sturggling to stay positive today

Hi Rissa!

Vent anytime! But things are much better than you're letting yourself believe!

You're doing all of the well-woman diagnostic things you're supposed to do--and you're still in the midst of the screening/diagnosis process. Here's a chart from the Imaginis site, about the screening process:

On the above diagram, note that your goal is to fail to be advanced farther "up" the diagram. Each one is a narrower group of people. Your doctor referred you for a diagnostic workup and they decided you needed a biopsy. There are various kinds of biopsies, here are a couple:

fine needle

core needle

surgical biopsy

as you work down that list, they become more traumatic but also more accurate. Because of the location of your lumps/focal areas, the docs so far think a surgical biopsy is the only way to get the info needed to see what's going on. BTW, the surgeon might disagree and be able to do a core needle procedure (for example).

Of all of those who are sent on to a biopsy (your category) 80% will be told their biopsy doesn't show cancer. But your odds are even better than that! In your earlier thread, you said that your imaging report showed a BIRADS 4 with low probability. Whichever doc wrote the imaging report thinks you have a 90-98% chance of a benign result!

I know it's easy to worry (and reading about the experiences of those of us who managed to work our way to the cancer diagnosis portion of the chart doesn't help!), but really. Try not to borrow trouble that isn't yours yet (and may never be!).

LisaAlissa

etc: spelling

Thanks, placid. It's a chart that's been posted here by various people many times over the years. I think it's helpful as well.

No medical background--just a legal background which gives me the ability to research the heck out of whatever field I feel I need to understand. It doesn't make me an expert, but it does give me the tools to develop an understanding of the real experts.

My diagnosis was DCIS (Stage 0, Grade 3), ER/PR+, which was treated with a lumpectomy, SNB, and Mammosite radiation followed by Tamoxifen and then Evista (raloxifene).

LisaAlissa

You need to be able to cry and be held! Your husband needs to be the strong one now, and somebody needs to tell him how. Somebody must have had a talk with my husband and told him what to do because there's no way he naturally would have known. I think maybe he was reading posts on a breast cancer support group I left open on the computer where he could see it......He just held me and rocked me and told me to cry all I wanted, and now I'm crying again out of gratitude from remembering it.

You can't expect yourself to be strong or hold it in. It has to come out. I had one visit with a cancer psychiatrist and she told me that me holding in the emotions during the day was really making my life worse at night, when I couldn't sleep. It has to come out some time.