only because it's been a few days...

having this blog is a little stressful.
what do i write when there's no new news?

yesterday was my first day without attendants since the surgery. eric went to work and my parents stayed up in vail - under my orders.

and i think i did pretty well. i got my own food. i let kitty out. i took care of the flower bouquets. i got the mail. and i even had a visitor. i do have to say, though...i think i pushed it a little too far. by the time 4:00 came around, i was exhausted. and my incisions kind of hurt. so. i learned my lesson. and today i will spend most of the day reading my book - water for elephants.

i'm still waiting for a call from the oncology department to set an appointment with an oncologist - the one who will recommend treatment for me. i'm still waiting for a call about the full pathology report - including what's lamely called a her2nu result. much like the estrogen receptor positive test...it'll help to determine what drugs will help me in the future.

and then thursday i have a post-op appointment with dr. haun. i'm not really sure what happens then but i guess she looks at all my incisions to see how i'm healing and feeling.

even more fun to look forward to, though, is having my friend riki come to visit from san diego this weekend. what i've definitely learned in this process is that even i don't have too many friends here in denver - holy crap - i have some really, really good ones outside of denver.

really good news

well, i'm back.
this whole typing with my left hand isn't that cool...but at least i'm sitting up now.

yesterday was a day full of good news.

i qualified to have the drain, that eric so lovingly described, taken out!! once it's draining less and less, it can go. which, thank god!! that was a really disgusting part of this whole lovely process. so my parents and i drove to kaiser, got that taken out.

then, ss we were all finishing dinner, dr. haun called with the pathology report from the surgery. some poor soul's job is to look through the parts of people that get taken off...to evaluate what was going on in there. yuck.

so. very good news:
1) the lymph node was officially negative for cancer. i'm still trying to get clear on all of this...but i believe that means that it's almost official that cancer did not travel to the rest of my body.

2) dr. haun was able to get very good margins around the cancer areas - 8mm. which means that it's very likely i will not need radiation.

3) the cancer is still registering that it's estrogen/progesterone receptor positive. which is a good thing. this means that the cancer was fueled by estrogen. which means if i take an estrogen blocker, it'll help starve any cancer that's left over.


all of this is very good news. i'm still feeling very cautious about getting too happy or relieved, though. i still have questions about my treatment. and until those are answered (when i meet with oncology), i'm going to be a little on edge. i'm still so worried i'll have to have chemotherapy.

and in terms of how i feel?
let's see...the nurse yesterday asked me if i could touch the top of my head with my right hand. nope.
i have all these stretches and exercises to do that hurt...and also really stretch me emotionally. like standing facing a corner, putting both of my forearms against the walls, the leaning towards the corner. someone has GOT to be kidding me with that one. no way can i do that.

i also just still have pain, twinges, stinging feelings around the incisions. and i'm still taking vicodin, which is helping a lot.

so...that's the update directly from the invalid herself.

now i have a follow up appointment with the surgeon next thursday.
sometime soon i have my first oncology appointment to talk about treatment options.

so...although we can all breathe a sigh of relief that the node is negative and all the other good things...there are still some potentially difficult things to come. i guess that's what i'm feeling now - SOME relief, but still holding back so much waiting for the treatment.

xo

Operation Complete!

Eric here -
Well, just 11 hours after getting to the hospital, we are back home. Meghan is doing very well, and the operation appears to have been really successful. As much as you can define "successful" as coming home short one breast and a lymph node. But the surgeon said it went well, and looks promising for reconstruction in the future. They will biopsy the full lymph node to check it for cancer, but preliminary biopsy was negative. Which is very positive.
Meantime, Meghan has to wear a device called a JP drain, which basically sucks the juices out of the wound in her armpit. It'll stay in for probably 4 or 5 days, and then it's back to the hospital to have it removed.
She's on Vicodin for the pain, and the nurses were adamant about making sure to take it every 3 hours so the pain doesn't ever get ahead of it. They said that with pain like this, if you wait until it hurts to take the pill, you can't catch up to the pain, and then you're screwed. So we're looking forward to nights of waking every 3 hours until further notice.
In any case, things are looking good at this point, and Jim and Judy are here with us and are taking great care of Meghan, Kitty and me.

schedule for tuesday

8:00am - Eric and I arrive at Kaiser to check-in

9:00am - Kaiser shoots me full of radioactive material

9:30am - Mom and Dad arrive at Kaiser

9:55am - Preparations for surgery begin

10:55am -Surgery (1 1/2-2 hours)

1:00pm - Recovery (2 hours)

5:00pm - By this time, if I am not feeling well enough to go home, I can decide to spend the night in the hospital. Yuck.

I imagine I will be totally out of it for a while.
So...I will have Eric crack through the tight security of blogger.com to give everyone an update on Tuesday night.

I love you all...ridiculously.
Thank you for your support, words, poems, cards, flowers, cookies, candies, coffees, and skirts. :)
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

as if I don't have enough to worry about...

Here I am supposed to be worried about having surgery, worried about losing a part of my body to the medical waste bin...Instead I'm worried that I won't have surgery.

When I had the biopsy last Tuesday, the technician put three strips of surgical tape to seal up the incision. She put them on SO tight that it hurt the area if I sat up straight, if I moved really. So I spoke to the surgeon about it. She told me I could take off the tape and instructed me to put neosporin on the blisters 2-3x a day. It's been 5 days now and I still have the blisters...and they aren't very nice looking.

Well, when a nurse called me this morning to confirm all of the appointments and the surgery tomorrow, she asked me if I had any new scratches or wounds around the area. She said if I did, it might be necessary to postpone surgery to avoid infection. I told her about the blisters. Then I also talked to another nurse who suggested we call the surgeon about them.

She called Dr. Haun and Dr. Haun said she could try her hardest to work around the blisters. Which I guess is a relief. But I'm still pissed the technician put the tape on so tight that it irritated my skin so much to give me bloody blisters?!! Grrrr...And to almost have to postpone the surgery for stupid blisters?!! Like I don't have enough going on in my head and body.

blizzard of 2007?

I feel like a crazy person.

I have a list of things that I feel I need to do, to get, to deal with before Tuesday's surgery. As I run through the checklist, it feels as if there's a 100% chance of the-worst-blizzard-to-ever-hit-the-state happening on the third Tuesday in July. Or maybe it's like Hurricane Gloria's about to hit and I desperately need to buy plywood to cover the windows.

1) grocery shopping - onions, orange juice, fruit, garbanzo beans, seltzer
2) library - check out the maximum amount of dvds and magazines to add to the Netflix movies already en route
3) walgreens - straws, drano, maybe some swedish fish and some peppermint patties for the freezer

I feel like I should be buying batteries, flashlights, water, canned goods, too. And tomorrow's my last chance to do everything.

*sigh*

One of my neighbors offered me valium. Another offered me xanax. Sitting here now...I can't imagine why I didn't storm their houses the second they offered...

this is making me sick

Before I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I wasn't acutely aware of how many people had had breast cancer themselves.

Now?

Someone has GOT to be kidding me - both with my own diagnosis and EVERYONE else's.

Since I've been diagnosed (17 days ago) I have accumulated so many stories of other women who've had breast cancer:
-the nurse who helped me as the victim of IV fainting
-the MRI technician
-another nurse's mom, grandmother, and aunt
-2 of my friends' moms
-my friend's sister
-numerous friends of my mom
-my neighbor's mom
-my coworker
-my coworker's 4 friends
-211,000 women in the U.S.and more than 1.1 million worldwide in 2005 alone
-etc., etc., etc...

I guess what's been happening to me over the last couple days is I'm somewhat beyond the shock of this. And now I'm just in disbelief at how many more cases I hear about. And then I think about all the time, energy, tears, and money that go into this. So far I've met with 5 doctors. I've had 3 biopsies. I've met with 4 technicians. I've talked with 4 nurses. I've met with all of them in the last 3 weeks. Think of all the money that's gone into this. And I haven't even HAD the surgery or the treatment yet!

I'm infuriated.
There's got to be more prevention.
And prevention doesn't just mean catching it in a mammogram.
Cause that's what happened to me...and this type of prevention sucks.

***
(And to make Susie proud...)
The Massachusetts Breast Cancer Coalition is doing a lot of research and advocacy.
Take a look if you're interested: http://mbcc.org/

(And go VC!)
http://erbc.vassar.edu/