The Healing Process

It has been almost two weeks since my surgery and I'm happy to report that while I'm in constant annoying discomfort, I am able to get around and have a semi-normal life right now. Before surgery I pictured the 4-6 weeks of healing time they estimate for this procedure to be a time of me permanently planted on the couch, knocked out by drugs all of the time. And that was definitely how I would describe the first 5 days. But on Good Friday, I was able to head to the UPC Plastic Surgery clinic and get my drains out. Good Friday, indeed! Drains typically stay in for 1-2 weeks, until the total day's output of fluid in each drain is under 30cc's. So I was happy to be on the short end of that spectrum and able to get them out in a week's time. I was very prepared for this procedure to hurt but really surprised when it didn't. What was shocking was how far up into your body the drain tubes went. The nurse told me to take a deep breath in and then exhale as she pulled them out. It didn't hurt me at all but the feeling of this thick tube making its way down from right under my clavicle and out of my side made me completely queasy. That however was not as bad as the removal of the pain ball wires that went into my chest. A pain ball is a cool little fanny pack type bag filled with a plastic circle that has what looks like a breast implant inside it. That "implant" is filled with a Novocaine type numbing agent that goes directly into my chest via little wires. The wires are wound up in a tight circle and taped to my chest so that it can't come out. I was instructed to remove this myself (!!!!) after three days when I was able to see that the ball was all out of fluid. Of course Eric removed it because I'm a wuss and he loves gross things so he removed the tape and started to pull the wires which we were told would just slip out. OMG, those suckers were in there practically up to my neck and the feeling of metal wires sliding down over my sore chest muscles 3 days after surgery had me screaming to Eric to "make it stop!!" and he's yelling "Jenna, just don't look!!" It's funny now that it's over but damn, that sucked. Oh and then there was the middle of the night vomiting two days after surgery that accompanied a low grade fever. The breast clinic and plastic surgeon's offices were called and they all agreed it sounded more like a gastrointestinal bug rather than an infection. After putting two and two together I realized that it probably wasn't the best idea to eat Outback's Ahi Tuna appetizer two days after a major surgery when you're immune resistance is down. I'm pretty sure that was my first case of food poisoning. Other than those exciting events, it's been a lot of laying on the couch, reading, eating all the delicious food brought to us by friends and neighbors, and getting yelled at by Eric for attempting to do too much. Eric, by the way, is a pretty good nurse. He was awesome at keeping me on a med schedule and always emptied my drains for me. My mom spent a lot of time here playing with Harper so Eric could take care of me and my mother-in-law also watched Harper so both Eric and I could have days of rest. And the best part of this whole surgery deal was that the dogs have taken a two week vacation to the Canine Clubhouse, Sadie's house, and the Lawson's house, so that I could rest and heal without dirty dogs jumping on me and needing to go out 50 times each day. Unfortunately, they come back today. Did you ever think I'd say such a thing? I had my first follow up appointment with the plastic surgeon yesterday and he said that things look like they are healing well. He was planning on "expanding" me yesterday but I nixed that idea quickly when I told him how much discomfort I still had from the tissue expanders. So I get to go back on 4/18 for my first tissue expander fill. They will shoot a needle into my "foob" and fill it with 50-100cc's of saline. At surgery I was filled to 150 cc's and our goal is to go to 500 cc's unless I decide I want to be a big boobie ho and fill it to 800 or something, which they said they can do as well. Go big or go home right?! The cool thing about these terrible tissue expanders is at least you can gradually see the size change until you find a size you are happy with. They like to do the implant exchange no sooner than 4 months after surgery. So if I do not need chemo, in about 4 months I will have my new reconstructed rack, if I need chemo we will wait until that's over so that I'm not subjected to a surgery while my body is weakened by chemotherapy. I have a goal to be physically whole again by Christmas time. All I want for Christmas is my new fun teets!!

 Now to the serious stuff. My follow up with the breast surgeon is next week on 4/10. That is when we will hopefully have the final pathology report and hopefully the Oncotype score which will give me an answer on if chemo will be a benefit to me for my type of cancer. I'm praying for the final pathology to not have any surprises and for a low Oncotype score so that I won't need chemo. But at the same time I want chemo. Who says that? Whatever happens, I want to do whatever I can to reduce the risk for recurrence to the lowest percentage possible. So whatever Oncotype score that is mixed with whatever treatment they recommend is what I want for myself. The only thing we know currently is that I will take Tamoxifen orally for 5 years, and if I have it my way, probably a lot longer than that. This cancer crap puts us in a situation where I will unlikely ever get to become pregnant again. There is the possibility of extracting eggs for the use in a surrogate but the steps that you have to go through to make the eggs viable involve pumping me filled with the same hormones that feed my greedy little cancer. So I'm not willing to do that. Since I will need to take Tamoxifen for 5-10 years (maybe more if evidence proves beneficial) to block my estrogen, I cannot get pregnant while on this medication. So Harper may be, like myself, an only child. This isn't what we wanted for our family but sometimes, this is the plan. She truly is everything I have ever wanted and more so my longing for another child isn't as severe as it could be. I do still get baby fever when I see newborns as we were going to start trying to have a baby pretty soon, before my cancer diagnosis happened. We never thought too much about adoption but that is an option we can look into as well. Part of me wants to kick cancer's ass and feel that my risk of it coming back is low enough so that I can confidently welcome another child into my life, knowing I'll be around to see him or her grow up. Again, thank you for your prayers, cards, and kind gestures! All the support has given me more strength than I ever knew I had. I'm amazed at what I can handle now. And to everyone who ever hears the C word in their life, it will rock your world at first. But then it will become just a part of your life and you will adapt. And there will be times when you realize you're happier than ever. After a cancer diagnosis, how is this possible? It just is. And while cancer was always my biggest fear, it happened, I'm facing it, I'm gonna beat it to a pulp, and that makes me pretty damn happier than ever.