Many of you have asked me about my cancer -- so I thought I'd blog
about it -- especially because it'll be a year on Tuesday that I was
diagnosed.
Lots was happening at the time. My daughter Gracie fell (a year
ago today - she was 6 at the time) in the kitchen and had broken her
femur. That was the day of my biopsy (running from emergency to
the cancer building in the same parking lot to have this done).
Grace was admitted and had this external fixator attached to her leg in
surgery the next morning. She was hospitalized for 6 days.
During that time was when I was diagnosed with stage Ia breast cancer -
which is the best it can be for cancer (caught real early).
I am the day I found out -- My Friend, Sue, took this picture. Here is
where I stayed for 6 days when Gracie was hospitalized.
Grace got out of the hospital completely needy -- wheelchair bound and
had to have everything done for her. My surgery to remove the tumor was
that next Monday (15th). My mom came down to help out as Grace
need to be lifted and carried and I was not going to be able to
do it (during the day when my hubby was gone).
The surgeon
thought he could go in and just do a lumpectomy to remove the cancer
and some follow-up radiation, but the post-op tests revealed that I had
a second type of breast cancer (ductal).
Another lumpectomy on the 22nd, test showed that it was all over my
breast and (got this news on Dec 24 - what a horrible time for that!)
that my tumor was very agressive and I needed a mastectomy and
chemo as an assurance that even though it (after CT & PET scans)
had not spread anywhere, there was like a 40% chance that it had spread
into my blood stream where it could deposit somewhere (thus the reason
for the chemo).
I cut my hair real short on the 29th. Chemo started January 5th
and went for 4 sessions 3 weeks apart ending on March 5.
The first one was pretty bad; I felt pretty sick and was down for about
5 days, but subsiqeunt ones were much better - maybe feeling nauseous
only a day or two. My hair fell out two weeks after the first
session -- in handfuls!! That was something that even though you
prepare yourself for, when it happens it completely blows you away!!
anniversay, March 3rd. She had another month of physical
therapy. She limped for a while, but now you'd never know.
I chose in April to have a double mastectomy (because, I mean, who
would want to go through this again!). So as of April, I consider
myself to be cancer free as having gone through the chemo and
mastectomies, assuming the chemo has done what it was supposed to do,
which was kill any microscopic cancer cells floating in my body.
Here's me recovering from my mastectomies.
At the time of the mastectomies my surgeon also started
reconstruction. Now I only have one procedure left for that and
I'm done. Then just 4 more years of onocologist appointments and
tests 
, then they'll consider me cancer free. My prognosis is very good.
My hair started to growing about 3 weeks after my last chemo.
It's about 3 inches long now, growing almost 1/2 inch a month (growing
really fast). It came in thick, and curly in the back -- which is
so funny because I've always had pretty much stick straight thin
hair!!!
My family and friends worked overtime to help me this last year with
meals and driving me places and taking my children here and there etc
etc etc . My mom made several trips down her in the last year to help
me during each surgery and recovery. It is so humbling and I feel
very blessed and loved. God's grace and mercy held me up through
every twist and turn. I felt much peace over the last year
concerning my diagnosis and treatment -- not that I haven't had my down
times, but those, by the grace of God, have been few and far in
between. I have laughed and joked about it a lot. Humor is
a good thing.
Well that's about it.
~Me
)
~me
I can't believe it. I am doing pretty good, just some minor details to take care of.... well, a lot of minor details, though. I have one of my last two procedures done for my reconstruction the Monday after we come back, so on top of getting ready to go, I pretty much have to have things together around here for when I get back as it will put me down for a day or two. 
(yes i was trying - I just love that Sugar Buster diet!!!!)
~love to you all....
. In June was the time all this junk started with
. The Dr says that stress
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