Tamoxifen for Non Invasive LCIS

The way I know if a side effect is from the drug is to stop the medication. If the side effect goes away and resumes after you begin to take it, it is pretty clear to me. Not scientific. But my thin skin is from Tamoxifen. My doctor mentioned depression can be a side effect. But am not sure about that for me.

Hi,

I Think many women here know their own bodies best. I could feel many new sideeffects, while eating the medecine

and I suspect the others too could feel the new effects in their bodies. Trust your inner feeling

I'm so sorry, OCJenny.  I have not had a mastectomy, so I don't know what having a mastectomy is like. 

 Its extremely likely that your lobular cancer (I assume you were just diagnosed with invasive lobular carcinoma, ILC, since you mention chemotherapy) was present way before you were diagnosed with LCIS.  It is thought that most breast cancers have been in the breast for some 5-10 years before they can be detected by *any* means.  ILC in general is thought to be a slower growing cancer.

Best wishes to you as you make these important decisions.  You can also visit the surgery and radiation forums.  Remember, people who have problems with a certain treatment are much more likely to post than people who have no problems with a treatment.

Hi there! 

Yes, I did have pain after my core biopsy a week later.  We're all different with respect to pain.  Its normal to have some swelling (hardness) in the area.  I had shooting pains in the breast, which gradually decreased over the next many weeks.  If the area is tender, red, and swollen, then you may want to check with your doctor if it might be infected.

 To explain invasive versus in-situ, think of the network of lobules and ducts in the breast as the streets in a town.  Its a rather strange transportation system, to be sure, because none of the streets intersect, and they all end in a dead end.  The streets are like ducts; the dead ends are like lobules.  The lobules are where milk is made after childbirth.  The milk travels from the lobules (the dead ends) through the ducts (the streets) to the nipple.  The sidewalk lines all the streets and dead ends.  These sidewalks, in microscopic terms, is the basement membrane, that lines all the ducts and lobules.  

Normally, there is a layer of cells that line the ducts and the lobules.  When these cells that line the ducts and lobules multiply, you can have ductal and/or lobule hyperplasia (hyper meaning there are more cells.)  This is analogous to instead of having cars parked neatly at the side of the street, you have more cars that are double or triple parked.  When you have atypical lobular or ductal hyperplasia, these double/triple etc cells look beat up (they do not look normal).  However, they are all in the street.  When you have LCIS, you have these beat up cars totally filling the dead ends.  (Some pathologists say it looks like 'marbles in a bag'.)  But in DCIS and LCIS, even though the cells look abnormal (beat up),  they are contained by the basement membrane; in other words the cars are ONLY found on the street.   So LCIS and/or DCIS by itself cannot spread to other places; it cannot kill you; it cannot get into the blood or lymph.  That's why many oncologists do not consider LCIS (and to perhaps a lesser extent DCIS) as breast cancer.  There is some controversy about this point though.

When you have invasive breast cancer, these beat up cars (cells) are not only on the street, they cross the basement membrane, and go up the driveways into the houses (into what is called the 'stroma' of the breast).  These abnormal cells can enter the bloodstream and/or lymph nodes and go to other places in the body.  Normally, if they do this, some are caught in the lymph nodes, which is kind of a 'filter' for the lymph fluid.  

I am not up on all the aspects of metastasis; I think (but am not sure) that before diagnosis, an invasive cancer can release some cancer cells into the blood or lymph.  I don't know if every invasive breast cancer does this, or whether just advanced breast cancers do.  

ILC is sometimes called  'the sneaky one'; it can be hard to diagnose; it is more difficult to see on mammograms, ultrasounds, and MRI.  It tends to form sheets.  Invasive ductal cancer (IDC) tends to form a lump (as opposed to sheets.)  

Since you have been followed closely, it is more likely  (and we certainly hope of course) that you have earlier (rather than advanced) breast cancer.  

Try to examine all of your options, and select the one that is right for you.  It doesn't matter if your choice is different from someone else's choice; it only matters if its right for you.

Brilliant analogy, Leaf!