1st leg nearly completed

My breast cancer started September 30, 2015 when I went for my first mammogram. On that day I never could have imagined that five months later, I would be 12 chemo treatments down and scheduling appointments with surgeons. Although these five months haven't necessarily flown by, they have gone quicker than anticipated. I can't believe March is next week and I'll find out the status of my cancer at the end of the month.

I'm beginning to let people know that I'll be out for a few months around the end of April. When did I go from its just a baseline mammogram to I'm changing my body forever and hoping for no radiation?! It's weird and scary but I'm also ready for the next leg of my journey. I have four chemo treatments left, then I'll be planning the removal of both of my breasts, reconstruction surgery and a hysterectomy.

That's a lot for my next leg, I think I'm going to make it a few legs like in transporting for rescue. My next leg is the MRI, surgery consultations and determining if radiation is needed. The third leg will be my double mastectomy and either radiation or reconstruction. My fourth leg will be the hysterectomy and in between I'll still be receiving infusions of Herceptin for the next year every three weeks.

My dreams continue to focus on me finding out I have more than one cancer. This may continue for the rest of my life or end once I get through surgery and have my next colonoscopy. I have read two stories this week of women with stage 2 breast cancer, like me, who have cancer come back as stage four after their mastectomies in different areas of their body. This is beyond scary and heart pounding.

I hate the thought that I'll have to continually check other parts of my body for cancer, forever, but at least I'll be more aware of body changes, symptoms, etc. Hopefully this is a one time opportunity to punch cancer in the throat, but if the opportunity rises again I'm sure I'll be up for the challenge.

I meet with my plastic surgeon tomorrow to discuss my boobs; I'm nervous about the conversation but glad I'll be able to learn of my options. Currently I plan to drop from a D cup to a C, maybe I can wear button downs, but I also may choose to forego new ones altogether. The more I read, the more I learn of women that have had bad experiences with reconstruction and wish they had gone a different route.

As I sign off and hope for better dreams tonight. I leave y'all with the thought that maybe we shouldn't save the tatas, maybe we should focus on saving the women (and men) going through this journey instead. It's tough, rigorous, expensive, scary and actually focused on killing the tatas for the betterment of the traveler.