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gleesond's avatar
gleesond
Member
15 years ago

Finally - a plan!

It’s hard to believe but after all this time….drum roll please….we finally have a plan! Here goes….(you might want to grab a coffee for this read!)

First of all, I have made the decision to not have chemotherapy.  I made this decision after much research and with the support of my family, medical oncologist and surgeon.  There are many computer programs out there that are used to determine, statistically, whether or not someone could benefit from chemo. …key word being “could”. With breast cancer (or any other cancer for that matter), there is no guarantee that chemo will kill any cancer cells that may have been left in my body.  In actual fact, it probably wouldn’t.  With stage 1 cancer, the cells aren’t dividing as quickly as they would with a higher staged cancer- chemo works best with very rapidly dividing cells therefore may not even get any cells that could be in my body.  I found this interesting because until now, I assumed chemo killed cancer cells no matter what – this is not the case.  With the computer models that the medical oncologist showed us, there was a 1% increased chance of me dying from cancer in 10 years without having chemo and a 3% increased chance of the cancer coming back without chemo.  After much consideration and debate, I decided against chemo.  These odds just don’t convince me that it’s worth putting my body through it.  Keeping in mind that chemo comes with many long term risks, I figured that the slight benefit gained just wasn’t worth the other risks that come with it.  I am very comfortable with my decision and feel like it was the best decision for me.  I believe that my healthy living – exercise, eating healthy, taking supplements that ensure my immune system is strong and healthy, being optimistic, and loving life are a better option than chemo.   The fact is that if I was older, chemo wouldn’t have been recommended for me (at least in Australia) so that tells me there is only a slight chance of it returning and I’ll do everything else in my ability to make sure that doesn’t happen. And, God forbid, if it ever returns I know I won’t regret having made my decision.

Now onto the hormone therapy.  I will begin having a monthly injections next week called Zoladex as well as a daily tablet called Tamoxifin.   I will be on these drugs for 5 years.  The reason they choose 5 years rather than 10 or longer is because if I have any residual cancer left in my body they think that within 5 years it will have “died”.  Hopefully my body copes with the changes okay and the changes will be bearable.  I have a follow-up appt with the medical oncologist in 6 months to discuss ovary removal if I am coping okay.  I’m not even going to think about this for now….

I have decided to have a double mastectomy (with reconstruction) probably sometime in June. I really want to wait until my gene test comes back before making my final decision but I am 99% sure this is what I want to do.  It will most likely be done in 2 separate surgeries because this will give me the best cosmetic outcome.  With the first surgery they will do the mastectomy and insert what’s called a tissue expander which is similar looking to an implant.  Over the course of several weeks they will inflate this expander to the desired size (this will not be a DD!) and then I will have a second surgery to replace the expander with an implant.  I looked at photos yesterday and seriously you would never know these women had anything done-it’s amazing what they can do these days.  My surgeon assured me that I should end up with very similar looking or even better breasts than I currently have.  Honestly, this decision feels like a “no brainer” to me. Once I have this done I won’t need to have mammograms done (obviously no need to do a mammo on a fake boob!).   I have another meeting next week with the plastic surgeon to start discussing specifics.  The big factor for me with this decision is that I know if I don’t have it done, I will be constantly paranoid about my breasts wondering if anything I feel is the return of the cancer. I don’t want to live my life like that so again, easy decision.  

The medical team explained all of these choices as a form of life insurance and we needed to determine just how far we wanted to go to try and prevent the cancer from ever coming back.  So, my insurance policy is to have a double mastectomy, hormone therapy and to consider ovary removal in future.  The only “extra” I didn’t take was chemo which just wasn’t worth it when weighing up the statistics and facts.  I like knowing that all of these decisions were my decisions and I made them after doing much research.  I feel incredible now knowing I made the right decision for me.  I really feel like after doing all of these things, if the cancer ever does come back (which it won’t!) then it’s God’s plan for me.  I really do have faith that it won’t ever come back – I think it was given to me to remind me how blessed I am in this life and to somehow help other people.

13 Replies

  • Sounds like a great,well researched plan to me.You are right to question chemo.It's by far the worst treatment-nearly killed me when my white cells dropped to nothing.It has taken me so long to get some hair back and I don't look like "me"anymore.So even though you are better,the "cancer"look goes on for another 6 months.This cancer was a recurrence for me(after 7yrs!)in the same breast despite radiation.So I was told I couldn't avoid chemo this time. All you can do is what feels right for you at the time.Good luck with surgery.

                                           Tonya xx

  • Thank you! It was a long, arduous, researched decision but the best one for me. I'm very lucky to have had an early stage cancer that allowed me to make the choice - most young women have Stage 2 or 3 cancer and don't have a choice with chemo. I'm a lucky one.

    Best of luck to you as well!ps. you can always get the other boob done you know???

  • What a story!!. You have guts girl. I really dont know if I could have made a descision like you have. Good for you. I really really hope it all goes well with you and I know you wont have made this descision lightly and researched it thoroughly. I really wish I had of pushed the bilateral mastectomy instead of just one. But at the time I was being bombarded with information and specialists results etc. And I dont think i was in the right mental place to decide anything at  all just wanted the cancer gone asap.

    Well good for you sister..must be a load off your mind and you will be able to move forward and live life to the fullest.

    Take care and keep smiling.

    Chrissy D :) xoxox