Back to Perky

Well, I was able to talk myself back to a good place this week. Most of the time, it has been required minimal effort for me to remain optimistic and enthusiastic, but there are times, like this week, when I have really had to remind myself of and focus on all the wonderful reasons I have to be happy with my beautiful life. I do love my life, and that is probably why when thoughts of my own mortality intrude, as they can't help but doing these days, I do feel sad. I don't fear dying. I just have too much living to do, so I am going to. Something will get me someday, but it will not be breast cancer! Dammit!

I had an appointment with my surgeon, Dr. H. this morning. If you will recall, Anna, his nurse practicioner was diagnosed with breast cancer a few weeks before me. We were both sporting our bare heads and expressing our gratitude that we still had eyebrows and eyelashes. She reminded me a little of Sigourney Weaver in "Aliens." (Incidentally, I was told last week while donning one of my very fashionable hats from the Hat Trader that I looked like Demi Moore, and not in her G.I. Jane role either. Made my day!) Anna is also doing quite well, and it was nice to be able to share experiences.

Dr. H. got up to speed on my situation. I told him that Dr. P. scheduled me for an MRI next Wednesday to assess the tumor's response. He had already felt the tumor. He advised me that he had an equally reliable, far less expensive tool for assessing the response, and held up his hand. "Plus," he added, "this tool has 30 years of experience, and it tells me that your tumor is responding." Woohoo!!! Must have been the pirahna! He also was unable to locate any swollen lymph nodes this time (I had one last time) which he takes to mean that the chemo is working. I was so very happy to hear him say that.

He said to go ahead and get the MRI but that it may not be able to distinguish between the morbid tumor cells and live tumor cells. He is strongly and adamanantly of the position, that unless the tumor has grown, we continue with the chemo and then schedule surgery. His reasoning is this: No one dies from cancer in the breast. Women die when the cancer spreads to other parts of the body. The chemo is now killing any cells that may have spread undetected. The surgery would only be targeting the tumor in the breast and would delay the chemo which is the more systemic treatment. That makes perfectly good sense to me.

I then had to go to Dr. P.'s for my lab work. From the very beginning, Dr. P. has been more inclined to consider surgery sandwiched between chemo. I was discussing my schedule with her office staff and mentioned that Dr. P. will need to consult with Dr. H. on the MRI results next week but that Dr. H. was of the opinion that I should continue chemo. "Oh great," said Pam. "That means we may have phones being thrown around next week." When I asked if the two doctors really get into it like that, she said, "Yes, sometimes. Dr. H. likes to think he is an oncologist, but he is the surgeon." Hmmm.... Well, in the interest of preserving the phones, I hope that the MRI results are not at all ambiguous.

Both doctors can and will make recommendations, but ultimately, the decision is left up to me. Since I am chronically decision averse, I hope there is consensus on the part of Dr. H. and Dr. P. If not, I guess each will have to present a case for their position and provide data that will allow me to come to an informed conclusion about the best way to proceed. I would much prefer to get the chemo over with and then deal with the surgery in the fall. Otherwise, I have to wait a month to recover from the chemo before having surgery. Then I have to wait a month to recover from surgery before resuming chemo. By then, I may have a full head of hair I have to watch fall out again. No way!

More to come...