Yippee
This post starts with a giant yippee. Why? Because they finally took my drains out. Imagine having two things sticking out of your torso underneath your arm pits. Two long tubes attached to what looks like plastic hand grenades, and make it impossible for you to sleep on your side. The only way you’ve ever slept. But mine are gone now, and that’s okay.
My son drove me down to Lahey in Peobody in today’s yucky weather. He wasn’t able to come in, so he sat in the car. I waited and waited because the nice plastic surgeon was in, surprisingly enough, surgery. Finally he came in, and took out the drains, and I was ready to go get some lunch and go home. But wait, there’s more….
Another Procedure
When they did my surgery, the scar across my where my breasts were looked like a rolled decorative pie crust made of skin. I knew this wasn’t going to be the finished product after my reconstruction, so I just rolled with it. Well after my drains were removed, the doctor decided to do another procedure, but later today. So my son and I went to go get some lunch as they said it would be a couple of hours. Of course midway through lunch, they called and said come back to the hospital. So we packed up our food, he got to have a car picnic, and I went back inside.
Ewww, Gross
Let’s just say that this procedure was ewwww, gross. The removed those rolled pie crust looking strips of skin. Luckily for me, I have no feeling there so no numbing was needed. But it was disgusting. The surgeon was on one side, and his fellow was on the other side and it was like ready, set, go, Start Cutting! After that the stitched me up so my boobs, or what’s left of them with the skin expanders look like they belong to Frankenstein, or his bride.
Yesterday
Yesterday was a post op appointment with my surgeon to make sure everything was okay, and it was, which is a good thing. Sadly, they don’t have the pathology report back yet, which is annoying because that means I still don’t know if the cancer had grown, or worse, spread into my lymph nodes. I don’t think that was the case, but still, the waiting is scary.
What’s Next
What is coming up next in this journey of mine? Friday I meet with my oncologist. He’s a nice guy. A little quirky, but a nice guy. We’ll be discussing the next steps. Do I need chemo, radiation or both? Do I need hormone therapy, or none at all? I’m hoping hoping it’s none of the above. The chemo and radiation are both pretty scary and damaging to your body, so I don’t want them. I don’t really want the hormone therapy stuff because the goal of that is to block hormones (I think that’s what they said) essentially putting my body into menopause. The only problem is, I already did menopause and it sucked. I don’t really want to do it again. I mean I will if I have to, but if I had a choice, I wouldn’t want to. Can I just say, Breast Cancer Sucks!
