Back home from the hospital. wow, what an ordeal!

I checked in and they started trying to put an iv in me. That is never fun, but apparently chemo degrades the ability of your veins to take an iv. They tried in 5 different places. Yes 5 times before they decided they would check with my surgeon if they could use my port. Thank goodness he agreed and finally they inserted an iv and I was able to get some drugs for the anxiety.

Next, my plastic surgeon came in. He marked on my breasts where he wanted the surgeon to make the incisions to minimize scarring for his reconstruction. I had called his office to let them know when the surgery was, but I found out later that he did not get that message and called my cell phone asking if I wanted to come in to the office prior to the surgery and get marked. When he didn’t get a response, he checked the surgery schedule and came to me at the hospital. He’s a nice guy.

Off to surgery I go. Three hours later, the surgeon comes out to talk to Scott, my mom and my sister. This surgeon is a riot, he has a very heavy accent - Iraqi- and a very high opinion of himself. I guess if you are having surgery, you want it done by someone who thinks he is the best at what he does. So out comes Dr. A telling them that all went well, that no does this surgery like he does and he is the best at it, blah blah blah. Then he announces to my family and of course all the wonderful friends who were there to support us that he saved my left nipple! Oh thank goodness, that was what I was worried about. And I am sure the rest of the neighborhood was vastly relieved as well.

I am in recovery at this time and not really coming around as expected. Scott believes I am doing ok and goes home. About that time I start to come around a little. I start projectile vomiting across the room. I see a bunch of people running around me in and out of the room and don’t remember anything else until later that night when I am moved into another room. It seems that my oxygen saturation rate dropped below 70% and the nurses called the rapid response team. They said I “coded”, whatever that means to them, and I was just a few minutes away from being intubated to restore my breathing. They were able to revive me and avoid all of that.

The next day, we find out the details from the night before. I am still on oxygen because I am not taking in room air well. We also find out I have fluid in my lungs and one is partially collapsed and has probably been that way for a while. I am not taking in food yet, so they try me on a liquid diet at lunch. (St. Luke’s has a neat system for food. They call it room service. There is a menu in your room and you call them, they check your file, to see what type of food you can have and then you choose from the menu.) i have some chicken broth which goes down and back up again immediately. So I’m off food again. It doesn’t seem to help much as I am still throwing up and not absorbing oxygen well. The new diagnosis is I am having a reaction to the pain medication. They stop the old and bring in new. This seems to help the nausea and the next day I am started back on food.

My oncology doctor has been checking on me everyday and he comes in on Wednesday, crying. Scott and I look at each other scared to death: What now? He was just overcome with happiness for me because (and this deserves bold print and exclamation points) THE PATHOLOGY REPORT CAME BACK IN WITH NO CANCER. ALL THE LYMPH NODES THEY TOOK WERE CLEAR AND THE TISSUE SAMPLES SHOWED NO ACTIVE CANCER LEFT ONLY DEAD TISSUE FROM WHERE THE TUMOR WAS!!!!
All the hell that was chemo for so many months was worthwhile. It worked! It worked! It worked! Oh thank God!

But the fun wasn’t over for me. My white cell count went up and my red count was down. The doctors weren’t letting me go anywhere until those things were rectified. They even were talking about making me have oxygen in the house when I did go home. Fortunately the white cell count rectified itself but I had to have 2 units of blood to get my count up to an almost normal level.

What is it about hospitals? What do they have against sleeping people? They come in all night to take vitals, blood and just to check on you. Then there is the non-stop beeping from my oxygen machine, and the alarm that goes off when I go under 85%. I have to unplug from everything every time I go to the bathroom and because of where they put the tissue dispenser and my surgery incisions, I can’t reach the tissue once I sit down, so I have to remember to get it before. Minor details that are a real problem when it affects you.

On Saturday, as a doctor would come in for rounds I would ask him what I needed to do to get out. Each said they were done with me, so I asked them to put it on the computer. This finally sprung me and I was on my way home! Without boobs, with drains and a lot of pain but at least this part is over.

This is it. Tomorrow is BBB day - Bye Bye Boobs day. I am relieved to be rid of the cancer in me but also scared at the same time. I am not afraid of the operation, it is the after effects that have me worried. Don't any of you let me be a different person after this. Please remind me that I am more than just the physical.

You know I don't think I would have been one of those brave martyrs who would willing walk to their death with their heads held high and be very dignified. No, I would be kicking and screaming all the way. That's how I feel about the operation. Granted it is not my death, but I feel like screaming all the way to the operating room, holding on to the "girls" for dear life. When you pray for me, pray for me to have courage.

See you all on the other side.

Well it has now been more than 3 weeks since my last chemo treatment. This is the longest I have been without poison in my system for almost 5 months. Thank goodness is all I can say. I still feel tired though, I guess it may take a while longer to get it all out.

I am counting down the days now until the surgery. And not in a good way. I know I just need to get over it, accept the facts and move on, but I just don’t seem to be able to right now. The whole thing has me pretty upset. Theoretically, I know it is just fat and tissue. Hey, it will be the easiest 10 pounds I have ever lost, right.

I know as the day gets closer I will be distracted by taking Nick to college. But when we get back I will be pretty scared, sad and upset. I probably won’t blog again until after the operation. I don’t want to whine and sound like I feel sorry for myself (which of course I do). Thousands of people have this diagnosis and operation every month and even worse. Intellectually I know this, emotionally - not so much.

Thank you all for the support and I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Ok, another trip to the plastic surgeon and another disappointment. I sort of new what to expect after I spoke with my radiation oncologist and went on line. Apparently I am not having just run of the mill, pin-point radiation. Because of the positive lymph nodes, my radiation will extend beyond just the breast, under the arm, into the chest wall and lungs. I can’t do anything halfway - give me the biggest, baddest, best. Anyway, this will cause some extensive tissue scarring. Anything implanted would be subject to rejection from my body.

So, I am hearing all of this. My doctor goes on about how he could not do reconstruction at the time of the surgery. Of course I am crying. I know it isn’t the fault of the doctor. He is just telling me the results, he didn’t create the facts. Thank goodness Scott was with me. He could listen more dispassionately and try to reason with me. Was I listening? No, probably not, it was all about how I felt.

Breast cancer surgery is really the only surgery that leaves a result that you can see. All other cancers (other than bone) require internal surgery, not this. Breast cancer takes the most visible form there is for a woman. And I don’t even really care how it looks to other people. But every minute of every day after my surgery, I will be reminded that I have no breasts and have cancer. With reconstruction, even though they are fake, at least I could forget for a while. Now, it will take months before I can start that mental healing.

So the new plan is to wait until after radiation and then attempt reconstruction. Radiation starts after the wounds have healed, so maybe 3-4 weeks after surgery and lasts 6-7 weeks, 5 days a week. Fortunately, the treatment itself doesn’t last very long and it is close to the house.

We know I am a planner. Once this all hit me and I realized that I wasn’t going to have re-made boobs, I needed information. Where do I get fake boobs? What do I wear after surgery? How long will it be before I start to look normal? Surprisingly to me, the doctor did not know where I could find fake ones. I told him he, or his people, should know who to call. He did suggest I needed a support group though. I guess I really came off as a crazy. Seriously, after thinking about it, I do think it is a good idea.

So my next step was finding a good prosthetic and a support group. I looked in the Yellow Pages, but those were all orthopedic. On-line I went, because my lovely friend Sue had told me about the wonderful things the American Cancer Society can do, I figured they would be the answer and sure enough, Sue was right. The web site referred me to the Jacksonville Women’s Center for a support group and I figured if they have a support group they would know who to call for the prosthetics. Brilliant, eh? Again, success. A lovely woman answered the phone and was very helpful.

Never one to let grass grow under my feet, I called the pharmacy recommended by the Women’s Center. I figured my luck would be they would have to order whatever I needed and it would take 3 months or something. This little place is over by Memorial Hospital and carries a variety of hospital needs. Back in a private room, a great woman helped me with everything I will need after surgery and through radiation. She did order them, so we will see how long it takes.

I know I am making light of these things, but it really was not easy. I just know it is something I have to do. I have no choice. But for the first time, I am questioning why is all of this happening to me. I haven’t really done that before. Why not me? You hear so many tragic stories. It seems so unfair when cancer hits a child or a single mother. But I am not special, I can get cancer just like the next person, I know that. But lately, with so many negative turns in my fight, I did start to throw the why me question up to the Big Man. I am pretty much over that kind of self-pity. I still wish he could take this away from me and I could have my life back. That will happen, just not the way I wanted it too.

Amidst this, the surgeon’s office called to give me the surgery date. Last week, I begged them to set the date even without the input of the plastic surgeon, but they wouldn’t. It will be no problem they said. We are only booking August 1 right now. August 17 or 18 will be just fine, don’t worry about it. They call and have set the surgery for August 21. Well, they messed with the wrong person on the wrong day. I strongly reminded them of the promise for the beginning of that week, that it was already 2 weeks after when my oncologist and the surgeon wanted to take me. They were somewhat taken aback that I would question the scheduling and tried to make excuses about other cases blah, blah, blah. I told them they were now putting my health at risk (certainly an exaggeration, but I was tired of people screwing around with me). The scheduler said she would see what she could do. An hour later, she called back with a new date. Surgery is August 17 at 10:00 a.m. Ah the sweet smell of success. A little control back in my life.

Well I made it through the last chemo treatment. Or at least I am trying to break through now. I’ve told you how it is, up and down, feel good and then feel crappy. I can do a small amount of things and then my head starts to swim and I have to sit down. This is so not like me. I am go full speed, get it all done and then sit down, so it takes some getting used to.

This afternoon I see the plastic surgeon again. My radiation oncologist spoke to him and now he is not sure about the reconstruction. It may interfere with radiation so I have a feeling he doesn’t want to do it until after the radiation is over. After all of this, it seems silly that such a thing would bother me, but it really does. I want to have something there when I wake up from surgery, not just pain and scars. The psychological aspect of healing from this may be as important to me as the physical and it will take a lot more if reconstruction doesn’t start right away.

I’ll let you know what he says.

Ok People! I went to the oncologist and told him how horrible the chemo treatment was last time, that if I had any more it would kill me. He was extremely sympathetic and made a deal with me. He would reduce the dose but I needed one more treatment. Well I figured anybody can do anything 1 more time.

So here I go tomorrow... after 4 months and 6 doses of poison, ONE MORE TREATMENT!!!! After that 10 days of feeling like crap and I will be through with chemotherapy. Thank God! I feel like I should wear a crown and skip out of there. Although I am sure you know I don’t really feel like skipping when I leave, maybe tomorrow I will though.

From here I go on to surgery. The surgeon was going to take me right away, but I told him I have to wait until after we take Andrew to law school and NIck to college. I didn’t want to be in pain (physically anyway) as our baby leaves the nest. You know I will cry all the way back to Jax after we drop him off. But he is more than ready to get out of here.

The surgery will not be easy. They scrape the tissue away from the skin and the plastic surgeon inserts the spacers to keep the tissue expanded for reconstruction. I spend 2 - 3 days in the hospital and come home with drains still in place. The plastic surgeon then decides when to take those out - when the fluid stops draining from them. I could bounce back in a week or two or it could take longer. We’ll see.

Meanwhile the surgeon has to consult with the plastic surgeon to coordinate their schedules to get me in. Probably the week of Aug. 17. So I have that to look forward to :(

I do have to say once again how thankful I am to have the most wonderful support group in the entire world. You all have gotten me through this and I couldn’t have done it without each and every one of you. THANK YOU!!!!!

Talk to you on the other side of chemo.

HALLELUJAH!!!!!!!!

The bone scan is clear! I can not tell you how thankful I am for that news.

The radiology technician knew I was nervous about the outcome of this test. He was kind enough to tell me he did not see any spots of concern. Cautiously optimistic is what he said. That was such a reassurance to me because I am sure he sees many, many scans with cancer every week, so for him to be positive sent me out with a much happier heart.

Then my radiation oncologist looked at the disk as well. She said that although she stayed at a Holiday Inn last night, she was not a radiologist, but the scan looked clear to her. So although I do not have the official radiology report, I am feeling unbelievably upbeat for the first time in a very long time!!

Thank you God for not putting this burden on me!!