Bone mets to Femur? Please help!

Unfortunately yes you can get mets on the other side.......There are a few ladies on the mets board who have mets to the femur also.......Also the girls tell me that bone mets can be maintained with Zeloda and that you can live years and years with bone mets....I actually had the pleasure to meet a lady who has had bone mets for 19 years and she is going strong........I wish you well.....



Nanalynda, I am so glad that my feelings are validated about no node involvement and mets......My oncologist even says she cannot say if or when I will develop mets.....Although she does say I have a low recurrence rate she cannot rule them out entirely........It makes me sad that some people will tell you that if you had no nodes involved you can't get mets........I wish you well also, dear sister.....I am the 5th in my family to have bc.....My youngest sister who is 5 yrs older than I had stage 3 and one older sister had stage 4...We lsot our mom in 1972 and our grandmother in 1976.........athe younger sister and I are doing well so far.........

Sometimes the cancer cells have already set up shop. Before you started or during treatment In your case, the femur.

Cancer cells can also be resistant to chemo. There are woman on the Stage 4 forums who have a lot of info. they may be able to help you!

Be well.

I remember reading once that with triple negs it doesn't really matter if you have node involvement or not. And besides..it can spread vascularly.

 Also..according to the recent study written on this site, your doctor can write "node negative" when there is an isolated cancer cell in your lymph nodes. THAT, I did not know!

Vicki,  I empathize.  I wish I had more to give you than that.  I have a PET Scan tomorrow.  I start chemo the fiest week of December.  My thoughts and prayers are w/ you.

Mine was by my surgeon, not even an onc!

Titan - The one guarantee with breast cancer is that their are no guarantees! I think that's the hardest part of this disease, and why so many women are on anti-anxiety meds. No matter what your stage/status, there is always a chance of recurrence/mets. I think we all live with that fear in one way or another.

I didn't mean to imply that you (or anyone) assumes that because they had negative nodes they can't get a recurrence.

Printed words don't always come across the way we intend them to, so I just wanted to make sure it was clear that there was no "scolding" or any negative emotion attached to my post!

(And yes, when I found out my cancer had spread to my nodes, I started shaking from head to toe. I made my rat bastard ex-fiance lie on top of me to try to stop my body from quaking. But here I am, almost 5 years later, doing great, and happy to feel like I have removed two cancers from my life - the breast cancer and the rat bastard ex-fiance! LOL)

Yes, mets can definitely show up anywhere in your body.  I was dx in 04/07 with Stage IV breast cancer which spread to my ilium.  They did a bone biopsy just to make sure.  The biopsy went fine and I can honestly say it did not hurt.   As of today, I have mets throughout my skeletal system and I feel fine.  Hang in there and I pray everything goes well.  Stay in the present and don't look too far ahead in the future.

Titan, I must disagree with your assessment that no matter what stage we are we are all going through the same thing......Our stage 4 sisters are going through a whole lot worse than we are.....They are going through more chemo and tests than we are and also they have less time here than we do......To say that we stage 1 ladies are going through the same thing as the stage 4 is very incorrect.......I once thought the same as you when I was first diagnosed but I have since learned we are a whole world apart in what we deal with compared to the stage 4 sisters......

Vicki26, good luck and prayers for B9.......

Vicki

When can you get a bone biopsy? Push for it. Did your path report say you had vascular invasion? Usually bone mets are caused by vascular invasion. 

newalex:  I had a sentinel node biopsy at the time of my surgery and it was negative.  It took almost two years for the mets to show up, but they were in the nodes around my collar bone and throughout my chest on the side of my surgery.  They were also in my mid chest (mediastinum) and in my spine.  Just 6 months previous to the mets, I had shoulder surgery on that side and had xrays and an MRI which showed nothing.  The Dr. who did my breast surgery was a very prominent breast surgeon and very experienced.  He was very happy I was node negative, but he told me I had a "nasty" cancer.  I thought I was home free since the sentinel node was clear.  I also have TN and a basal tumor which were working against me.  I get upset when I read on these boards messages to newbies that "no nodes are key" when indeed I know from my own story that that is not necessarily true.  Then I am torn about posting my story and dashing their hope (which I don't want to do), but I want them to be informed about what can happen.  Linda

Edited for spelling.

And my Docs were aggressive because I was TN.  I had a partial mastectomy, dose dense TAC, and Rads.  I know everything was done to prevent a recurrence, but it happened anyway.  You are so right barbe.... knowledge is power.

Vicki

Maybe there were cell travelled into blood before the mast and chemo. Did you have a PET scan prior to chemo? 

I truly hope that no one on these boards gets mets, but everyone needs to know it is a possibility.  Titan is right... having no positive nodes does decrease your chances, but there is still some risk for all.  I started out stage I in 2006 and in 2008 I was stage IV... totally shocked that it happened.  Knowledge is power.... yes, don't believe what you read on the boards, but instead research and learn everything you can about your cancer.

Vicki:  Have you gotten a date yet for your biopsy?  Linda