I'm really new here... hope I get replies

Hi Angelisa~

Not a great way to meet, I know.  I was 43 last year when I was diagnosed.  Had tummy surgery to create a new breast and chemo.  I am almost done with a year of Herceptin as I am Her2+.  I know your head is swirling right now but please believe me that it will get better.  Once you have a plan you can go forward and kick this cancer in the butt!

Hugs to you...

Sorry I can't help you with the HER2 status because mine was negative.  Just wanted you to know that we are here to help you in any way we can.

The worst part for me was waiting for the final diagnoses.  Once I got a treatment plan - I was ok emotionally.  That doesn't mean that I didn't cry, scream out in anger, etc.  I just felt more in control knowing I was kicking some cancer butt.  It is normal for your emotions to run wild right now.  My emotions would change within 5 minutes from being sad to angry to totally numb and bounce back to the same over and over again.

I ended up going into chemo induced menopause.  I cried at everything.  I couldn't even watch a funny show without crying.  It was my body adjusting to the lack of hormones.  I am in weekly therapy now and I believe that is helping me more than anything in the world.  It also helps that my therapist is a BC survivor herself so she understand me better than someone that has never gone through this.

Keep us up to date on what is going on - feel free to PM me if you wish.

Hi There,

            I have not, been on this for over a year, my first advice is remeber everyone is different, I was one of the luckier ones, I was never sick one day with chemo.................took two weeks off after the surgery and have never looked back.

               I started wearing a wig BEFORE I lost my hair so no one knew, and as I lost my hair I drove around my town throughin it out the car window my little way of saying  _________ you to cancer!!

             My doctors keep saying just take your time on discisions, that is one thing I would do not do over I would plan everything very fast and get it done with, once you have made a decision it can be done any over with with in a month and you can start your life over again................... this place saving me one night and I am on hear now looking for my past friends who were there for me!!!!

              I will try to stay on and visit with you if you would like!!!  Sweeeeetpam 

Angelisa, 

I know that waiting is hard and we tend to imagine the worst case senario, but try to keep positive thoughts.  When my doctor explained my diagnosis, I was surprised by all of the treatment options that were available. I am finishing my chemo and also taking Herceptin since I am HER2+.  I would advise you to take someone with you to your appointment on Tuesday. It is good to have someone else there to hear what the doctor says as you may find it dificult to remember. Also write down any questions you think off and take a pencil and paper along just in case.  Best of luck and try to keep positive thoughts.  Gloria

Sorry that I can't help you but I will "bump" your thread to help others see your cry for help.

XOXO

Linda

Angelisa,

There is a thread that was started "Mother's of Young Children".  We haven't been posting much lately - probably because we are all busy doing treatment and chasing after our little ones.  Anyways, here is the link (hope it works).  You can read everyone's perspectives and see that we all have the same common fears.  Please let us know how everything goes.  Please come to the boards often to get support.  The beginning part of this journey is truly the worst.  It will get easier, I promise!

http://community.breastcancer.org/forum/96/topic/754773?page=1#idx_13

Angelisa,

and just like that...there is the thread in--cognito directed you too.  I'm smiling because you have seem to have far reaching Angels today.

Traci

Angelisa,

God does hear and answer prayers. I was diagnosed in October of 2009 and he continues to send others my way to inspire and encourage me and just let me know he loves me beyond what I ever imagined. I learned recently that my eye doctor's wife is a cancer survivor. She's been NED for 20 years and she has a friend that has been NED for 30 years. I've been going there for at least 5 years and never knew this until I told them about my diagnosis. God is awesome!  

Hi Angelisa, I am HER+ and just started chemo today.  I will be on TCH regimen and have the SE drugs ready if I need them.  Had just the Herceptin today because I am 10 days postop LMX with ax nodes.  The waiting part is the worse and not knowing what treatment they start with.  Just remember we are here for you!!

Peace and laughter one day at a time,

Cheryl

Just so you know, there is no need to do a double mastectomy if you only have cancer in one side.  Cancer doesn't spread from one breast to another and your risk of getting it in your other side is extremely low.

Be mindful that when you do a double mastectomy, you can lose feeling all across your chest and back.  I had a unilateral mastectomy and I have no feeling from the cleavage area to the middle of my back.

Also, statistaclly, there is no difference in survival rates between women who have lumpectomies and women who have mastectomies.  I wanted a lumpectomy but I was unable to have one due to the extensive nature of my cancer. 

Cancer can also return in the mastectomy scar, so there are no guarantees.

I'm not trying to scare or talk you out of a decison - but  I do want you, and everyone,  to research and not react emotionally.  Lots of women just "want 'em off" and are shocked to discover the cancer has returned anyway.

I am HER2+, did six rounds of chemo.  I did three of taxotere and carboplatin and ended up with neuropathy so he switched me to weekly taxol.  So, I had nine more weeks of that but am fine now - my last chemo was March 31.  I am still doing herceptin until December.  I also have not had my reconstruction surgery yet due to a mistake on a doctor's part, but I will have it in November.  

My hair fell out but it grew back a silver - like a platinum!  'd been dying it a fun crazy red shade for years.  I like the odd colors and was happy it came back this way - somebody asked me the other day if I dyed it     I also have a pixie cut now (not exactly a cut) which I never would have tried but I like it.

I worked during chemo, I got a new job a month ago and life does go on.    My youngest son turned 13 and started high school and I'm okay.  When I was on chemo, I chaperoned field trips and volunteered along with working.  I didn't cook dinner much because I wasn't very interested in eating so that ended up my husbands job. 

My energy level is not back to where I want it yet and I have a bad day or two when I get really tired - mostly due to Tamoxifen SEs which you won't have to take.  But for the most part, I'm doing extremely well.

That's the way it ends up for most of us.  A year from now, you'll post something like this for a newbie too.

You can read my blog too if you like - it's in my signature.

Good luck to you.  It's not nearly as bad as you think.  Like everybody else said - the worst part is the time between diagnosis and treatment when your imaginaton goes wild.   

CC - where are you in Ohio?  I'm in Akron and I'm almost a year out from the last chemo.  I started at University Hospital, which has great onc nurses, but I didn't like my doc.  I finished my year of Herceptin at City Hospital with Dr. Payne...she is wonderful and has a great bedside manner, very caring.  I did a lot of supplements and a nutrition program too...lots of juicing as well.  It's easiest just to do about four carrots, a big handful of spinach, half an apple, and a quater sized piece of ginger is great to throw in for an upset stomach.  You can experiment as you go along.  Obviously, juicing is not going to kill cancer on it's own, but it gets a big shot of vitamins and nutrients into you quick and I truly believe eating well and supplements are what helped me get through chemo.

This is the most overwhelming time of this whole process.  A counselor told me "Don't go there until you get there" when I kept worrying about test after test and which chemo and how much rads, etc, etc.  It was the best advice I got.  Take things one step at a time, even though it's really hard not to worry about the future.  I found that if I researched a lot and got an idea stuck in my head of how treatment would go, I would be upset and depressed when a doc told me treatment would go a different way.  So I learned quickly to not assume every situation was like mine and I stopped reading about different treatments until I got the facts on my situation and was ready to start those particular treatments myself.   It's hard...kind of like trying to keep yourself from flipping to the back of a book to see how the story will end.  But I learned that nobody knows how the story will end for sure, not even docs, so I might as well just go page by page.  

Hang in there, I hope this testing and waiting time goes as quickly as it can for you!

cc4 - My mammogram and ultrasound said my tumor was 1.2.  The MRI said 3.0 cm x 3.2.  When I had the first lumpectomy, the main tumor was 1.5 cm with another 7 mm area next to it.  They went back in and found another 1 mm.  I decided to start chemo and do a BMX in November, so I don't know how much was left behind.  I had a PET scan before I started chemo and it did not show any additional tumors, but a PET scan can only pick up so much.  For what it's worth I was breast feeding during the time I did the MRI.  The MRI report said "No areas of multifocality seen" when I did in fact have areas of multifocality. 

Good luck with the MRI! 

Gosh CC, I wish I knew.  I don't even think I have my MRI report to look back at.  I know my biopsy report said there was lymphatic invasion but I had no lymph nodes involved.  It sounds like you have no invasion so that would be a great thing.  I would think that non-specific would mean there's nothing that looks out of the ordinary with those nodes, but I'm definitely no expert.  Sometimes you can get better answers from the doc instead of having a nurse read you the results.  In my case, the nurse never read the results unless they were good results and even then she "leaked" them to me.  Don't be afraid to ask what everything means.  It can be intimidating because they nurses and docs always seem to be in a hurry and you kind of end up feeling like they don't have time for you.  But you're just as important as the next patient so make sure you're comfortable with their explanations.  I think they deal with this so much that they tend to forget or take it for granted that we know what they're talking about.

Hopefully, someone here has a little more experience with this than I do and can chime in.