or guidance in helping you deal with this disease. These are my experiences and suggestions. Every breast cancer is different. If you are touched by breast cancer, be sure to consult your Dr. for direction in treatment.
I equate my blog to the emergency evacuation instruction the flight attendants do before you take off on an airplane. Nobody pays attention to them but when your plane is about to crash you think, "sh*t, why didn't I pay more attention to them? Which color cord do I pull first again?" We have so many things going on in our lives that one more thing to dwell on that doesn't apply to us right now may not be important but when it does, we wish we would have paid attention.
My blog is something you might read a couple times or maybe follow. Hopefully you gain some knowledge about breast cancer, in particular, Invasive Lobular Carcinoma (ILC). It is the 2nd most common type of invasive breast cancer however it only accounts for approx. 10% of all invasive breast cancers. It is the silent breast cancer. It is generally not detected with a mammo but rather an ultrasound. Invasive Lobular Carcinoma (ILC) is what I have been diagnosed with. My suggestion to every woman who is of mammo age insist on an ultrasound with your mammos.
UPDATE 3/2011
I have had my bilaterial mastectomy and I am recovering. ILC is a sneaky cancer as I said above. My various Dr.'s here and at UCSF confirmed the size of my tumor should be between 2.5cm-3.5cm with possibilty but not most likely, 7cm. After my surgery, my tumor was confirmed to be 11cm. My Dr.'s are very knowledgeable and are on top of things. This is simply the truth about ILC. I had mammos every 6 months, ultra sounds, and MRI's. With all of these, it was not picked up until 1/2011. The good news, if you can call it that, only 1 sentinel node out of 2 has micromastic findings and 5 aux. nodes were negative.
Be sure to start my adventure from the blog history on the right. I have tried to bold points to make it easier to extract the important information. If there is anything you get out of this blog, refer to my Dr.'s listed below if you know someone who has been diagnosed with breast cancer in the East Bay. These Dr.'s; Dr. Gottlieb, Dr. Wotowic, and Dr. Sherman are my 3 musketeers....all for 1 and 1 for all!
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