The Day It Really Hit Home 11-14-06

I went for my appointment yesterday 11-14-07 with Dr. Alison Laidley, a breast cancer surgeon and know a little more than we did. I am scheduled today for a PET scan where you drink glucose and then they do a scan on you to see if the cancer has spread any where else in the body. That will take 4 hours for the whole process. I’m scheduled for an MRI tomorrow at 11:30. The results of these 2 scans will give Dr. Laidley more information as to the strength and type of treatment.

Dr. Laidley did an ultrasound right in the exam room, so she could see the tumors herself and compare them to the films she got from Lake Pointe Medical Center. We had been scheduled in at her office as her last appointment of the day. She had me get dressed and then took us into her office to sit down. She explained the size and type of cancer that I have, she drew pictures to explain the options. What we weren't prepared for was when she said, "I think we can save your life, but it's going to be a long, tough year." That was a shocker! The first thing I thought of and it came out of my mouth was, "Well, just take it out now!" She put down her pen and looked straight at me and said, "Do you want to lose your breast?" I lowered my head and said "No" and David reached up and touched my shoulder and told her that we had already talked about this, but that I was just upset and I didn't mean that. She was hoping that we might be able to save the breast, but could give no assurance of that.

Dr. Laidley said she is going to be very aggressive with my treatment because of the size of the 2 tumors and how fast it has grown in such a short time. She will start me on chemotherapy next week to arrest the cancer growth and hopefully shrink the tumors and if there is cancer any where else, it will stop that also. She wouldn’t even talk about surgery of any kind at this point because of the size and rapid growth. I would have to take the chemo anyway, and doing it first gives a better chance of a successful surgery later. We will start with the chemo, then do radiation and there is also a new drug called Herceptin that has been successful in attacking the rapid cell growth on the type of cancer I have.

Thanks for all the prayers and hugs and encouragement. We’ve got a fight ahead of us----and fight, it’s gonna be.