Fight like a girl.

 Alright another appointment down. I kind of wanted to cry sitting there. It just feels overwhelming again.  Yes my cancer is all gone. But that doesn't mean I'm done. I got the call saying the tissue is all clean, there's nothing in the breast or lymph nodes but I still have to go through this treatment for the next six months. It's really going to be like a year before I'm going to be completely done.  I'll start with the morning appointment. I saw the plastic surgeon NP and she saw the bruising on my left breast. She said she wouldn't do any expanding on that side to let it heal. She said that would be fine because we have to over expand the right side at some point anyway to account for the shrinking that will occur with radiation, so now is as good a time as any. So I'm totally lopsided right now. That's fun. SHe also took my other drain out. YAY! No more drains for me.  Then we headed to the radiation oncologist. He was sitting there talking ab...

 I look like a chia pet. My hair is growing in on my head like crazy. Not very evenly though.  I’m hoping I showered with a drain for the last time tonight. The output has met the requirement for the past three days. It should come out tomorrow when we go to the plastic surgeon. Woot! Woot!  We also meet with the radiation oncologist tomorrow. We get to find out how many days of radiation I’m doing. When we met with the oncologist NP on Friday he said, “According to NCCN (some cancer thing) if you have a double mastectomy and your lymph nodes are clean, you don’t have to do any radiation.” Ryan and I were kind of like, hmmm really? Cuz everyone we’ve talked to has said I need radiation. He kind of back pedaled. I mean I don’t blame the guy, he doesn’t know me or my story. As he said, he’s just a placeholder for the doctor. 🙄 I’m trying to get back to normal but I’m not there yet. I think I did too much on Friday. I woke up Saturday morning with a huge bruise all over my ...

I'm sitting at the oncology office right now. I'm getting another Herceptin infusion. It's that time again and now I'm back on a three week schedule. I got time off with my surgery. Woohoo. But sitting back in this room gives me some PTSD. I was sitting here listening to a nurse go over all the side effects of the chemo drugs, what medications to take to fix those side effects and what happens to your various blood counts. It was actually the same nurse that went over everything with me that first day. Oh that was so horrible. I feel so bad for this lady and I am so grateful to be where I am today. I remember when she handed me the paper and went through each bullet point and I just silently cried. I know she stopped and was like, "Are you okay?" No I'm not okay!!! I'm starting chemo! Would you be okay?!?!?!  Ya I didn't say any of that. I wiped my tears, put some big girl pants on and told her to keep going. That was really so horrible. And to kno...

It’s been three weeks today since I had surgery. I’m feeling pretty good. I get achey throughout the day and I’m not doing much. I take some ibuprofen and Tylenol occasionally. If I’m up too long I have to sit down and give my back a rest. I’m sure I’m hunched over all day trying to protect my chest. That doesn’t help with my back pain.  I’ve been checking every day for any signs of infection. Nothing yet, still keeping my fingers crossed. I see the doctor today, Thursday (since it’s technically after midnight). I’m really hoping I get my drains out today. I should. The output has been very minimal the past few days. They don't hurt, which I'm super grateful for, they're just a little annoying. And I’m getting nervous that it’s going to hurt quite a bit when they pull them out. I mean, my incisions are healing so beautifully, I’ve got to think that the drain incisions are also healing. Except they’re healing around the drain tube. 🙄 and the tube goes all the way up and aro...

I had an.....epiphany the other day. I had gotten out of the shower and was putting lotion on my legs. I was sitting in the recliner in my room and the sun hit my leg just right for me to see leg hair. I keep feeling my legs and I don't feel any hair but when you get right up close there is actually a nice layer of fuzzy leg hair. Right then, I had this feeling of gratitude come over me. I just felt like- "Okay. I'm going to be okay." It was this calm feeling and I was just so happy. I had to just bow my head and thank my Heavenly Father for getting me through this.  

My sister in law passes her clothes on to me and right before surgery she had given me some clothes. I kept this dress, little did I know it would be perfect for post op. It was perfect with pockets because I turned the pockets inside out and put my drains in there.  I went to see the plastic surgeon on Thursday. I saw one of his nurse practitioners. She said everything is looking good. No sign of infection. Typically they see infection week 3-4 post op so I'm not out of the woods as far as that goes. I didn't get my drains out. I was really, really hoping but no, there's still too much coming out.  Do I have to sleep reclined, on my back? No. I can sleep however is comfortable. Which is such a blessing because I have not been sleeping very well trying to sleep reclined and on my back. I have all the pillows propping me up every which way. I've slept in a recliner and in a tempur pedic remote controlled bed but none of it was quite like my bed. She said she had one pati...

  My picture here is due to some news I received on Monday. The pathology from all my breast tissue is back. It came back super fast, which I'm grateful for. The left breast tissue was all benign. The right breast tissue- no residual tumor found. The right lymph nodes removed- negative. So I asked the nurse, "So as of right now, I'm cancer free?" She said, "Yes, as of right now you are cancer free." I may have sat and cried for a while after that. Ryan was home for the initial phone call but then he had to go to work, so I just sat at home, by myself, on the couch, crying tears of joy. I, of course, text all my family. I posted it on social media.  I am CANCER FREE right now. How amazing is that? All the dumb chemo is done. I kind of don't want to do anything else the rest of the year. I don't want to have to get Herceptin for the next seven months. Although it's not chemo and the side effects from that first dose were minimal, I still had some i...

 Ok surgery is done. I'm home now. I'm going to start with my day yesterday.  Yesterday Ryan and I got to the hospital at 6:45 am. They brought me to a pre-op room. I had to pee in a cup to make sure I wasn't pregnant. 😆 I got in my gown and waited for everyone to come in and talk to me. The plastic surgeon came in first. I was asking him about sizing and skin stretching. He had me stand up and he drew a little map on my chest of where the incision would be on both breasts. The left breast incision is under the breast and the right is in the middle of my breast kind of where the tumor was. He wrote "IN" on my port so they didn't take that out. He asked me about my left nipple. He said, "If we can't save the nipple on the right, do you want us to save the nipple on the left or take it off." I hadn't really thought about that. I was like, um I don't know. The pre-op nurse said, "Take it off, you want to match." So he wrote on the...