My first year living with Breast Cancer

My first year living with breast cancer

Friday August 9th 2013, was my last Radiation treatment, the war is over. It started September 26th. First campaign was chemotherapy.... chemical warefare , first round would be A/C (adryamicin and cytoxan ).

As I sat in the treatment room, surrounded by cancer patients with tubes coming out of their chest (ports like mine) and arms, shaved bald heads, hats, scarves, I felt like we were the elephants, in the room..

Eyes disappear when there are no eyelashes or brows. It makes the eye, more camouflaged.

The shape of the faces change, rounded and flat due to steroids. You can tell who is new, and who has been here a while.

We are the battlefield.

Nurses with incredible compassion, buzzed around taking care of every detail. Working like a hive, each knowing instinctively what to do. They lookede to me like they almost danced across the room, carrying their WMD.

Chemotherapy is like using arsenic as an antidote. Every time I watched them put the needle in my chest....watched as the red dragon (it's what bc patients call a/c, because its red and dangerous ), nurses wore large plastic masks to make sure they don't get any on them... yet, there I was accepting this into my body.

These...WMD , coursed through my veins quickly, within minutes my urine was stained red... almost like blood.

Chemotherapy is a very efficient weapon. I could feel it in every cell of my body, as i slowly become poisoned.

The fall out , was rougher then I expected. I did not realise the power my hair gives me, nor its ability to help define who I am.. this was a lesson I will not soon forget..

My blood work was always strong, I had very little medical issues with chemotherapy, The nausea was abated by medical and non medical drugs. I put on 30lbs because of the steroids and being in bed for a year but it sure beats throwing up and the consequences related to not eating etc...

My only problem with chemotherapy was the second round, Taxol, gave me really horrible migraines... actually I think it was just one long one. From January to March. None of the regular meds for headaches were working... and I could not convince my Medical Oncologist (MO) that they were due to Taxol.

So I turned to my family doctor (a great soldier to have on board during the battle ), he gave me oxycoden saying, “no need for pain now” . Relief was so welcome...

Headaches stopped when the treatment stopped.

The Surgical Strike , was the next step..the next campaign.

The chemotherapy had reduced the enemy from 4cm's to 2.5... it was time to take the enemy out. My surgeon is at the top of his field, a teacher and mentor to many, head of surgery at the cedar breast clinic.

It was a very quick campaign , in and out with extreme skill. The scars are healing very quickly and very well. I commend not only the surgeons skill on the battlefield, but the care of my loved ones at home for my quick recovery

All of the enemy was remouved ...and no evidence of advancement thru the nodes was found (nodes were negative for cancer cells )

To quote my husband “I want to thank the surgeon, for saving a couple old friends..”

The third and final campaign... Nuclear war.

Such a dirty way to wage war..

Total annihilation . I had 16 full breast doses, and 6 boosters (only the area were the tumor was ),

5 days a week, for 4.5 weeks, I took the bus from my house, 90 minutes each way, to go in for a treatment that took no more the 2minutes.

I would go in, get changed into that stupid little blue robe...go into a very cold, dimly lit room, and lay down on a table (not a bed, these things could never be beds!), take my arms out of the robe and put them above my head. Below me is a sheet, the technicians use to shift my body into position.

They use the 4 small and permanent tattoos to line me up. They also use ink (chinese ink I am told, smells like guache! That paint we used in kindergarten ), to mark the “field”.

I hated laying there, making small talk with my breasts exposed. I tried to distract myself with looking at the green laser light coming out of the celling as it danced and reflected off the machine and other stuff in the room.

The was music playing, something different each day...classical..country...rock...opera...Beatles...even Johnny Cash...the radio had a clock, but it was flashing... I could not really see it, except for the flashing.

The big machine whirled and whined its way around me , after the techies left and went behind the foot thick wall and doors...and I was alone.

Big red light “BEAM ON”

Those 2 minutes were the hardest... I thought of my mom. 11 years ago, she died after having a heart attack on the table, during her LAST radiation treatment, in the same hospital... I tried to think... what was she thinking, laying here alone.

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Each day I went , was a huge act of courage... each day I came home I told myself how strong and brave I was.

On the last day of my treatment... I was very scared.

I knew I would be emotional and I also knew I was not my mom, she was a lot sicker then I was when she was in treatment. As I laid there, alone... thinking her, I realized something... everyday I get after this day... is for both of us. She did not survive...but I am.

So... as I sit here today, looking back at my first year living with cancer, there are so many lessons , so many stories to remember ..but... I look forward and see more living, then I have ever seen before.

I want to thank each of you, for the love an support you not only give to me, but to yourself and others who are in this war.

Cancer does not define me... how I fight it...does.

Be well love

celine