Feeling overwhelmed and unsure what to do
Hi Ladies I have aggressive ductal carcinoma in my left breast. I have had a lumpectomy and sentinel lymph node removal. BCI organised for a endopredict test to be done. I am in the high risk caterg...
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Hi @Honestly,
It’s such a whirlwind of emotions with so much happening all at once. Like you, I’m also high risk for recurrence. I had a lumpectomy but I had a re-excision too. I did my chemo before surgery though as my tumour was big, I had lymph node involvement and it was aggressive. Im not sure what low dose chemo is but perhaps someone else might know.
It’s such a whirlwind of emotions with so much happening all at once. Like you, I’m also high risk for recurrence. I had a lumpectomy but I had a re-excision too. I did my chemo before surgery though as my tumour was big, I had lymph node involvement and it was aggressive. Im not sure what low dose chemo is but perhaps someone else might know.
I didn’t do cold cap as I knew it doesn’t work for everyone and I really didn’t want to extend my chemo time (it was going to add a couple of extra hours to the total time), I just wanted to do chemo and then get out of there. I got some really great wigs and got heaps of compliments. Most people were shocked to know it wasn’t my real hair.
I chose not to work for the 10 mths while I had treatment and surgery as I really didn’t know how I was going to be affected by the whole thing. I had enough leave to do half pay while I was away so financially I didn’t have to work if I didn’t want. For the first time in my life I decided to take some time for me. I’d never done that before. At the time of diagnosis I felt really guilty for getting sick and then deciding to take time away from work as I’m a workaholic but I’m glad I did. I actually enjoyed being home even though it wasn’t under the best circumstances. Looking back, I would have been ok to work for most of my treatment (except during AC chemo). There were quite a few appts along the way with oncology, surgeon, blood tests, scans etc plus daily radiation for 6 weeks and as i live 60 kms from my local cancer centre, it really wasn’t worth it for me to do half days.
All the best with everything :-)