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Posted by Kristy I'm sorry that it's been almost 2 months since I last wrote to you all. Kendra, good to hear from you again, I've been wondering about you girl so will send an e-mail to find out more about you later. Alot has been going on since I last told you all about mom's diagnosis. We have been on the hunt to try and find out if there were any options at all possible to try and avoid her having the mastectomy because she truly doesn't want it. I'm not talking about like how some women are that don't want it but go ahead and do it. I mean she really doesn't want to do it so we have been doing a ton of research on the issue including on something called radioablation that they are trying on some forms of breast cancer. Well, we went and saw this one doctor (the first surgeon she saw after the diagnosis was made) about 2 weeks ago and I'm telling you ladies there were several times I wish I could have slapped that doctor. The reason we went back there is because she told the Physician's Assistant of the medical oncologist (these are the doctors that administer the chemotherapy to cancer patients) that she would go with this doctor (and that's a story for another time about trying to decide between this doctor and another doctor, also a surgeon) instead of the one at another hospital. But this discussion with this doctor (a lady doctor, yep, that's right) about drove me nuts and one of the things I picked up that made me wish I could slap her (but yep, was proud of myself for restraining myself in spite of it all even though I would have never done it but you know what I mean) was the issue of narcotics for pain control on the cancer. Because she said, "Think of how life would be if you had to be on Morphine" and basically said we should be scared of that issue, which we aren't just like we aren't scared of death either. The comment that drove me even more crazy is when she said, "The oncologists see this all the time". Problem is that no they don't. Well, ok, speed forward to yesterday. When I was online and then got off I checked our voice mail (yep, it takes our calls when we are online) there was a message there for mom from this woman doctor saying that she wanted to know if mom had made a decision yet. They aren't supposed to do that. And I can't believe this doctor did that. So mom has decided she is not going to call this doctor's office back, who by the way never did what they were supposed to do, find another surgeon not affiliated with the group she's with (the second opinion doctor is also affiliated with this group although at another hospital) but at one of the other hospitals. We have also talked to a radiation oncologist to see if they had some additional options for her so she wouldn't have to do the surgery. He said she should do it. Interesting thing about that conversation though (although there was one time I wish I could have smacked him too for something he said but again would have never done it but still) is the example he gave about her kind of cancer and where it is. That he likened it to leaves like at autumn. Very interesting analogy. He figured out by looking at her breast in general that she is a D cup. That means that I'm probably a D Cup too which means that I should try one in that size to see if that's my right size after all instead of a C all these years. She had an appt with her cardiologist because it was time and that went ok. The doctor said she needs to get this thing in her breast taken care of which of course we will but we had to exhaust all options so she wouldn't feel later (as in after the mastectomy) that she could have done more about the situation with the lumps. He asked her which surgeons she saw and the first one she mentioned was the lady surgeon that I just told you about. And when she finished telling the cardiologist about that surgeon and the second one he just shook his head. Which told me that my instincts were right even though the second surgeon was nice in his own way but still pushed the same surgery she doesn't want. So my mom asked him if he had any friends that were surgeons that she could try. He gave her the name of another doctor. He told her that this doctor is very compassionate which we feel mom needs at this point because it is a big deal to be told you have to have your breast taken off. So we are going to meet him on August 6th. So that's where we stand on that right now. As for me, I'm still hanging in there but just got over a nasty bout with bronchitis (still have small traces of the cough left but that's getting better). I did go to the walk-in clinic for that and got some medicine for it which helped. I had to go there since I still don't have a primary care doctor and hope to have one soon. Try to do some searching on that this week since I didn't get to last couple weeks or so. The other thing going on is that I had a bit of a bleeding spell when I came off my estrogen cream for my vulvar area. That bleeding lasted 8 days and that was old blood. Well, I went back on my estrogen cream and so far so good. Only problem then came was last Thurs where I started bleeding (thought it might be the estrogen cream so called my doctor's office last week, yep, last Thurs to ask if it could be the estrogen cream causing this bleeding and they said yes). Well, I've been back on the cream now almost 2 weeks (it will be 2 weeks on Mon), and a week since I started the bleeding. Strange thing about this bleeding is that since last Thurs it did not start out as brown which is old blood and go in to new blood and work up from light to heavy. This started at heavy and stayed heavy. I had two clots that were the size of a quarter but all the rest were dime, nickel, and penny size (mostly that of nickel and penny size). Also strange too is that if it's not the cream this bleeding came out of nowhere. So I called the doctor's office again on Mon to talk to the girl I usually talk to. She asked if I wanted to double up on my pill again after figuring out that I didn't miss any pills but told her no (because I knew what would happen if I did). So I have an appt set for next week, on Tues since I couldn't get in at all this week since the doctor was going to be out of town the rest of the week and I couldn't be worked in on Tues a.m. before she left. In the mean time I'm keeping my iron levels up as I should and doing my best to take it easy knowing that this flow is a mess although I am trying to keep it at a slow rate although yes it is still on the heavy side overall but at least I'm not feeling sick from this thanks to what I know I have to do with the iron. I'll keep you posted on the doctor's appt. Today will be 7 days since the bleeding started. When I go to my doctor for this it will be sitting at about 12 days total. So we shall see. Other than that we are all hanging in there the best that we can. Will be in touch soon and sorry this is so long. This is what I get for being away for so long. Kristy
Link: Kristy's Personal Story
on 8/2/2007, 2:32 am
Hi again everyone, 
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