8-16 Weeks for BRCA 1&2 Results from UWashington :(

I definitely understand that it's likely that those who have been through all this and are on the other side of it probably think my anxiety right now is silly and that 8-12 weeks really isn't that long to be left waiting.  Logically, I can agree with them.

Unfortunately, that isn't making this any easier to handle.  I was expecting the wait of 2-4 weeks that most of the people had reported elsewhere and really was hanging on to that timeframe as I went through the MRI, then the ultrasound, and now gearing up for the biopsy.  I know my BRCA status has nothing to do with the biopsy, but it's yet another thing that I feel like my life is on hold for.

I'd rather be planning ahead than waiting.  I know these things probably sound so stupid and superficial to someone who has had a cancer diagnosis and faced treatment with all the pain that comes with it, but before I went to test, I was planning my year ahead and now I'm on hold, unsure whether I should put in a vacation bid at work, or give up my chance to save my time off for potential surgery.  I'm unsure whether I can plan ahead for things to do this summer, or if I'm going to be busy planning for other things.

I know other people probably handle this kind of uncertainty better than I do and I know logically that being upset about this isn't going to help anything, but I am upset and yes, I'd likely be a little more patient with this process if they hadn't seen some dumb, likely benign lump on my MRI that suddenly made all this feel all too real and brought me right back to everything the other women in my family have been through.

I feel alone and I feel like I likely have no right to feel the way I do or to go looking anywhere for sympathy, but yet I feel this way anyway.  I was looking forward to the light at the end of this tunnel and it suddenly got pushed twice as far away as I thought it was.  I don't feel strong...I feel weak and afraid and I feel like there is no one to talk to about it.  Even worse, I have trouble concentrating at work and I can't keep being this distracted for four more weeks and expect to keep up with everything I need to do there.

So, my mind completely agrees with you...I just need help getting the rest of me to listen.

Thank you.  It's weird, but I feel guilty coming here for support when pretty much everyone here has it so much worse than I do.  I have a little lump that looks benign on any scan and a possible, maybe chance of being BRCA positive.  I'm guessing that most people would prefer to be in my shoes and it feels selfish to complain, but no one else really understands what it's like to be waiting on results like these.

I know I'll go through with the biopsy and testing.  I have too many people in my life who depend on me, including two kids that I need to be here for even if that means going through all this.  I can't let them down if there is any chance I have something that needs to be caught early.  I think I just hit a point where I needed to feel like I COULD walk away and needed to just be SO angry and fed up, if that makes any sense.

Looking back, my family always shielded me from this part of the process.  I only heard someone was sick after the diagnosis.  I never knew about the waiting and worrying part.  I never heard about biopsies that turned out to be benign or weeks spent wondering.  I just knew the adults in my life were distracted and stressed and then, at some point, my mother would sit me down and explain who was sick and with what and what stage they were.

I think a lot of this is also everything that I've held inside for years and years all hitting me at once, things that I just buried deep so that I could put on a brave face and make it through all the funerals, all the sickness, all the loss.  I used to have a big extended family and as I grew up, we buried them until there is hardly anyone left.  I pretended that was normal or that it didn't bother me or that it had no real relevance to me.  I moved away the first chance I had and I built a life for myself and maybe part of me wanted to pretend that I'd moved far enough that it would never catch up with me.

Now it has and maybe it's time to stop and face more than just the medical part of it all and also unpack all that emotional stuff and deal with it as well.

Cancer sucks.  It's unfair and I hate it and it's out of my control, but I can't just hide from it, like my family is trying to do.  I also can't run from it as I've been doing.  I have to face it and finish this process and find some place of acceptance.

Yeah, had I know then what I know now about the wait times for University of Washington versus other labs, I likely would have paid the difference out of pocket to have my testing done somewhere else.  I've easily lost the difference in decreased productivity at work already.

I'm keeping my biopsy appointment tomorrow and moving forward with that and I'm going to talk to my primary care doctor today about some kind of anti-anxiety medication.  At this point, that's about all I can do...and wait.

I called my primary care doc and spoke with her nurse about anti-anxiety meds.  I have to admit, I felt a little weird doing it, but I just sucked it up and made the call.

Thank you guys so much for just being there.

I just thought I'd post an update, so that anyone else who is testing through UWashington can breathe a little easier.

My genetic counselor is on vacation and has been for a couple of weeks.  Since we're pretty far past when she initially told me to expect results, I finally called the lab directly and found out that instead of the BRCA 1 and 2 test the entire BROCA panel was ordered, which generally takes about 12 weeks to process.  I feel a LOT better knowing that my results aren't just taking an unusually long time or sitting on someone's desk somewhere or that my sample was lost.  It looks like they just opted for the larger panel for whatever reason and it's taking the normal amount of time to process it.

So, it's likely that anyone who is just testing for BRCA would not have this long of a wait.

Yep and I feel a lot better now that some of the mystery of what was going on is solved.

I think my genetic counselor was trying, in her own way, to help me worry less by NOT telling me that they were doing the entire panel.  Initially, she said that they would only do BRCA and then, if something on the rest of the "platform" came back odd, they'd call my insurance and get authorized to do the entire panel.  Then, I was confused when suddenly the timeframe for results changed without any further information.  Now that makes sense.  I can see how, for some people, it would be less stressful to have less information, but I'm the exact opposite.  The more bluntly honest someone is with me, the more I feel I can trust the information they give me.