How could I be so lucky?

A few weeks after my breast cancer was diagnosed, I went for my annual GYN. Just like I went for my annual mammogram.

Uh oh. Glad I did it, but would the bricks please stop falling from the sky??

Tumor on ovary. Probably benign. But maybe not. Tested positive for BRCA1, which points to ovarian AND breast cancer. Are you kidding me?? Just because I could have ovarian cancer, I probably do? Or will? 

You can't biopsy an ovary to find out what's cookin' in there. You have to just rip 'er out and then take a peek inside. 

Oh, and there's another problem. Can't finish treating the breast thing until we resolve the ovary thing. You have to do these things in order, you know.

Full hysterectomy April 9. I don't need that junk, anyhow.  

A couple of weeks to get over the hyst. Then, march onward to chemo and SEVEN weeks of daily radiation.

Sounds like a party.

So here's the deal...

I try to be a logical, rational decision maker. I reason my way through an issue, sometimes drawing a timeline or decision tree on paper to help me visualize a logical conclusion. It is important to me to make good decisions and I can drive myself nuts trying to do so.

It's hard to make a logical decision with breast cancer. The question before us is to have a bilateral mastectomy or to do the chemo and rad, get mammograms every three months, and hope for the best.

I'm lucky enough to carry a gene that gifts me with a possibility of up to 75% (depending on what you read...) of cancer recurrence. That would seem to tip the scales, no?

On the other side of the line, I also have a tumor on my ovary, so having a hysterectomy soon. If I have a mastectomy AND a hysterectomy, they'll be cutting out every thing that makes me a girl. Or will they?

What makes us girls? I'm smart enough to know it's more than boobs and ovaries, and those things are just the physical. If only the matter were so simple, though.

You know what scares me about all this? It's not the fact that my 42DDs will be no more or that I won't be able to have more children. I don't want any more children, having the first one completely cured me.

It's the anticipation of the surgeries and recoveries. Really? Am I really that much of a coward that I am more worried about a little discomfort than of learning to live with a flat chest? 'Fraid so.

Dig a little deeper. The real fear? It's the fear of not finding the courage to do this. I'm afraid I really am a coward.

A friend pointed out the upside the other day....if I have reconstruction (yet ANOTHER decision that must be made), I can request perky 20-something boobs rather than the tried and true ones I have now.

Now there's a thought...

Accepting it, owning it, whatever

I cried the whole way home. I cried for the first three weeks. Constantly. It was annoying. Kleenex are expensive.

Remember a popular book someone wrote about breast cancer years ago entitled "First you Cry"? I haven't read it, but golly jeeze, I get it now. First you cry. Then you start making a list.

Crying makes me feel out of control. Not to mention the headache it leaves me with. Making a list makes me feel IN control. Talking about it makes me feel in control. I need a little control over my life, otherwise I'll be a blathering crying idiot when I need to grow a backbone and get busy making appointments, asking questions, and making decisions.

Radiologists, my general practioner, my gyn, my surgeon, the oncologist of all types, even my attorney...these folks are my project team. My beautiful friends and family, they are my support team. My iPhone becomes my project notebook. There's an app for breast cancer, you know. Really.

Meanwhile...back at the radiologist....

A week later, I am back at the radiologist for my followup. I'm hoping this second set of films will show a shadow or some other simple explanation for why I was asked to come back for "diagnostic imaging".

No woman loves mammograms. Especially a women with, how shall we say..."healthy size  boobs". That's what we'll call them. I've had the girls since 6th grade. It seems they've always been one size. Healthy size.

Early in puberty, my very southern and very conservative mother did everything possible to hide them. The tightest bras possible. Minimizers. Because not only they made shopping for highly modest pre-teen clothing in the mid-1970s more difficult than it should have been, but also because it reminded her that her "little girl" wasn't so little any more.

So back to the radiologist. The technician took the films. Another technician did an ultrasound, which took flippin' forever it seemed. Then we took more films. Each time, I had to wait for the radiologist to review and provide more instruction. Obviously my instincts were right. There was a problem.

Finally I was allowed to get dressed. I was asked to wait in a room for the doctor to come talk to me. Another bad sign. He walks in, pulls a chair up very close to me and sits in it. He looks me directly in the eye and says "you have a problem". I already knew that, but that statement hit me hard.

I could feel the tears coming. I cry easily. I'm an emotional being. And once the flood gates open even a smidge, I can't reign it in. He hands me a box of kleenex. I think of my son, away at college. I think of my job. I think of my dog. All the implications.

I take a deep breath, wipe my eyes, and say "Ok. So what do we do about it?" That was my first step of courage. I immediately accepted the problem and owned it. Now I was going to work it.

What do you mean I have cancer?

Those were the first words that went through my head when the radiologist first said these words to me. I'm 90% sure it is cancer. Whhaaattt? I am 52. Never had a major illness in my life unless you consider the trials and tribulations of having teenage children akin to a temporary illness that is cured when they grow up. If ever.

I am diligent about my annual "girl" exams. Both of them. Just because that's how I am. I get enormous satisfaction from marking things off my list, and here's my opportunity to mark TWO things off my list each February. My GYN exam and my mammogram. Every February.

A week before I was to leave for a business trip across the country, I went for my mammogram. I did not expect to hear another word about it until I got home and received the customary letter that all was well. Except it didn't happen like that.

Halfway through my business trip, the radiologist called asking me to come back immediately for a follow up. Generally not an alarmist, this sent major bells ringing in my head. In that instant, I knew there was a problem.