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PET SCAN CLEAR, BABY!!!! Yours truly does not have metastatic disease beyond the lymph nodes. I am, however, still a special fucking snowflake because the testing also still didn't find the primary tumor. Meaning I am of the less than one percent of all breast cancer patients who present with an occult tumor. My exact staging will have to wait until they can get the cancer out, find out how many lymph nodes are involved, and test it for grading and hormone sensitivity and all that blather. I will probably be staged at IIa or IIb. Next step is to meet with the surgeon on Wednesday. ETA: because I'm a moron I forgot..also have to have an ultrasound pelvic and a bone scan later this week. Both are expected to come back clear with a high degree of certainty, so I am not hardly stressing them.
The lymph nodes are getting hacked out for absolute certain, the question of whether or not one or both of my boobs is getting fired will be discussed further with him, but frankly I'm not letting them leave the left one on regardless. The fact that the primary cancer evaded all normal method of detection means it may actually still be there somewhere, and they don't know where, and if it simply ate itself up it could come back and evade detection again. No way in hell am I living with that time bomb. As for the right one? The oncologist wants me to do genetic testing before deciding. I'm sort of thinking, fuck that. Anything, anything I can do to avoid going through this again, I will do, and I'm not particularly attached to my breasts to begin with. And again, I have no way of knowing if there is a hidey motherfucker in that one as well that just hasn't reached the lymph nodes yet. Better flat than sorry is currently my motto. I will, however, wait for the results of the genetic testing before deciding on a prophylactic removal of the ovaries.
After the removal of body parts it will be on to chemo and then radiation. Again, exact course and drugs dependent on testing following surgery, but I will definitely be given both. This is still going to suck HARD, and I've got a lot of shit left to go through. But today? I AM NOT DYING. I can fight this motherfucker, and you better believe I'm gonna. Bitch is going down.
The lymph nodes are getting hacked out for absolute certain, the question of whether or not one or both of my boobs is getting fired will be discussed further with him, but frankly I'm not letting them leave the left one on regardless. The fact that the primary cancer evaded all normal method of detection means it may actually still be there somewhere, and they don't know where, and if it simply ate itself up it could come back and evade detection again. No way in hell am I living with that time bomb. As for the right one? The oncologist wants me to do genetic testing before deciding. I'm sort of thinking, fuck that. Anything, anything I can do to avoid going through this again, I will do, and I'm not particularly attached to my breasts to begin with. And again, I have no way of knowing if there is a hidey motherfucker in that one as well that just hasn't reached the lymph nodes yet. Better flat than sorry is currently my motto. I will, however, wait for the results of the genetic testing before deciding on a prophylactic removal of the ovaries.
After the removal of body parts it will be on to chemo and then radiation. Again, exact course and drugs dependent on testing following surgery, but I will definitely be given both. This is still going to suck HARD, and I've got a lot of shit left to go through. But today? I AM NOT DYING. I can fight this motherfucker, and you better believe I'm gonna. Bitch is going down.