July 2020 chemo club

good luck with your imaging! I’ll be curious to know what they find. I have a mammogram scheduled for next week to get a new baseline after chemo.

I had a MRI last week and the tumor has shrunk 95%. So my SO decided to bring forward my surgery to be on the 1st December. Hope everyone is doing well

WONDERFUL news!! So happy to hear!

I am so frustrated. My surgeons and oncologist can not get on the same page and surgery still is not scheduled. I thought I have been waiting for someone to call me with a surgery date, and finally had someone from the plastics office call me to tell me since I’m anemic, they will not do reconstruction surgery, until a later time. My general surgeon still has not called to schedule my double mastectomy, and my oncologist wants this all done ASAP. The surgeons say my blood work is not good, my oncologist says it is fine. He never said I was anemic. Also. My blood work has not been done for 5 weeks. I really do not want delayed reconstruction. The original plan was double mastectomy with expanders.

That is what I asked the nurse at the plastic surgery place. The blood work they are looking at is from October 15. I’m sure it has changed. And will change again before December when I should be having surgery. My oncologist is saying it is fine, how am I supposed to treat anemia when it’s 2 surgeons against one oncologist and they are saying different things?! Ugh. I’m waiting for a call back from plastics, which they said they would be calling back in 30 minutes...2 hours ago.

Well, I have an MRI of my breast today (the last before surgery) and my last round of Taxol. I'm a little paranoid about some kind of weird interaction between the contrast and the chemo, but I guess someone would pick up on that, right?

Seems like everyone has stuff happening...I hope it turns out well for all of us. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Thanks Joni. I will be praying for you too from this side of the earth. My MRI shows the tumor has shrunk 95% so I am really hoping for a clear margin.

Tryanryan and mtspacekace, all the best for the surgery.

Good morning, everyone. I am excited to read about the reductions a couple of you have had in your tumors. That's fantastic!

Iamloved, the first sentence in your November 26 post really made me chuckle. I don't usually bring attention to spelling, but I hope you don't mind because that's funny! 🤣

I am cheering for Melbo and Susie for finishing chemo and for KMom for finishing radiation! 🔔🎉🎊🥳

Best wishes to everyone with your upcoming surgery and to those of you still having chemo.

My update: A breast MRI showed a 50% reduction in the tumor. It is 1 cm now. I hoped it was gone so that was disappointing. However, I was very excited about the results of the CT scans, especially the CT scan of my lungs. The multiple nodules throughout both lungs have significantly improved. Many are gone, two have reduced to 2 mm and seven have reduced to spots too small to measure. Because they were all too small to biopsy, the oncologists do not know if they were metastatic cancer cells that responded to the TCH infusions or an untreated infection that responded to the dexamethasone used for the chemo side effects-only God knows! Either way, I am very excited and grateful!

Hello, all! Congrats to all the new milestones in our group! Sounds like a busy week coming up!

I had my covid test this morning in advance of surgery on Wednesday. I'm having a lumpectomy and sentinel node biopsy, and it turned out I potentially qualify for a clinical trial, so if, upon review of the sentinel node(s) during surgery any residual cancer is found, I'll be randomized into either an ALND (the arm of the trial that's standard-of-care) or only have the SNB with no further nodes removed (the experimental arm).

My ultrasound post chemo showed an “excellent" response, so I certainly hope there's nothing left at surgery. I had my first HP-only treatment on Wednesday and it was fine. Sure was nice not to get the stomach pains the taxotere gave me, and to have my taste buds remain normal!

The only hiccup at the moment is that I'm anemic from the chemo and my BS wants labs drawn again on Monday to see where my numbers are. If they aren't where he wants them, then he wants me to get a transfusion on Tuesday. I asked about just delaying surgery for a week instead and he didn't seem keen on the idea. On the other hand, I want to get everything over with before hospitals in my area lock down even more than they have already. But my numbers don't seem that bad, from what I've read about pre-surgical thresholds for transfusion, but I'm also just too mentally exhausted to figure out how much I should fight something like this.

Has anyone out there had a transfusion? I really don't want one, but I can't articulate a more convincing reason than that it seems like the sort of thing we shouldn't do lightly and my body will fix this on its own if you give me more time.

So, they wanted to give me a transfusion to get my hematocrit up to 30 (it's at 26) prior to Wednesday's surgery. I talked to my surgeon bc I really didn't want a transfusion unless there was a critical need. He wasn't terribly helpful, I felt—he told me that when I'm under anesthesia and they give me fluids it'll drop further and that's what they worry about, but then he also said he's expecting virtually no blood loss...and I don't know how those two things are related, and I was holding back tears of stress so I couldn't do a spectacular job of thinking and questioning. Anyway, he said it's fine if I don't have a transfusion and they'll just transfuse if there are any issues during surgery (to which I do consent). So, no transfusion. Just another festival of anxiety and second-guessing and exhaustion.

It was a real life-lessonexperience for me today, that advocatin for yourself doesn't actually garner much praise or admiration. Mostly it's met with annoyance and irritation.

Best of luck to those of you undergoing surgery tomorrow. I will hold you in the light.

Iamloved, I am saying a prayer for you that all goes well with Tuesday's surgery, recovery and follow up appointments.

Others have surgery this week, too, and throughout December, so to each and everyone of you, best wishes with your surgery, recovery and follow up appointments.

jujumartin, I did not get a mri after chemo. I had one prior to chemo, and will have a double mastectomy after chemo. Then they will decide if I will do radiation or not.