I guess it’s never really over.
Going through treatment for non-Hodgkins Lymphoma was brutal. It was scary. It was exhausting. Post cancer I have been dealing with MS, likely triggered by all the chemotherapy. The MS is very stable, and in the scope of MS pretty minor. I have left side weakness including foot drop when I am tired, my balance isn’t great, and I get tired easily. I am also working very hard to build up my strength, stamina, and improve my balance.
This is my new reality. I spend a lot more time with doctors and getting tests and scans than I would like, but it is what it is and I am still adventuring.
If you are new here and don’t know the story, you can read the entire thing here.
Post cancer, every year I have a series of medical appointments, tests, scans, blood work, and so on to monitor my health and make sure the cancer has not returned and to watch for any secondary damage the treatment may have caused.
This year – 5 years post treatment – the oncologist thought it would be good to do one final PET Scan to put to rest the question if the lymphoma is really and truly gone.
I had the PET Scan. Not my first rodeo so it was no big deal. The results…
Well, good news is the primary mediastinal large B cell lymphoma is gone. WooHoo!
Bad news there is a very small something lighting up in my left breast. This did not show up on the mammogram I had 4 days earlier (radiologist was told to look again) but I have dense breasts.
Ugh.
So queue more scans. Yep, another mammogram (still doesn’t show much) and a breast ultrasound that does show a very small (7mm x 7mm x 5mm) suspicious mass. Next is a biopsy to figure out what kind of a suspicious something it is.
The biopsy is a week later. I have the procedure and wait for the results. They trickle in.
I have triple negative invasive ductal carcinoma in my left breast.
This is not great, but the PET scan means we caught it really early so we can treat it fast before it is a much bigger problem. I know lots of people hear “breast cancer” and freak out. I am not most people. First, I know that breast cancer treatment has improved so much that it is rarely the death sentence it once was. Second, I have already been through brutal cancer treatment. Nothing they do for breast cancer comes close to the treatment I received for lymphoma.
Am I happy about this? No. Am I scared? I am not. Honestly this is an irritation and an inconvenience because I should have been in the Bahamas by now swimming off the back of my sailboat and enjoying fresh lobster and conch salad.
I start the dance to get the treatment started. I need to get appointments with the breast center oncologist and the surgeon. First available appointment is 2 months away. I am not a happy camper. Small cancers do not stay small. I call my primary care doctor who agrees that 2 months is too long to wait for that first appointment and she makes a phone call. That first appointment is moved up 3 weeks and I am put on the list for earlier appointments if available. Then it is moved up another 2 weeks. I have the first visit with the oncologist and an educational visit with the resource nurse. I have been chatting with the resource nurse team in the patient portal and asking about what I should expect for next steps so while I am in the educational visit I ask about getting the appointment with the surgeon and they get that started. I also get an appointment with a genetics nurse who sets me up for genetic testing. Best they can do is Christmas Eve but I take it.
This is when things speed up.
I get the blood drawn for the genetics testing and see the surgeon. It is important at this point to remember that I am pushy and I want to get this surgery done as soon as possible. The surgeon asks when I want to do they surgery. I suggest that day. He laughs. I point out that the cancer is small and based on all the tests and scan I know exactly where is so I could probably take care of it DIY with an exacto knife. He made a face but promised they would get this done quickly.
His nurse rushes in with his schedule, he has an opening the day after Christmas but I will have to do all the preop appointments that day – Christmas Eve. I say yes, let’s do it. I have to get more bloodwork, and ECG, talk to the anesthesiologist, and get the pre and post op instructions. Everyone involved is very accommodating and several have stayed late as the offices were closing early for the holiday. I got it all done.
I go home. We do Christmas – cinnamon rolls, presents, Christmas dinner. And then, because we are about 90 minutes from the hospital, we drive there and spend the night in a hotel that is on the hospital campus because my pre surgery appointments start at 6:50am.
The morning of surgery – the day after Christmas – I head to the clinic where I get radioactive dye injected to identify the sentinel lymph nodes and a radioactive seed injected into the tumor to help guide the surgeon during surgery. And then of course, I get another mammogram to make sure they can see the seed.
Then it is waiting for the surgery. And then the waiting as they prep for the surgery. Surgery was about 2 hours. Then they sent me home.
And now we … wait….
For the pathology report. The pathology will provide the information for the next steps in my treatment.
I don’t know what the next steps will be. It could be chemo (I really hope not), radiation, or even more surgery. The waiting is, as the song says, the hardest part.