The specialist I saw in Houston explained to me that many of her triple negative breast cancer patients are still anxious about the end of treatment no matter how awful it is...why?? Because there's not much out there in terms of medical maintenance treatments to keep the cancer at bay. Even though chemo didn't prove to be that great for me anyway, for some reason I felt kind of safe in that phase (umm...maybe a little less safe when the tumor started growing again. Ha!). Radiation makes me feel like at least I'm doing something extra to blast anything weird going on in my righty area, but when this is over, I'll be back to trusting my body to do the right thing and flush cells that aren't supposed to be there out instead of letting them take over like we found out happened in October with the breast and lymph node lumps. I'm having a hard time trusting that my body knows what to do! It sounds harsh, but I feel like it failed me. I gave my system an F and I'm having a hard time allowing all of the extra credit projects I've been working on (healthy eating, exercise, praying, weirdo hippie stress management strategies...) to get that grade up in my books. I'm working on letting go of this grudge I'm holding against myself for the incident with Righty. Trust in God. Pray. Be thankful for the day.
So that leads to the conversation about Lefty. Shouldn't I just cut that baby off too?! Maybe, but as all of my medical professionals have told me (and this is really hard to hear and to say out loud), having a left side mastectomy in no way is going to prolong my life. If I'm hoping that I will get more cancer free years out of that surgery, that has been disproven (is that a word?) time and time again (at least for people like me...there are many other people that this does benefit in that way!) Ouch. Statistically, I have the same chances of recurrence whether I have another surgery to remove my left breast or not. If I choose to have a left side mastectomy it will purely be for my peace of mind (and so I can avoid getting arrested for indecent behavior because I'm doing self breast exams all day in public. haha). We will revisit this topic at a later time. I know for now, if I had to have the surgery, I could make it through recovery, but since I don't, I AM TIRED and definitely would be exhausted with another surgery. Putting a bookmark here for now...
I had a heart to heart with Dr. Jim. We didn't chat much about cancer specifically, we chatted about what my job from here on out is...and that is to live my dang life. Every moment is precious. These moments cannot be wasted. Yes, cancer might come back across our path (I honestly don't know statistically what my prognosis is and don't know that I want to know), but so can many other things (like the time I almost ran my car off the road because I thought I felt another lump in lefty!). Haha. Seriously. Worrying about cancer, I almost crashed my car into a freaking light pole! I have to work on how in the heck I am not going to allow this to take away from all of the amazing moments I do have. That's quite a job. Between that and taking care of this little guy, I think I deserve a dang WIN THE DAY RAISE!!
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A few more updates from Dr. appts:
- My white counts are a little low (not neutropenic. yay!) and my reds are much lower (not transfusion low. yay! but definitely anemic and energy level low). I am so dang tired. When I sit down, my body literally melts into the couch. Good thing Austin keeps me on the move because exercise actually is one of the only things I can do to kick those red cells into production. First step though is that I have to have enough red cells to carry oxygen to my legs so I can get off the dang couch! haha.
- My vitamin D levels are really low (I have not had a good session in the sun for MONTHS!! It's sooo hot I've been getting awful heat rash bumps from just a few minutes outside and I have to cover up my radiation treatment area). Going on a prescription strength dose for a couple of months and then will re-check
- I will start Tamoxifen in 2 weeks for 5-10 years. The pathology came back the 2nd time slightly ER+ (2-4%). This is really low, but this means that a clone from the original tumor survived and grew that was ER+. Tamoxifen may benefit me in staying ER+ cancer free. Yay! Menopausal Jenn is just around the corner...thank goodness I have another drug reaction to blame on me being a wierdo! haha
- Because I did not qualify for the vaccine trial for the Her-2 protein study, my team is not recommending that I take Herceptin as a maintenance treatment. This has not been proven to have a benefit yet for people like me...another place to put a bookmark for now...P.S. I've tried to talk about this trial to a couple of people lately and I get all teary and upset. Why?? It kind of reminds me of when I was expecting a baby girl for months and everyone told me how I would be such a great 'girl mom' they really couldn't see me as a 'boy mom,' but then when we found out in the last couple of weeks of my pregnancy that I was actually having a boy, everyone switched their story...they really secretly thought that I would be a way better 'boy mom.' Haha. Everyone was super excited for me to be a part of the trial and thought it could have great benefit for me, but now that I didn't have the blood markers to qualify me, there's not much benefit it might have had anyway...hmmm...I'm trusting that this is the best thing for me right now (and am honestly thankful to not have to take another drug)
- radiation update...pretty red and a little flaky and itchy in some spots. They reduced my prescription in the auxilla (armpit) area because it was getting pretty red. My throat is bothering me a bit. Feels like a lump in my throat and kind of sticks when I swallow. This will all go away a bit out of treatment. We are in the home stretch...
-Since I will not be taking Herceptin (which has to be administered by infusion), I am going to have my port removed in a few weeks. This is a pretty simple procedure that my surgeon does right in his office. No big deal. Will also have another follow up at this time regarding the lump in my left breast. Dr. Bob took a look at it again a couple of weeks ago (ok, I forced him to get the ultrasound machine out and look at it again. If I could get my hands on one of those machines, I would seriously be 'ultrasounding' myself all.day.long. haha) and he found no changes from the time of the biopsy. All good news.
Get out there and live your dang life today friends (thank goodness those ultrasound machines are not for home use, so I can get out there too!!)
Win the Day!
Love
Jenn
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