Today was a long day. Both physically and emotionally. I started at the clinic at 7am to get a PET scan. They injected me with the radioactive dye and then let me relax for approximately 45 minutes before taking me into the scanner. The machine first pushed me in and pulled me out quickly for a CT scan, and then it pushed me all the way through, and stopped over my pelvic area for four minutes. After four minutes, it pulled me through another 4 inches and stopped and scanned that area for four minutes. The total scan time was about 25 minutes and was not as bad as I thought it might be. Keeping my eyes closed helped me relax and not freak out; not that I'm claustrophobic, but it was still creepy.
Following the PET scan was a sono and the placement of a titanium marker over the tumor. The sono revealed another cyst in the right breast this time, and a couple of puffy lymph nodes in the left armpit area. So, after the tech conferred with the breast imaging doctor, they decided to aspirate the cyst in the right breast, place the titanium marker over the tumor and biopsy the lymph nodes and place a secondary marker there; from one procedure to three. Apparently I handled it all much better than they expected. Honestly, it wasn't that bad. The worst part was the armpit as it was tender, even after she gave me numbing medicine. I didn't feel any pain per se, but just a lot of tugging and when she popped the biopsy tool the sound it made was slightly disturbing; think 5x worse than getting your ears pierced! Tonight my armpit is quite tender.
Following the procedures I was sent to mammography for a film to show the marker placement. All went well and I was able to call my mom to have lunch with her. She works at Mills and so we went downstairs to grab a lemonade from the fridge, then went outside to sit and chat. It was a lovely day and the lifeflight helicopter went straight overhead! Wish I had my camera on me.
Then I had just over an hour until MRI. So I sat in the library and checked my email, answered some messages, forwarded some phone calls, etc. and then looked at a copy of Water for Elephants; I have wanted to look at that book to see if it was any good for some time, but never taken the time. I'm thrilled to say I will order it on my Nook to read while recovering from surgery. The first chapter sucked me in!
The MRI was a no go, so it was a wait to see the doctor at 4pm. He was running late and we were told it would be more like 4:30, but it was actually after 5 I think by the time he came in the room. He was fantastic. However the news he delivered was not what I was expecting. I knew the tumor was fast growing, but he didn't mince words and told me that it was his recommendation that I have a mastectomy before chemotherapy. His fear is that undergoing neoadjuvant chemotherapy (before surgery) could cause the cancer cells to become resistant to the chemotherapy prior to surgery. He also indicated that I had youth on my side and said that my cancer is bad; the chemotherapy will be difficult and if I were older, I would have a hard time surviving the treatment. Long story short - this is going to be ugly.
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