a light at the end of the tunnel

Last tuesday I had my long awaited consultation with Dr. Duffy.  He is a plastic surgeon that specializes in DIEP reconstruction.  The day before the appointent Jim and I were talking about it, and when we would try to get the surgery done.  I have talked to a few people that have said that absolutely no sooner than 6 monthsafter the end of radiation.  Well, that is the middle of September.  I am starting grad school at the end of August, so I absolutely can not schedule surgery in September.  If I were doing implants I could possibly do it towards the end of the week and have the weekend to recover, but DIEP is a very big surgery, with a long hospital stay.  At the very best I was hoping the Dr. would be willing to do surgery the first week of August.  I didn't hope for anything better than that, and really- I did not think he would go for it (especially since I burnt so badly during radiation) So, I fully expected to have to wait until Christmas break. 
Now, I *knew* that my chances for this summer were pretty much obsolete, but that did not mean that I was going to actually let myself admit that!  Much less have a conversation about the possibilities.  The only thing that has kept me going is knowing (hoping) that I would get to have surgery this summer.  Sometimes Jim is a little slow.  He brought up the topic of surgery and tried to make me admit that I knew surgery wasn't going to happen until September.  He even had the audacity to suggest that I put school off yet ANOTHER semester.   I am pretty sure that once he said this, he probably saw the smoke coming out of my ears.  It took everything in me to not hit him hard.  I told him in a very stern threatening voice that there is no way in hell school is getting put off again.  The is also no way I will concede to surgery a year from now.    NO.
But of course, the rational part of me knew that the doctor was going to disappoint me and stretch this damn neverending journey out much longer than I wanted.
So, Jim and I are at Dr. Duffy's office.  I am very nervous.  He talks to us about the procedure and how he feels I am a very good candidate, and also most of his patients only spend 2-3 days in the hospital rather than 5.  I know so much about my cancer when they are asking me questions that the doctor's nurse asks me if I am also a nurse! LOL!  Then the big moment I had been waiting for- we started discussing surgery dates.  I admitted that I know the other doctors are all telling me 6 months, but I have school, and more importantly I have a DREAM about how this all needs to play out.  I give him this whole long sob story just hoping he feels sorry for me and decides to do surgery in early August.  He said he would do it in June.  J-U-N-E!!!  Quite literally my jaw hit the ground.  And then I started to cry.  This is the first time since diagnosis that something has not only gone the way I hoped, but actually better!  much better!  Of course, then I asked if he was sure?  Is that enough time to heal?  My regular plastic surgeon said the radiated skin could do very poorly if surgery is too soon.  Nope, Dr. Duffy said that since we will be adding non radiated skin, that the surgery will be much different.  JUNE!
He then escorts us to another room and has me undress.  There is a camera in the room, and I get to pick a pair of panties from a basket.  He is going to take pictures of me.  Niiiiice.  Let me just add, these panties leave nothing to the imagination.  He makes me stand in a variety of positions and takes pictures.  This will help him plan his surgery- since he will be cutting off a huge hunk of my abdomen and putting it on my boob.  Sexy pictures they were not.
The surgery is actually 2-3 surgeries.  The first is the actual DIEP flap transplant.  Then about 3 months after that, I will have a revision and at that time, they do a lift on the other side to match, and also transplant an areola/nipple that will come from my hip, the last part I am not sure about- I think it may only be tattooing to color in the skin of the areola to make it look darker.
JUNE
JUNE
JUNE
and here is a bit of irony:  My breast biopsy was June 18 last year.  At that point, I pretty much knew it was bad news, but I didn't have it confirmed until June 20.  And now, I will have surgery to make this nightmare end on June 19.
It is early enough in the summer that I will get to enjoy swimsuit season with nice boobs and a flat tummy!

my radiation oncologist SUCKS!

I can not believe how difficult the recovery from radiation has been.  I am now 2 weeks out from the end of radiation and FINALLY I am feeling better.  I am still tired more than I think I should be- which I know is normal, but I can deal with tired.  The pain is what I had a hard time dealing with. 
Toward the end of treatment I started getting burned, but also I started to swell under my arm.  They gave me all sorts of creams to use, and it did help the burn, but nothing was helping the swelling get any better, and I realized that the swollen area is where I was having the most pain.  I dipped into my leftoever vicodin and tramadol and honestly- I was taking a hefty dose every 4 hours!  Finally last week, I called the radiation oncologist to ask for more pain meds.  Get this- they asked who had rx'd the ones I had been taking.  Well- they were left over from my mastectomy I had last summer.  He wanted me to call THAT doctor to get a refill.  What the fuck?  HE is the one that did this too me- burned me and made me all swollen.  The surgeon isn't going to refill my pills- that is INSANE!  Finally, his nurse contacted my medical oncologist and had HER refill my meds.   Yes, at least I got them filled, but seriously it is messed up that Dr. Cavey wouldn't give me an rx himself.  Jerk!  After a few more days of being heavily medicated and still not really getting any relief, I come to the conclusion that I had developed truncal lymphedema.  I guess usually people that have had lymph nodes removed get lymphedema in their arm, but instead I got it in my chest.  This explained why the swelling was still not getting any better, and also why I was in a great deal of pain.  I called my lymphedema therapist to see if she could see me and help get the swelling down.  Unfortunately she needed a new referral from my radiation oncologist.  Well- from recent events, I am betting you might know how this turns out- yep!  He did NOT send in any referral or do anything else to help me.  I called that office nearly every day last week and they basically did nothing to help me.  Throughout this whole cancer ordeal, I have been relatively upbeat and have dealt with everything pretty well.   The last month though, has been terrible.  I have been depressed, and extremely anxious, and weepy.  I know that it is because I was in pain all the time, never getting any relief from it.  And then to have the doctor basically ignore my needs just about put me over the edge. 
Last Thursday I was panicking, because I just couldn't deal with the fact that I would still be in constant pain over the upcoming weekend.  Nobody would see me or help me.  I finally thought to call my massage therapist.  He is very kind and has offered to help me ever since I was diagnosed.  I haven't had a chance to see him though because I have really been way too busy.  I wasn't sure if he would even be able to help with lymphatic drainage- luckily he did know how to do manual lymph drainage, and he was able to see me on Friday.   I was worried about the appointment because I couldn't tolerate being touched.  I couldn't even handly my clothing touching me under my arm.  For the last week I have been wearing a tank top turned inside out so that the seam wouldn't rub my skin.  By the end of my appointment, the swelling had already started to go down quite a bit!  It is now Tuesday and the swelling is completely gone.  I am so glad to not be in constant pain anymore.    Also, most of my radiated skin has peeled off and is starting to look like normal skin! yeah!

The longest 6 weeks EVER is now over!

I am so glad this day is finally here.  I know I said it before, but I will say it again- I would have gladly done another round of chemo if it would have gotten me out of radiation.  Actually- I would do 2 rounds of chemo for that!  Seriously!  I have never known that level of exhaustion.  I think I have only gone to the grocery store about 3 times in the last 6 weeks.   And that's not because I plan ahead and buy a lot of groceries at once.  We basically just didn't eat very well, and certainly didn't eat anything home cooked.  Oh well!  In the last week, I have really started to burn quite badly under my arm.  I begged for new medications.  A week ago, they did give me some aquaphor mixed with lidocaine- meant to numb the area.  It didn't.  I went back and asked for something else, but they told me the burn wasn't 'bad enough' for the next medication :(  This weekend was really rough- I ended up crying a few times because it just hurt so bad.  I then dove into my stash of 'good' pain pills, and tried to stay doped up as much as possible.  I took a picture of it but the camera just doesn't do it justice.  The dark area is much more of a purpley brown rather than just the dark red that it appears.   Today was great though- I am glad to be done, and also glad that my burn was finally bad enough that they gave me a soaking solution and some silvadine- I have heard that it is really good for healing burns!  Oh thank goodness!

  

Since it was my last day of radiation, we had a little fun.  I made brownies to take in to the staff- I topped them with florescent green frosting- *radiation brownies* !! :)  Also, since going to radiation, Ethan has mentioned a few times that I should take a spider with me and radiate it, and then bring it back to him so he could get some spiderman action going on. Well, I decided to take a plastic spider with me, but couldn't find one.  Instead, I brought a little plastic frog.  The radiation techs put it on my bolice during my treatment hehe!  Then, after my treatment I got to go up front and ring the bell, while they all cheered for me.   Of course, now that I am done with that.....I still have to go back for my herceptin treatments.  The next one is tomorrow.  I never catch much of a break, but Thursday and Friday I am really going to enjoy not going into the Center!

*Radiation Brownies*



OUCH!



This is what I did every day for the last 6 weeks!

Little frog getting radiated ;)

Ringing the bell!

All the wonderful techs that put up with my complaining ever day!