Introductions
Hi girls.
Sorry I have not been very active lately.
My name is Cathy and I live about 2 hours west of Mackay. My treatment was in Townsville (chemo and radiation and mastectomy) which was about 4.5 hours travel each way.
Thankfully all treatment is finished and I only have to visit the hospital once a month to have my port flushed. My next endeavor this year is to have a breast reconstruction. I am only just starting to look at dr's etc and spending lots of hours looking over breast reconstruction photo's over the internet.
I had what i was told was a 2.5ish cm tumour in my left breast (later told it was over 7cm and that my left breast was full of smaller tumours). I had 8 out of 18 nodes involved as well. I started Chemo first to try shrink my tumour and then when that wasn't working, we had the mastectomy and then more chemo. In April May 10 I had 5 weeks of Radiation and within all that, i also had Herceptin for one year.
I found it so hard living rurally. I have three small children who were 4, 20 months and 8 months when I was diagnosed. They are now almost 7, 4 and 3. The youngest was in Kindy (qld equivelant to Preschool in some other states) at the time and then had to start primary school (Prep - which is equivelant to Kindy in other states). I hates spending 5 weeks away from her in 2010 whilst she was in Prep whilst i underwent Radiation.
I would love to know everyone else's story. Where are you in your cancer journey? How have you found it living rural?
Comments
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Hi Kristen
How are you going with your treatment? Would love to know what drs you are seeing. I saw Sally Meade for the mastectomy and was in the private system at the mater and the other private hospital for chemo. Oncologist was sabe sabesan and nurse Anita. I love love love my radiologist Sean Brennan.
It's hard with the kids so young isn't it. Do you live in Townsville? Try to get lots of video footage, I had major Chemo brain and can't remember much during my chemo time of what happened with the kids. A really good book for the four year old is "my mummy has cancer" or it could be breast cancer in the title. Really helped my then 4yo understand what was happening a lot more.
I am three years surviving. You can do it to. Keep a positive attitude and your boxing gloves on. You definitely have a good reason to keep fighting. Good luck.
Cathy0 -
Hi
Yes Sally did my mastectomy and am having treatment at the private. Anita was back this week for chemo as she had a really bad fall and shattered her elbow. They have been taking good care of me there. I am bseeing Abi Joshi who has been in TV about a year. We had just moved here in Dec From Cairns and he was the onc up there for a few years. Nice guy. Heard others talking about Sean but I got referred to Sue Hewitt the lovely south African lady. The people have been very good it's just the uncertainty and not knowing that keeps throwing the spanner in the positive wheel I am trying to stay on!
I am halfway through chemo and juicing and vitamining like crazy to try to survive the effects. Some days are good some are bad but I am the kind of person who just pushes on anyway. I have family that are flying in for the ten days or so after chemo to help out so I feel blessed on that account. I won't lie it hasn't been easy to move to a new town, have a baby and get cancer. 2012 can't wait for this year to be over! I will get my radiation in before Xmas so will be able to have a holiday after treatment ends. I still have to have the Herceptin for 12 months.
I spoke with Sally last month about having the other mastectomy done. I am struggling with being uneven and this way for 2 years in this heat etc as well as the worry of cancer returning. How have you dealt with this mentally and are you or have you considered this with your reconstruction? Did you make any progress with your referral, I get the feeling Sally doenst refer in TV and prefers to send people to brisbane? Other people say that Tuscan and vucak are ok?mi struggle with who to believe because it's pretty major step. What do you think?
Thanks for replying sometimes it feels like your friends and family really don't understand this new world I have found myself in......
Kirsten0 -
Hi Kirsten.
How is your treatment going? Sorry I haven't replied in so long, I tend to forget to look on here and I musn't have any reminders sent to my email because I didn't know i had any replies.
I am now in Mackay and so see the staff here for my stuff now. I am three years post diagnosis and although there is no treatments (other than port flush once a month) I still have a lot of "head space" issues that I deal with. I guess its not as bad as it was in that first year and a half, but its still there.
I can't even think about looking into my reconstruction until I can get my lymphodema under control. Its pretty bad at the moment because life just gets in the way and I haven't been in to get any treatment done to help minimise it. I think I will probably either go to Brisbane or even Sydney for my Reconstruction. Because I will get the other one done at the same time (no point getting a new perky one and then have the other looking at my stomach!) it will be costly and if I am paying the money, i may as well get it done by a well known dr!
My husband has been awesome with my scar and uni-boob status - cupping the empty one or rubbing it etc as if there is nothing wrong. I have a fakey that I wear but its heavy and I hate being limited with my clothing choices. I was a little upset with Sally with my mastectomy. I have fatty bits under my arm and we PAID extra for that to also be removed but even though I paid, the fat bits were not removed and it actually looks like i have a boob (more so because the scar ends at the tip of the highest bit and looks like a nipple lol) on the side of my chest.
Have you started radiation yet? The people there were absolutely lovely when I got mine done. Make sure you use the carpark at the back right near the radiation rooms and see if you can get hold of one of the parking tickets you can put on your car too. Ask the breast nurses there if you need to.
Anita probably would not remember me as they have so many people through, but please tell her that Cathy from Glenden (now mackay) thinks of her often and is very thankful she got me through the hard times. I had three very young children too at the time - a four and a half year old, a 20 month old and an 8 month old and we had not long moved to Qld from NSW when I was diagnosed. Sounds like our stories are similar!
Anyway, hope you are well
Cathy
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Hi Kirsten.
How is your treatment going? Sorry I haven't replied in so long, I tend to forget to look on here and I musn't have any reminders sent to my email because I didn't know i had any replies.
I am now in Mackay and so see the staff here for my stuff now. I am three years post diagnosis and although there is no treatments (other than port flush once a month) I still have a lot of "head space" issues that I deal with. I guess its not as bad as it was in that first year and a half, but its still there.
I can't even think about looking into my reconstruction until I can get my lymphodema under control. Its pretty bad at the moment because life just gets in the way and I haven't been in to get any treatment done to help minimise it. I think I will probably either go to Brisbane or even Sydney for my Reconstruction. Because I will get the other one done at the same time (no point getting a new perky one and then have the other looking at my stomach!) it will be costly and if I am paying the money, i may as well get it done by a well known dr!
My husband has been awesome with my scar and uni-boob status - cupping the empty one or rubbing it etc as if there is nothing wrong. I have a fakey that I wear but its heavy and I hate being limited with my clothing choices. I was a little upset with Sally with my mastectomy. I have fatty bits under my arm and we PAID extra for that to also be removed but even though I paid, the fat bits were not removed and it actually looks like i have a boob (more so because the scar ends at the tip of the highest bit and looks like a nipple lol) on the side of my chest.
Have you started radiation yet? The people there were absolutely lovely when I got mine done. Make sure you use the carpark at the back right near the radiation rooms and see if you can get hold of one of the parking tickets you can put on your car too. Ask the breast nurses there if you need to.
Anita probably would not remember me as they have so many people through, but please tell her that Cathy from Glenden (now mackay) thinks of her often and is very thankful she got me through the hard times. I had three very young children too at the time - a four and a half year old, a 20 month old and an 8 month old and we had not long moved to Qld from NSW when I was diagnosed. Sounds like our stories are similar!
Anyway, hope you are well
Cathy
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