A little pissed off..mostly at myself..

Heatherbee

Went to the onc again today for a little more unveiling.  The last report after a CT scan and bone scan showed that I had a small mass in my lung 2 cm in a node, but my wall was full of fluid so much so that my left lung was collapsed and my heart was pushed to the right.  I thought I just had a bad cold, but at the beggining it felt like someone had broken my rib, but I was going through reconstruciton at the time and my plastic dr. told me that was sometimes normal for things to fuse to cartliage and be painful.  The rib pain went away,, but the hard time breathing didn't.  After three months of this I finally went to the dr. who thought I had bronchitis, but had a chess xray done.  Chess xray reveiled fluid so I had a CT scan, but I was also complaining of what I thought was arthritis in my left hip, so they ordered a bone scan too and I was referred to my onc.  I had the bone scan on a sat and was told the images would be available for my onc appoint the following monday, but the report wouldn't be out until that afternoon.  Monday, the report was there but no pics.  My onc said there was a tumor in my left pelvic side (all he said)  However Onc said the CT scan showed a small mass 2 cm in a node, but pulled a pulmanary dr who scheduled to have fluid drian from my lung the next day and said they would do pathology on it.  Scheduled me back the next week.  Met with another fellow and we walked through the bone scan results and it showed that I have a tumor in my left upper femor ball, left pelvic area, left 6th rib, and sternum. When i met with the pulminary doc and asked why there was fluid in my lung, he thought it was because cancer had attached the wall.  They checked on the pathology report on lung fluid and all they got back was that it was being retested, but there was abnormal cells. 

 Anyway, the reason I am pissed at myself is that when I was previously diagnosed, they said I had a small chance for be hormal and wanted to put me on tamoxifin, which they wanted to give me a hysterectomy and yada yada.  I was referred to an eye doctor at the hospital for a base line vision test, cause this crap could cause blindness.  At the time, they found some abnormality in my eyes and thought I had a brain tumor, which turned out not to be quite accurate..  I have a psydo tumor.. excess fluid in the brain putting pressure on my eyes.............so I was like....yeah I am done..my breast surgon said don't worry about, we are going to monitor you and if you have a reaccurance we will be able to handle it and won't let your breast tumor get that bad.  So I refused tomafin.  Well I am on it now in hopes that is what is going on.   I am praying that what I have right now is the same gig and not something new.  Pray for me.  Thanks for reading this, I feel like I am rambling.  I am grateful that I am not in a lot of pain, however I was given some valume to help with panic and some hydrocodone to help with pain..  I pray for all you other gals going through same gigs.  I just keep thinking we don't make it out a live any way, but it is good to have a place to vent with others who are going through the same.  Thanks for this sight.

~H

ICanDoThis

Do not blame yourself, please!

We all make the best decisions we can, based on what we know at the time, and who we are at the time. Sometimes, later events show that it's possible a different choice may have had a different outcome. but we all know that hindsight is 20/20.

Additionally, you are only SLIGHTLY hormone receptive, and that might mean that tamoxifen wouldn't have changed anything.

In the meantime, I hope and pray that things will get better for you.

Mouse6

Heatherbee,

I'm so sorry to hear that you have to deal with a recurrence. We all struggle with making decisions through this process. I find myself constantly second guessing myself and the doctors. The crappy thing is - there is no way to ever know if the decisions we make today will be the best ones in the long run. We just have to make a choice, and have faith that things will go our way. And if they don't, well, we can't blame ourselves. After all, even the best scientists in the world can't figure cancer out yet. We can't possibly expect to crack the code ourselves! It sounds like you made the best choice you could at the time. Be gentle with yourself. Much love. ooo

Jelson

Heatherbee-

You have been through so much in such a short period! and you made the best decisions based on the information you had at the time and as ICanDoThis points out - the outcome may very well have been the same. Don't waste your energy on what might have been and certainly don't question your ability to make intelligent decisions about your future treatment.   So sorry you are going through this now - I too am hoping that you that you get better news and of course that you remain painfree - and do make use of anxiety reducing drugs!!

Julie E  

Ezscriiibe

Hugs.

By the way, I am perpetually pissed at myself. It's a fruitless exercise. Don't know why we do it.

In the end, as others said, we make the best decisions we can based on the information we have at the time. 

None of us can see into the future. And none of us would purposefully make decisions that we felt would hurt or impair us.

 

Heatherbee

Thank you all you lovely ladies.  I am think I am still processing the news and trying to focus on what I need to do to heal and staying in the "now" but it is hard work! 

~H