Back to the Surgeon

October 18, 2012:

I was at work yesterday, and this morning. I had to give a webinar to librarians across the country. Again, it's good to be distracted.

The surgeon's visit was MUCH briefer than the oncologist visit. I love that they are both so different in their approaches. I'm beginning to think Keith is overwhelmed with information, but I can't really do anything about that right now. I'm a science major at heart and so this all makes sense to me.

We've decided on a lumpectomy (which this time means she's really opening me up and scraping out all the cancer she can find. Keith and I have started to refer to this as being poked with a sharp stick). This surgery will also include looking at the lymph nodes to see if the cancer has spread. This is a more involved surgery and will actually take place in the hospital, though I will still go home that night. The recovery time will be longer.

My choices could have been a mastectomy at this point, but I am opting to not do this at this time. She tells me that this still might be necessary down the road depending on what they find. She also tells me that I will probably have to have an MRI every 6 months for quite some time...this is a discussion we will have another day.

I schedule the first surgery she has open, on the 31st. There goes Halloween being my favorite holiday, and our annual Halloween party. My daughter is going to be crushed, because being in 5th grade, this was going to be the last one. Oh well, this is a tragedy we will have to deal with.

After the surgery, I will know what the next course of action will be...regardless, nothing can happen for 6 weeks after the surgery because it needs time to heal. So it looks like whatever the next step is won't happen until the New Year.