January has been an eventful month for us. Rick is healing up nicely from his surgery and Zoe is progressing with her recovery too. We've posted Sasha's info and picture on three lost pet sites, posted flyers around the neighborhood and contacted the shelters. Meanwhile Gypsy keeps watching for Sasha to come back through the hole under the back fence.
My FMLA was finally officially approved, which is a huge relief (Thank you Lord!) Rick has helped me get some housework done. I've bought some soft seamless, wireless bras that I hope will be comfortable during my recovery and should come in handy during radiation later.
My lumpectomy surgery is the day after tomorrow. Our son, Paul, took the day off so he can pet-sit, which will be a big help and no small task, especially with one dog still recovering from her own surgery. Wednesday promises to be a very long day and a boring one for Rick. He'll take me to the Methodist Hospital at 8:30 AM.
After being admitted, I'll start my day in the nuclear medicine department, where they'll inject a radioactive isotope to help the surgeon locate the sentinel lymph node. The sentinel lymph node is the first lymph node under the arm that the cancer would have spread to, if it has spread into the lymph nodes at all. That node will be removed during surgery so it can be biopsied. Additional lymph nodes may be removed if they are closely clustered with the sentinel node or if they look suspicious to the surgeon. Lymph node status is a major indicator of my prognosis and determines whether chemotherapy will be recommended. None of my lymph nodes are noticeably enlarged, so I'm cautiously optimistic about this.
After the isotope is injected, a radiologist will do the wire localization / bracketing so the surgeon will be able to locate the tumor with precision and remove it plus a margin of tissue around it. After all this high tech preparation is done, surgery should start around 2:00 PM and is estimated to take about 90 minutes. It won't be like some of the dramatic TV episodes you see where the surgeon comes out and announces to the relief of the anxious family, "We got all the cancer!" I will get the info from the pathology report Monday or Tuesday of the following week, although if there are any preliminary partial results by Friday, I could get that information before the weekend.
After spending time in the recovery room and then in observation, I expect to go home Wednesday evening. Kelly will be coming in late Thursday night from Dallas and staying the weekend. It will be so nice to have her here while I'm waiting to get the results of the pathology report. The pathology report will tell us the lymph node status, whether or not the margins of the tumor were clear, and the "staging" of the cancer more accurately than the biopsy report did.
Statistically there is about a twenty percent chance that the margins will not be clear, which would mean going back in to have a second surgery. That surgery, if it happened, wouldn't be such a long involved process as the first one. My hairdresser, Erica, says that her mom had that experience and it really wasn't too bad and she's doing fine four years later. I'm inclined to trust a woman who named her daughter Erika, even if she didn't know how to spell it.
My daughter, Erika, whose name is spelled correctly, will be coming in next Tuesday from Iowa and should be able to stay a whole week. That's long enough to really start missing her husband and children before she leaves, but I'm sure looking forward to having her here.
My heartfelt thanks to all of you who've been encouraging and praying for me, and to the friends who've shared their own breast cancer stories with me. I hope mine will be a help to someone else someday.
In this, as in everything, my life is in the hands of a loving God and I know He'll see me through, come what may.
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