Just diagnosed

ChaosRains

have a thread here and really have no energy to type it all out again, so I apologize.   You can read it here 

https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/5/topic/8...

my question here is is there somewhere online i can put in my pathology report and decipher it from its alien language into something I can understand?

Anonymous

There is CancerMath.net .  I used it to kind of mentally prepare myself.  But then I'm the type that feels more empowered by knowledge...whether it is good, bad, or ugly.  I didn't want to have unrealistic expectations.  But I totally understand where others might get too stressed or worried by some of the stats.  Only you will know if the information will be helpful or not.

I was going for nipple sparing mastectomy...so I was curious as to my chances that my nipple could be spared.  CancerMath actually has a "Nipple Involvement Calculator"! Go figure.

I read your other thread, and like you, I got through a lot of this with a sense of humor.  And yes, many times morbid.   I can't tell you how many times I broke into fits of giggles with my mom or husband in the various doctor offices.  But that's just my personality.  Everybody said I was so "strong"...but what are you supposed to do?  Either cry or laugh I guess.  Laughing is more fun, plus it helps ease the tension.  I had my crying moments, for sure.  But they were few and far between.  Anyhoo...I'm almost 4 years out and come back here from time to time to check up on the latest studies/treatments and try to give encouragment to newbies.  I devoured this site in the first months that I was diagnosed.  I learned more here from any of the doctors.  It made me feel empowered and I felt I was able to be a better advocate for myself and my treatment decisions.

Best of luck to you.  Sorry you are forced to ride this BC train.  Hold on tight and try to keep that humor during the crazy ride.

Anonymous

Also ...a couple of comments from your other thread you linked.

I don't know your specific stats and there probably is very good reason behind them wanting to start chemo....In my case, the original pathology from my biopsy was high mitotic rate (grade 3) ...but the surgery (BMX) pathology 2 months later dowgraded it to grade 2 with a low mitotic rate of 1.   I was able to have the oncotype test because the tumor was ER+...and that ended up coming back as "low" ...so no chemo.    The doc was pretty surprised.   Everyone was preparing me for chemo.  My sister even knitted me a hat for cripes sake.  (a beautiful chocolate brown yarn. She knew I'd kill her if she did pink! )

Anyhoo.... I guess what I'm trying to say is sometimes things turn out different than originally thought.  I know you said you trust your docs..but sometimes it doesn't hurt to get a second opinion. 

Also... not sure if you heard about them.  If you are concerned about losing your hair...they do have a thing called "cold caps" that has been successful in preventing ladies from losing all of their hair.  I would have done that had I needed chemo.  No doctor ever told me about it...I learned about it on this forum.

ChaosRains

Susan, 

Thanks so much for your info and sharing your story as well.    My family and friends have been more upset than I am, so I wrote cancer a letter and posted it to my facebook/ texted it to them so that they would know my thoughts and also because it helped me remember who I am.   

I am a person who has to have all the knowledge, good, bad, indifferent, I just have to know and I have given myself one hour each day to research things, etc (though I think I'm going to exclude this site from that hour just because it is great to be able to jump on here and talk to others who know exactly what I'm going through).    It may sound crazy to some people but I refuse to become my diagnosis and quite honestly other than stress of the diagnosis I feel fine so I am going to keep things as routine as possible until I am forced to change the routine. 

And, surprisingly enough I'm not so worried about if I do lose my hair anymore.   I have really long hair at the moment (almost to my waist) and I've never really had a short hairstyle because I was always too afraid to try it... but I'm kind of turning this in to an adventure now my sister-in-law is a hairdresser and I've been googling hair styles I'd like to try and I think I will have a hairstyle that gets shorter every week for awhile so its kinda neat in its own way... and that way if I do start losing hair I will have already adjusted to a shorter style and it wont be such a big deal