Today was an emotional rollercoaster. Meeting with the social worker was uncomfortable and I wanted to be anywhere but in a small room with my mom and her talking about how I feel. I don't do emotions that well. I was fine talking about my clinical diagnosis when she asked; such as how it was discovered, how fast it grew in the last 8 months, the course of action as I know it right now, etc., but I did tear up and feel like I could lose it when the social worker gave me papers on the living will and power of attorney. The thought of no longer being able to make my own decisions and be independent is unacceptable for me to comprehend. I have always been stubborn and seldom asked for help. I'm a "put on your big girl panties and get r' done" kinda gal. A "pull yourself up from your bootstraps" when the going gets tough. We took a tour of the infusion room. I saw the room on a tour when the cancer center was first opened, but it was a large open room without the reclining chairs, IV poles and bald people staring back at me.
Just prior to leaving work for the appointments today, I received a call informing me my surgeon was out sick and couldn't meet with me, but if I wanted to, I could meet with his nurse. I opted to go ahead and keep the two meetings today as I felt bad for rescheduling with the social worker twice, and I figured the surgeon's nurse might be able to answer a question or two I had about the process of surgery and chemo. I grossly underestimated my surgeon's nurse. Not only did she answer my questions, she gave me information I hadn't considered. One of my questions was how soon chemo and/or surgery would take place. She informed me that surgery would likely happen in the next three weeks. Discussing the tumor and it's size, we agreed that I would probably have a mastectomy and not a lumpectomy. I had started to wrap my head around not having a left breast, and having to go through a reconstruction on that side. Tumor Board was held today, a meeting among the oncologists, radiological oncologists, plastics (reconstruction team), and various other medical staff, and my case was the first to be presented. They discussed my care and it's felt that my tumor would respond quite well to chemotherapy and shrink the tumor so that I could have a lumpectomy instead of a mastectomy. The surgical nurse called to inform me of this and I can't describe the emotion I felt at the time; not that I was looking forward to the mastectomy, but when she mentioned a lumpectomy may be a possibility, I was almost disappointed. I think I had tried so hard to accept the mastectomy, that her telling me they would only remove the lump and not the entire breast was a let-down. Probably doesn't make sense to the normal healthy person reading this blog, but hopefully others facing cancer will understand my feeling/reaction.
Tomorrow is going to be grueling with the number of appointments. I start at 7am with a PET scan, then have a marker implanted (which they didn't do when I had the initial biopsy), then a mammogram and ultrasound on both breasts (to be sure the right is healthy), then an MRI and last but not least, an appointment with the surgeon (provided he's not out again sick). Friday will be a meeting with my oncologist and she hopes to have the results from the MRI and mammogram and sonograms. Then I guess we will decide if it's chemo or surgery first.
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