April 2019 Surgery Support Group

Hey, Motheroftwo, glad to hear you're feeling better. Yes, tired!

Your cancer center process may be different from mine. I got a phone call today (your surgery and mine were both on 4/18, right?) from the nurse with some of the pathology info. But the full report isn't available to me on the secure messaging system until next week. The nurse said she would send me a copy in the mail. But to decipher it, likely I'll need help from the MO next week when I see him.

Nurse said the MO might be ordering genomic report (like Oncotype) but not until AFTER he talks with me. My cancer is triple negative and Oncotype doesn't work on mine (only ER+, not ER-) so my testing would be a different one, if he wants to do it.

Might be worth calling or messaging to your medical office to find out what the schedule of info to you will be. Or just wait patiently...

UPDATE for me: good news. The surgeon got clean margins and also negative nodes.

But I just woke up from a nap and was dreaming about being sent on some type of game treasure hunt. But I wasn't told the rules or what I was looking for or who was on my team or how we were supposed to prove that we'd found the treasures we were supposed to find... Pretty much how it feels right now!

Well the tumor board met yesterday (and officially have labeled me with synchronous bilateral invasive breast cancer) and they think I might benefit from chemo before the double mastectomy. So I will see the MO on Tuesday. I was told he decides if we send tumors out for oncotype (which he probably will) and that will determine if I need the chemo. I really don't want to go down that road, but I'll do whatever is best If I need the chemo I'll do that prior to the double mastectomy. I received the copy of my pathology report a few days ago, it was 8 pages long and a bit overwhelming).

Meanwhile, I'm recovering well from the bilateral lumpectomies, and as annoyed as I am that all the ADH in my L breast was actually 17 micro tumors of ILC, I am glad I know exactly what was going on in there and getting it all out eventually.

So glad everyone seems to be well on the road to healing. Praying for low oncotype scores for all of us!

I just saw my surgeon for follow-up after lumpectomy (quadrant). I do not have a clean margin on one surface. Two of four lymph nodes are positive. He didn't give me a stage, so I am self-staging at this point (IIB based on charts I found). I see an oncologist on the 15th of May. My port will get placed in about 3 weeks and he may do the re-excision then or may wait until after chemo. We are going to see what the oncologist thinks. He isn't thinking they will need to do more node removal as I will be getting radiation, but again, the oncologist may feel differently. I am weighing re-excision of the lumpectomy or mx. He still says there is no difference in outcome and that reconstruction couldn't get me the size to match my right. I'm not sure I would do reconstruction anyway. Does anyone have any insight in to what to do here?

Thank you as always and I hope everyone is doing well and having great path reports.

Is there somewhere on here that I can post part of my path report to get some insight into staging?

Motherof2-

That is a cute, comfortable looking gown. The pockets lik at a good position but you would have to have holes by the pockets to bet the drains into them.

Best of luck!!

hello ladies! I had my drain out today. I was still getting 50-60ml output in 24 hours but they wanted to get it out. They didn’t warn me that there may be additional swelling but I feel like my ‘foob’ has swelled a lot over the day. It feels huge and lumpy. I’ve put a tight sports bra on hoping it will help. Anyone else have this and have any advice?

I’m a bit of a worrier and the nurse told me if I do need anything drained it will need to be with ultrasound because of the implant. There is only one breast ultrasound guy at our hospital and he doesn’t work full time - certainly not over the weekend. So I’m a little worried that it’s going to fill up and POP! :-

rrshannon, thanks for the information. I posted some of my path results at:

https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/145/topics/871238?page=1#idx_2

I had my lumpectomy on Wednesday 4/24 and my healing seems to be going well. I did have quite a bit of pain when I first woke up from surgery but they got me extra pain meds and it was quickly under control. I took the strong pain killer twice the first day but since then have just been using Tylenol and it's fine. After the first day, the lymph node incision has been fhe one that's more uncomfortable and I just have to watch how I move, but overall seems I can move my arm fine. They took 3 lymph nodes. It is numb under my arm on that side but I guess that's normal.

I got good news yesterday from my genetic counselor that my testing did not turn up any genes that would indicate strong likelihood of breast cancer, Now I just need my path report to see how the nodes looked. So far my next plan is radiation but need to hear about the nodes and possibly oncotype score. Hope everyone is having a restful weekend. I'm trying to take it easy since I plan to go back to work Monday or Tuesday,

Hi all. I had my bmx on Thursday. The soreness is not too bad... the sentinal node area is the most uncomfortable part. My node came back negative, thank you God. I have a question about the expanders...what should my chest look like right now. I assume the expa does are empty going in because my chest is dented and lumpy...and kind of flattened. Is that the norm?

Pommom, do you use your arms when you climb stairs (to hold/pull on the railing)? If so, then yes, set up downstairs.

Also, if you are not staying overnight after surgery, or react strongly to the meds (woozy, being downstairs the first few days might be safer. That's when you're the weakest and most tired.

My legs worked much better than my arms after surgery.

Hello. Just checking to see how everyone is doing... hasn’t this been a crazy rollercoaster ride?!

I’m up and down - think I’m doing ok and then next thing I’mworried about some pain or swelling I don’t understand. I wish I had my own personal BC nurse staying with me so I could have every niggle checked out and every question answered.

Hope you are all comfortable and pain free, and being well looked after. Xx

Hi TriMama. I'm seeing PT on Friday. She just gave me basic shoulder exercises to do until then. I have quite significant swelling lower down under my armpit and around to my back the last couple of days and I think it is getting worse. It is very tender. I'm wearing a tight sports bra to try to give it some compression but I almost can't bear it. It is so sore and uncomfortable. Were you told anything re swelling in terms of wrap it tight or leave it be?

I have been wearing an older seamless cotton bra with very thin elastic around the bottom. I have two that are older and stretched out and have worked the best for me, other times I am just wearing an overside cammi which is pretty easy to get overhead now, last week I needed assistance to get it on. I will be two weeks out tomorrow. Though currently I only have one TE with out 125 cc of air and one side concaved from removing the TE so not much support is needed.

Wondering how much walking/steps everyone is getting in? I was told I could walk as long as I didn't sweat. I feel today I was finally able to get two short 1/2 mile walks in. The more I am upright standing and walking the tighter the chest muscles feel. Tylenol doesn't seem to work and I don't like narcotics so currently just deal with the discomfort. Not the worse pain I have every had so it is doable.

For my arms they stated not to lift anything heavy and for movement and range of motion I could do what ever felt comfortable. I have seen a huge improvement during week two.

TriMama sorry you have to continue with Xeloda. I feel if I had residual cells or no clean margins I would for sure continue with that course as well.