TRIPLE POSITIVE GROUP

Thank you Deni, I feel pretty good right now.   

A short update , I saw a team of two psychiatrists from the mobile unit yesterday and after a few hours an psychiatrist from the cancer rehab at my clinic. The mobile team, that is a more stand-by emergency unit, prescribed anxiety medication until there will be a diagnosis but the psychiatrist lady at the clinic talked to me together with my therapist and said: I see it all the day, you should try a mild ant-depressive, you will be feeling better in a few days, we have to put you back on your feet so you can relax and go on with your treatment. This medication will also be good for you when you later will start on Tamoxifen. The anxiety med the team prescribed you can take it so far but it is working through dopamin and is nothing but alcohol in the pill form, so I can eventually drop those. Here I am, day 1 after 1/2 pill yesterday, pretty tired and drowsy, slept a lot, but I guess it it too early to tell. It really helped that those of your guys who are on anti-depressives shared it with me. I do not feel like a failure now, I know it is hard on many people, not only on me. I know where are two possible ways to go when it comes to the mental condition: either I choose to believe that they get this bc out of me and subdued me to all the treatment that prevents it from coming back or if I sit and dread that nothing worked. The last option is not living everybody will agree with me. It is just I need to stick to the option one and do not let myself fall down the rabbit hole all over again, which is hard. Any suggestions? What do you tell yourself every day when any fear crosses your mind? Any strategies to share?

Another question: what about dates? Are they ok to eat? They contain a lot of sugar but other than that is there any contraindications?

Cherry

Cherry - What works for me when that anxious feeling starts to overtake me is to do something that requires the use of my hands and my brain at the same time. For me, it's making dolls. Cooking and gardening work, too. I think it's because I'm using two parts of my brain at the same time which makes it harder for the anxiety to get in.

Thank you deni1661. Glad the Center worked for you.

Vicky

Hi everyone. I am wondering if anyone has 1.) completed herceptin in the last two years and 2.) pursued the idea of continuing with nerlynx. I checked again and my MO said we will not rule it out and will decide when I am done Hercrptin. I was happy with that.

I did some more research on PCR and lymph node PCR and learned that a PCR after neoadjuvant chemo is not really a prognosticator of disease free survival or overall survival when one is triple positive.

My greatest fear is recurrence. I don't care about the nerlynx side effects because the Arimidex for 10 years is already going to make the next 10 years really fun. I just wondered if anyone pursued the topic since the last time we all discusse it here

Suburbs, my oncologist said no, was not worth the side effects but I already said it before. What is about nerlynx that you want to try it? I admit I have to read on this subject.

Cherry

Tresjoli2, I have been prescribed Mirtazapin Actavis, the active substance is mirtazapin. I checked the active substance in Celexa and Lexapro and tey contain citalopram. I got it from the psychiatrist in the clinic that treats me and when I asked her when can I stop she told me that I am going to need it while on Tamoxifen. Do you have any info on Tamoxifen interfering with another anti-depressives. I would really appreciate it.

Lita, you are so right about how keeping busy keeps the anxiety away. When dx'd I was working as a special ed teacher in a high school. I "pushed in" to algebra and English classes which were often boring. My mind had time to fill with all kinds of anxiety and worry.

This year I switched jobs. I now teach young students with autism. They are the BEST aniti-anxiety drug! My day is filled with dancing, singing, art activities, etc. No time to think about myself at all. I get a lot more movement in my day, too which is really helping the aches and pains to go away.

soxfan,it does not adhere to the wound. maybe ask your radiation onco about it? sorry for the side effects of radiation...

Thanks for the article, HapB.

I wish Cure had included the calculator.

Vicky

Make sure you are using the most up to date PREDICT UK model, the 2.0. Here is the link in live form:

http://www.predict.nhs.uk/predict_v2.0.html

Ladies, if you include a link you can make it live two ways. Either use the link box in the tool bar above the text box (the one that looks like a capsule shape, the one to the right of the rectangle with the right facing arrow), or hit the enter button after you paste the link and the link should turn color. This allows someone to just click on the link rather than copying and pasting to another window.

Hap - it's assuming mastectomy or it's equivalent, ergo lumpectomy plus radiation.

I thought the same 5% thing you are talking about when I first read the article but when I reread it I realized it's actually saying unless the patient's chance of living for five years is greater than 5%, adjuvant therapy isn't recommended.

Interesting. I just realized Predict doesn't factor in progesterone receptors in it calculation. I'm wondering how much that would change things.

HapB Thanks for sharing, it is an interesting article.  Makes a lot of sense.