hard day

Today felt hard. First, not as many results of tests were available as we had hoped. They had said "Monday or Tuesday," but the mind latched onto Monday.

We did learn a couple of things. First, the mysterious area of the left breast has a BIRADF (a rating scale) rating of 4. Scale runs 0-6. I forget what each number means, but 3 is "there is something there; get a mammogram in a few months." 4 is "something looks suspicious. there's about a 1 in 5 chance it is cancer." 5 is "it is 95% likely that this is cancer." 6 is what I have in my right breast. So the left thing is a 4. That concerns my surgeon. And me.

Also, it turns out that they can't do an MRI-assisted biopsy on the left breast because of the location of this "suspicious" something. And a lumpectomy would, again because of the location, severely disfigure me. I could have another MRI, in which they insert a wire into my breast, and then, days later, when they are removing my right breast, the surgeon can take out the area around the wire. They would then send this to a lab, and two days later, we would know what's what. But by then I will be home, recovering. And, if it cancer, I would need to go back to the hospital, go back under, and remove the left breast.

It feels as though I am being forced (by circumstance -- not by anyone else) to choose to have both breasts removed without even knowing if there is cancer in my left breast. But the stakes feel high, or might be possibly high, or something like that. I can hardly think clearly right now about it all. Having gotten cancer this once, I already am statistically at a higher risk of developing cancer in the other breast. Removing it would pretty much remove the worry of developing another breast cancer. I will always be at a higher risk now of developing other kinds, and my surgeon says to brace myself for the possibility of removing the ovaries, given the nature of my tumor.

But there's another piece, too. Sorry if all this is too much detail - - it helps me to write it down, and it is nice to imagine you listening. The other piece is that when they tested the hormone receptors, they were negative -- in this case, that is a bad thing. It means I may not be eligible for less aggressive post-surgery treatment (e.g., Tamoxifen, a five-year regimen). I might instead need to do chemotherapy. That is a serious bummer to me.

We will know more tomorrow -- something about the Her-2 receptors, for one thing. Also, the abdominal MRI results will be in. My guess is that we will be scheduling the double mastectomy soon. I would love some encouragement about this. Though I know it is my decision, does this sound like it makes sense to you? Or would it be worth it to have the one breast removed, wait for results, and either keep or remove the other? My brain hurts and my heart kind of aches.

love you all,

p/mom