Over the 1st hurdle !
Well I spent yesterday under the care of a wonderful team @ Maroondah Hospital , they work like clockwork !! Repeating my name , date of birth & address a million times during the day ,almost muddling it up by the end of the day ! Flashing my boob to many blokes who seem to need to draw on it , stick needles in it ,take pictures of it , dye it blue ,& draw more arrows on it ! Then finally slice & dice it ! All done ! Wide local excision & sentinel node biopsy (3) Feeling sore & tired but on the whole not too bad, nurse just visited at home & confirmed all was well . Now for a long wait for the results !!! Many thanks for all the well wishes & hugs ,I really appreciate them.:) <3 :* 1st step over on this shitty climb !!
I'm Baaaack!!!
WARNING: This post contains an image that may be triggering to some members - BCNA Hi there all you folks who have been asking after me and who have sent messages. Well...that was fun!!!. Nineteen days in the slammer. a week of which was in ICU. The aneurysm was safely clipped and after a bit of drama with my BP and maintaining the balance between the risk of a brain bleed, versus another pulmonary embolism, I am finally home. A bit buggered and bruised, as you can see, but at least I'm back to my beloved knitting, and with babies galore, all baking in various family members' tummies, I'd better get a crack on. Onwards and upwards...
Eyelashes and surgery
It's such a stupid little thing but I am so cross with my surgical team. Somewhere on breast surgeon Liz O'Riordan's blog she wrote that having breast cancer taught her the importance of how much the little things can mean to a patient. Such as now when she operates on women going through/having just gone through chemotherapy, rather than applying tape directly to the eyes, she makes sure there's a bit of gauze under the tape. This protects the eyelashes from being ripped out when the tape comes off, baby eyelashes or ones bravely hanging on. This was not done for me and I'm really annoyed. I had managed to hang onto most of my eyelashes through chemo. They had thinned a little but were doing better than my eyebrows. When I was finally able to hobble to a mirror I was appalled to see that almost every single lash on the bottom left lid had gone, and that half of the lashes on the top right lid had disappeared. Now I'm not especially vain, don't always put on make up, and wear glasses. But ffs! After all the ugly indignities that BC puts you through, the scars you're left with, the ongoing side effects of long treatments, is it SO bloody hard to take the time and effort to think about and eliminate one thing for the patient?? One little thing that can affect our fragile self-esteem, sense of personal pride, privacy about our health? The thing that keeps grit out of our eyes? One less thing to remind us of CANCER everytime we look in the mirror??? How long will I have to wait before my eyelashes grow back?? What's a little thing about your treatment you'd change? I am mightily pissed off.
Partial mastectomy & Tdap flap experience
Thought I would share my experience here for future users as I didn't find many examples for partial mastectomy and Tdap (thracodorsal arterial perforator) flap reconstruction. I was diagnosed at 43 with stage 1 idc of 3.5cm in my right breast. It was found in my first ever mammogram which I only had as baseline because I was starting HRT for perimenopause. Thank god it got caught early. My Surgeon was very thorough and ordered CT, bone scan and MRI, which didn't show any spread to lymphs or beyond. The tumour was located at about 10o'clock between the nipple and armpit. Due to its largish size of 3.5cm the Surgeon recommend partial mastectomy but indicated would be able to spare my nipple and key sensation nerves. Understanding the options available to me was really important including the pros and cons of each. In particular I wanted to understand options that would maintain sensation. My breast surgeon put me in touch with the plastic surgeon to talk through options. I strongly recommend you ask for this consult if it isn't offered to you. Given the size and location of my tumour if I had opted for a reconstruction only the breast size would be very small, and then I would have needed to consider reduction of the healthy left breast for symmetry. The Plastic surgeon identified I was a good candidate for a TDAP flap reconstruction as part of a single surgery. While there are some risks a flap might not take, I felt it was the best first choice option for me. And I was positive that if everything went well I would only need one surgery rather than subsequent later reconstruction surgeries. Involving both breast surgeon and plastic surgeon did add a few weeks and a number of appointments to the first month after diagnosis. Luckily for me with my particular diagnosis the surgeon wasn't concerned it would impact on my prognosis. I am very aware how lucky my circumstances have been to allow me these choices. My surgery was about 4 hours I'm told. The breast surgeon removed the tumour, x-rayed to check the margins and then handed over to the plastic surgeon. In the end the flap needed to be taken from between Tdap and ldap area on my back close to my armpit area in order to have suitable arteries for blood connection. 1 lymph node removed. Thankfully when I came out of surgery I didn't have any nausea and ate a meal that evening! I was in hospital for 6 nights afterwards as you have two drains for flap surgery and the plastics team like to Closely monitor the flap and drains. The main discomfort I had for first few days was a sore shoulder because my arm had to be above my head for the four hours surgery. So anti-inflammatory cream was in high use. I was able to walk from day 2 and pretty much just on Panadol for pain. The bruising all over the entire breast was epic so arnica cream was essential. After 6 nights in hospital I was allowed to go home with my drains and have daily nurse visits to check. I also had direct mobile number for my specialist nurse if I had any questions. Being home in a quiet bedroom was a relief after the noisy nights of hospital ward. Currently on day 10 post surgery and still have the two drains, although I think they will be out in next few days. Flap surgery can also mean longer period of recovery before you can drive-up to six weeks. Although that is very individual and I'm hoping I might be able to drive in another week or so. Still early days but thought I would share my experience so far. SIs reconstruction right for me -
I am very new to all of this and the site. I had a diagnosis in May. Surgery within 3 weeks and then straight into chemo in June. I was told by my surgeon because my margin surgery was still not 100% that following chemo, there would be a mastectomy of my right breast. And that included a reconstruction and reduction of left breast. Well, it's moved so fast that now I've finished chemo 3 weeks ago and met the surgeon and plastic surgeon but 2 weeks out I don't know that I can face a reconstruction. I'm older, not super fit, exhausted by chemo and just not sure I can cope with reconstruction surgery. I haven't concentrated on this during chemo as I couldn't do the thinking - I know I should have. I just accepted it because that's what I was told was happening. I'm really not certain I could cope with a reconstruction. I'm struggling but thinking at this stage I'll opt for a mastectomy but really concerned of having a large remaining heavy breast on my left side. Actually, I really don't know what to do.
Lumps
Ah, the joy of little lumps! The one removed last week turns out be a seborrheic keratosis. Important words are benign and harmless. I am getting a collection, two neurofibromas (one removed along with my breast just in case it was a skin cancer) and a schwannoma, still in situ as it’s as harmless as the rest but no-one really wants to dig in the nerves of my other armpit! Daughter still leading this little competition with a dermoid cyst - complete with blonde hair and teeth bits! Any more tales of the benign but odd?
