Reconstruction-Eve

Hey guys, it' been a while since I've even thought about my blog.  I'm been reading the memoir of Stephanie Nielson, who is that famous mommy blogger who survived a plane crash and was burned on 80% of her body.  (Very inspiring story, I highly recommend it).  Anyways, it kind of reminded me that I have a blog too, and I should update!  When I logged on, I saw that I haven't updated since June.  What a WONDERFUL 6 month it's been!  Healthy, happy, blah blah blah...  First of all, here's my new 'do:

I guess it's not so new anymore, because I got my hair cut over 3 weeks ago.  I had a crazy 'fro with a mini mullet before this hair cut, (I don't even think there are any pictures of me at that stage!) so I am really excited to have had it cleaned it up.  It's kind of counter-intuitive to have your hair cut, when all you want to do is grow out your hair, but I found a great blog, where a gal documented her hair as she grew it out from a pixie.  I loved it every step of the way, so I'm going to have my stylist copy it.

I wanted to let you all know that tomorrow I am going in for my first reconstructive surgery.  My hard and uncomfortable tissue expanders will be removed and replaced with silicone implants.  I am beyond excited, as these expanders are pretty uncomfortable.  Think of 2 really hard rocks, then imagine them being surgically inserted into your chest, behind your pec muscles.  Then keep them there for a year.  Oh, and sometimes go in to the doctor and have them increase the size of said rocks.  Oh yeah and picture that those rocks are a little uneven in their placement and are a little too high and far apart. Now, wouldn't you be excited for reconstruction too? :)

The surgery will only last for a couple of hours and I will come home the same day.  I admit I was a little bummed about not getting to spend the night at the hospital.  I heart spending the night in the hospital.  Yeah, I'm weird.  It's just that there are no dirty dishes to clean or arguing kids to yell at there.

Well, good luck to me.  I'll let you know how it goes!

2 Weeks Post-Mastectomy

Well, it's been a couple of weeks now.  I'm still feeling pretty good, but sitting around doing nothing was getting pretty old.  THANK GOODNESS  I was able to get the last 2 drains removed on Tuesday.  That was pretty freeing, as those things were a nuisance.  I had to keep them in my little pockets in my camisoles, and when I took baths, I had to wear them on a lanyard around my neck.  Such a pain.  And during our meeting w/ the plastic surgeon (Dr. Scott) on Friday, he told me I was ok to start moving my arms a little more.  It's hard to know how much or how little to do on my own.  I don't have much of a reach, especially w/ my left arm (the side the lymph nodes were removed from), but it's definitely getting better. He told me that I'm healing up perfectly and there is very little chance of infection or any complications now that we're 2 weeks out.  Hoorah.  I made it through the critical period, I guess!

Dr Scott filled my expanders a little bit yesterday, too.  It was pretty amazing, especially because I felt no pain at all.  He used some sort of magnet doo-hicky to find the port under my skin.  Then he drew a little circle and inserted a needle (Trev said it was about an inch long) attached to a HUGE syringe that held the fluid.  I'm assuming it was saline.  I couldn't feel the prick of the needle or any pain during the expansion, but I could feel the skin getting stretched tighter.  Then he did the other side.  It's funny because he'd count down to the needle poke, and apologize for poking me. Next time, I'll have to scream or something.  :)

Well, in my last post I talked about the pathology report and how great it was that they only found a 2 cm tumor.  I actually had misunderstood Dr. Soriano's explanation over the phone.  I learned during our appointment on Tuesday that no, they did not find a 2 cm tumor.  What they found were a few rogue cancer cells within a 2 cm area.  MUCH better news, if you ask me!  I was wondering how they found a 2 cm tumor, when the MRI a couple weeks prior turned up no visible cancer at all.  So, we are just overjoyed that the chemo worked so well.

Every single choice we've made pertaining to my cancer treatment so far has ended up having such positive results.  It gives us confidence moving forward that Heavenly Father is directing us as we travel down this road.  We felt strongly that SCCA is where I need to go for my radiation oncology, rather then do it in Everett.  Today I kind of second guessed it to Trevor (thinking of the distance and the hassle of having to go in to Seattle every day for 6+ weeks, paying for parking...), but he reminded me that so far our decisions have been spot on, and we need to trust in the good feelings we had about SCCA.

So I'll sign off for now, but not before attaching a few more family photos from back in September.  We got the CD a while ago, and I'm pretty sure I haven't posted these particular pics here on the blog yet.  I'm just lucky I have such cute kids, I'm sure you're not sick of seeing them. :

One Week Post-Mastectomy

Well, I've been home from the hospital for a week now.  The surgery went well.  Where should I start? What do you want to know?  Honestly, it hasn't been bad!  I am under strict instructions to do nothing with my arms until further notice, so for the past week, I have sat on the reclining love seat doing really nothing as everyone else waits on me.  The person who should be complaining is Trevor.  He's now the Dad, the Mom, and my Home Care Nurse.  It's a big job and he's doing so well.  He spends a lot of the time just keeping the kids away from me, because the slightest touch or bump makes me wail in pain.  And I can't use my arms to push Ellie away if she starts climbing on me, so I yell for Trevor and he come running to grab her before she hurts me.

How does it feel?  Well, if I'm not moving around or being touched, the pain is controlled pretty well with the Vicodin (which I'm slowly trying to wean myself off of).  The sensation that bothers me the most is the numbness in the upper part of my left arm.  When the surgeon removed my lymph nodes, the nerves that go to the back of my arm were in the tissue, and were removed as well.  It's a weird combination of numbness and heightened sensitivity back there.  The slightest touch in one spot bothers me so much, but another spot right next to it is completely numb.  Trevor reminds me that my C-section incision felt the same way as it healed, and now it's just numb there.  So hopefully, the super-sensitivity goes away soon. 

Drains. I'll bet ya didn't know about the drains!  Unless you were one of my friends that came over a couple of nights ago and were subjected to a full show and tell!  But don't worry, I won't post pictures here. ;)  I left the hospital with 2 drains on each side.  2 tubes leading out of my body just under my armpits on each side lead to little bulbs that look like grenades.  Fluid drains from where my breasts were down the tubes and into the bulbs.  I have to wear special camisoles that have little pockets to hold my drains underneath my shirts.  Then twice a day I empty, measure and record the amount and color of fluid that I've lost.  The color was bright red for the first couple days and has gradually changed to yellow.  When the amount of fluid decreases to an amount pleasing to my surgeon, I get the drains removed.

Two days ago, I saw my plastic surgeon, Dr. Scott, for a post surgery check up.  He said everything was healing fine, and the fluid was low enough to get rid of one drain on each side.  He just snipped a stitch and just pulled the things out!  Yes, it pinched a little, and it made me pretty woozy, but it wasn't horrible.  So, now I'm down to 2.  YES!  As you can imagine, it isn't very fun having tubes coming out of your body.  It's really weird, and I can't wait for the last two to go bye bye.

He did expand the expanders a tiny bit at the time of surgery, and he said he'd expand me a bit more next week.  He's going to do that to take up space and eliminate space for fluid to build up inside my chest.  Then he'll leave me alone for a little while as I heal, I think.

OH!  How could I neglect to report that we heard back from pathology?!  Dr. Soriano called Friday evening to tell us that they found the tumor in the breast tissue and it had shrunk to 2cm, and the margins were great.  This was good news because if the tumor had been too close to the chest muscle, I would have had to go back in for another surgery as they removed more of my muscle.  Ugh.  Also, out of the 11 lymph nodes removed, 0 had cancer in them!!  And they found no cancer on the right side (which was only a slight concern in the first place).  Happy day!  Trevor and I are so excited. 

All in all, I'm thrilled with how things are going.  I have said it before and I'll say it again:  I'd rather recover from surgery a million times than go through chemo again once.  I'm so happy right now!  I know it's been extra easy for me because of my wonderful husband and a tremendous amount of support from our family and friends.  Thanks everyone for praying for me and being there to help us out.