I
committed to 'mastectomy training' (working out) prior to the big surgery to ensure that I would be in
the best position possible to recover from surgery faster. Over a period of 2 months, including 1 chemo treatment, I did work
myself up to doing a full Insanity video, yay me! I was also able to fit in
some time with the family and birthday celebrations, in between several pre-op
appointments and wrapping up projects at work.
Tuesday,
February 5th was my official
surgery date. Andrew and I checked in to admissions at KU Med at 5:30 am
for my 8:00 surgery start time. Once I
got to the surgery waiting room, I was called back and immediately to begin the prepping process for what
turned out to be an 8 hour surgery consisting of a double mastectomy, lymph
node removal, port installation (under the collar bone), and expander
installation. For everyone who camped out or made a cameo appearance in the waiting room, and came to
visit Andrew that long day, thank you. February 5th was Andrew’s 30th birthday. As
a gift, I wrapped up 9 lottery tickets, 1 for each hour (and 1 extra for luck)
I was in surgery. This would give him something to look forward to and
help pass the time, and if he won, that would be an extra bonus!
When I
woke up from surgery, all I can remember is
having several clinicians swarming over me, swooping me into an upward sitting
position, and wrapping my chest with some kind of compression. I remember
being very groggy and whining, “what are you doing? Why are you doing
this to me? This hurts….” It is kind of funny to how straight forward you can be
when waking up from sedation. I remember Andrew and a handful of others coming back to talk with me. At that point, I knew I was ok, and made it out alive. I do remember taking shallow breaths and talking quietly because it hurt to expand my chest from breath to breath. From there, I was moved into my room in the
5th floor around
9:30pm. I did not get very much sleep that night because I had to press
this button every 10 minutes that released short lasting pain relief. If
I dozed off for too long, I’d wake up in pain. The next morning, I was finally
offered long lasting pain medications- oxycontin,
vicodin, and valium…. Yes
please. Later that morning, I was asked if I would like to stay an
additional day at the hospital until the pain medications were more
stabilized. I declined, I’d rather go home and see the kids, I
missed them so much! And with that, I was discharged home.
I spent my first week of recovery sleeping, going to
doctors appointments, draining tubes and bulbs, taking medications, and
watching movies- nothing that required too much brain power. I have to
wear a mastectomy camisole to hold the drains and bulbs. I
have 3 drains literally hanging out of my body needing to be
stripped and recorded 2x per day- bulbs and
drains. I cannot have them removed until I drain under a certain
amount of drainage total per day. Really, they are the biggest pain of all. I
am convinced that there is no way to be comfortable and have them. My
expanders (expand chest muscle to make room for implants later) are
very heavy on my chest when I lay flat, so I have been sleeping in a
recliner. At this point, I am having a hard time sleeping
because the drains are a bother and I just cannot get comfortable.
Normally, drains stay in for 2-3 weeks. As for getting them removed
at my next appointment (Tuesday the 19th), it is not looking
good, but I am hopeful.
This is what a drain tube looks like once removed:
This is what a drain tube looks like once removed:
My
‘big’ doctors appointment was last Wednesday-
the pathology report was final and ready.
You always know bad news is about to be delivered when
someone starts the conversation with “well, the good news is…” You are
just hoping that the good news out weights the bad news enough to give you an
overall positive outlook. So here we go. The good news is that all
the tissue removed from the breast was negative for cancer cells. The bad
news is that there were a seven lymph nodes
with a few cancer cells remaining. The
doctor said that she wanted to know whether those remaining cancer cells were
in the dying stage or alive, ensuring the effectiveness of chemo in case there
were other cancer cells that have circulated
to another area in my body, unnoticeable by
the most keen of tests and procedures (we are talking tiny 1-off cells).
We left the appointment somewhat relieved, but knowing that more work had to be
done. I was feeling nauseous from the pain medications, and went to the
treatment center for Herceptin (the HER+ cancer blocker) and nausea
medications.
That
night, my doctor called. The lab
reviewed the cancer cells found in my lymph nodes
and reported that the cells they found were
very viable and fast growing. So, we believe, in theory, that all
the cancer cells have been removed in my body through surgery, however, since
they were found in my lymph nodes, these
tiny cells could have possibly traveled somewhere in my body. Cancer is
detectable when they start multiplying and creating tumors- which are
detectable. To prevent the possibility
of a small number of cancer cells, that may or may not exist, from multiplying, I will have 4 cycles of 2 new types
of chemo- Epirubicin and Cytaxan OR the EC combo,
as some call it. Both of these chemotherapy’s have a pretty nice resume
of side effects ranging from the
hearts ability to pump blood to worse nausea and
fatigue then my previous chemo, etc.. Epirubicin has a maximum lifetime amount, some side effects can go
undected for up to 8 years after chemotherapy stops. Sounds
like a blast. Chemo ‘take 2,’ will start mid March, and I
will receive a treatment every other week until I have had 4 treatments completed. Again, I will lose my hair, have irregular GI system, fragile
nail beds, low blood counts, the
whole 9 yards- all over again. Nothing
that I am not used to at this point. Once chemo is over, and my expanders are fully expended, I will then
have radiation in the area that the cancer cells were found in the lymph nodes and possibly my chest area. The good news
is that I have never had radiation, so I get to go into this new experience
blindly optimistic. I have heard that radiation is a breeze compared to
chemo, and then again, I have heard it the other way around. I will be the judge of that :).
When
I first learned the results, I was very bummed. The more I think about
it, the more confident I am that my cancer will be
beat. This additional treatment gives me the peace of mind that
all cancer cells will be gone. If only a handful of cells were remaining,
4 whole cycles and radiation will surly do the trick. I’ve heard that receiving news of reoccurance is more
devastating than the first diagnosis. I trust my oncology team and
will get through this portion of the race. I keep telling myself
that one year from now, things will be back to normal. As bad as this
sounds, as a mother of 3 kids under the age of 4, ‘mommy life’ is very
ritualistic. You just have to get through the push of the work week to
enjoy the weekends of fun and ‘projects’ (during nap time and ‘after hours’ of
course). You begin to grow accustomed (I would even go as far to say
‘take for granted) to things such as picking your babies out of their
crib to rock them to sleep, wrestling and tickling them uncontrollably, helping
them off the chair at meal time, even holding them and snuggling with them on
the couch. Now those things as well as the mundane task of reaching
up to get the key to let the dog out, taking a shower (still!), getting up from
a sitting position, and putting on button down shirts- are all very
difficult. As the cliché goes you always want what you don’t have
and I today I want nothing more than my stressed out, jammed packed,
juggling act of a life back. I’ve learned a lot along the way, but the ‘1
year from now’ cannot come soon enough.
