Overwhelming

I am sorry you are going through this. My tumor was also a grade 3 and I found out on January 8th and didn't have surgery till Januar30 th. That was a really hard time for me but now I am doing a little  better I am going  through the expander part and now waiting on Oncotype DX test to come back.  The waiting is very hard. Hang in there. If you have any questions let me know. I may be able to answer them.

MissyK, 

It is difficult, people try to be supportive, but they say the dumbest things. I got so sick of, "just stay positive". Like if I did this would be easy. 

You are in for a roller coaster ride, so be self-centered and put  yourself first. We seldom do that. I think we stay tough for our families, I know I tried hard to push myself so my adult kids did not worry excessively. 

Posting on this website can help with anxiety and to get info from ladies that are going through the same treatments....

I am sorry you are going through this. My tumor was also a grade 3 and I found out on January 8th and didn't have surgery till Januar30 th. That was a really hard time for me but now I am doing a little  better I am going  through the expander part and now waiting on Oncotype DX test to come back.  The waiting is very hard. Hang in there. If you have any questions let me know. I may be able to answer them.

Hi Missy, 

I'm very sorry that you have been diagnosed - it's such a scary thing to hear, and none of us knows how we're supposed to deal with it & that goes for the people around us too. I'm going to tell you the first thing that my breast surgeon told me - he said, Breast Cancer that is confined to the breast does not kill anybody. That helped me understand what the treatments are and what they are meant to do. When they do your surgery, they are going to remove all the cancer cells from your breast & possibly nearby lymph nodes. They are going to check to make sure that they got 'clear margins' and if they didn't, they'll do a re-excision to make sure. The treatments after that will be 'just in case' treatments, Just in case there are some cells they missed, you might have radiation, just in case some cells made it out into your body - you might have chemo. These treatments are really quite effective - none of them are easy, but you will get through them and we will all be with you every step of the way no matter what.

In some ways, it is probably a good thing that you husband was grieving - some guys just stuff their emotions away and ultimately they come out somehow. I noticed that many people were very concerned at first, then as soon as treatments were over  expected that I would be 'all better'. (and you'll end up learning to roll with it). Take the next couple weeks to treat yourself really well and prepare for the surgery (get some stool softeners, get a bunch of sizes of pillows together. There's a lot of good advice on the threads here. Being proactive helps, and if people offer help then tell them exactly what they can do to help - if there isn't anything right away, you can say that you don't know yet what the long term treatments will be but that you might very much need their help and would it be okay to call when you know better what you might need help with. This initial part is really tough, but you will get there. One other thing - anxiety meds - if your doc hasn't prescribed them for you make sure he does. You don't have to take them, but it's good to have them on hand. 

(((hugs)))

The best thing you can do for your husband is talk to him. I just assumed my husband was coping well- he was taking care of me, the kids, the house and still working. He constantly would pat my hand and say everything will be alright. This was the only emotion I got from him. This really angered me and one day I blew up, screaming at him "how do you know everything will be ok"? He screamed back, " I don't know! I just don't know what else to say! I am busting my butt trying to help you, but you act like it's not enough" Well this really hurt me. I realized I wasn't helping him- emotionally. I told him to please not pat my hand anymore, but just hold me while I talked or cried. After that we were both able to cope a bit better. If you have kids, don't hold off telling them either. They are clever and know when something is wrong and they worry. I'm so sorry you are here, but welcome.

I am done with my chemo treatment as of 1/10/14 and waiting for my exchange surgery on April 9th.

I'm afraid of it coming back...so what do I do? I try to find on the internet all the success stories of women with TNBC and don't find that many. After reading, it seems me to a dark place and I get so depressed. I'm always promising myself that I will not read the horror stories, but I find that I still do it. I'm just angry because initially Pathology said I had DCIS, ER/PR positive and Her2 negative. Then after the mastectomy I also had IDC triple negative. I am so insecure, but my MO says my prognosis is excellent, those were her words. But I am still afraid. I am 59 years old and happily married for the past 5 years. I don't act like an old woman, but my body feels it. In fact, I feel mentally young. I am finally happy in my life and now I have to worry about whether I will be around for the next 5 years. Fortunately, I am taking Lexapro for depression because of this, but sometimes in my mind I am so afraid.

I don't find too many success stories and that makes me anxious. I'm sorry I am being a Debbie Downer, but I am so afraid.

Maybe I should just stay off the internet reading about TNBC and just stay here.

p.s. TifJ...I found some hope in reading your stats. You were triple negative and are still blessed to be here. You have given me hope. Thank you!

my mother had BC when she was 40. Now she is 66 and been BC free since then. I am waiting on Oncotype test too. I called lab today and they said that sent my result to oc Friday. So now every time the phone rings now I'm nervous. Ugh. 

Shori- In my opinion, cancer is a crapshoot. No matter what type you have, it can come back or not. It follows no rules so I don't put a lot of faith in statistics. Most info online is outdated and does nothing but scare the crap out of you. If it returns, we can only just deal with it and keep moving on. Does it mean I am not afraid of recurrence? Absolutely not! The fear is still there, but after 3+ years, it no longer consumes my life. I still worry about every ache and pain, but attribute them more to my age(48) than cancer. I do get any pain lasting longer than 2 weeks checked out though.

I see that this is your second time around. Do not put a lot of worry into the fact that you're TN this time- it is treatable and responds well to chemo.

Like Catherio said, TN doesn't equate to automatic death! You probably don't find that many long term survivors on the discussion boards because they are out living their life! You will get to the same point, it just takes time. hang in there.

OH I loved your post…It expressed it well.  I am a medical professional and I had done it all.  to no avail…still got tricked. I was one of the few that a mammogram did not do anything for…I was stage four 8 weeks after a mammogram found nothing…YOu are so right….like your advice. 

Carolyn from TN/Fl