Myths I taught myself! :-)

Myths and things I have had to let go of about breast cancer!

Yes I find I have actually believed in a few myths myself and had to release their ugly hold on my thinking to get past the recriminations that sometimes crop up in the middle of the night and haunt me, or come spewing out of my mouth at inopportune time. The good thing to know is I'm not the only one that believes these things, but I have had educated people with MDs behind their names agree with me on them in the past. So they are prevalent in our daily knowledge.

One myth that I had held onto for a long time and just seemed to not be able to let go is that "breast cancer can be there 10 years before it is detectable on a mammogram". Some slowly growing cells that no one can detect, and that you only notice when it gets to some magic size of 1 cm or larger. Believing this was a possibility I just couldn't understand why the mammogram I had two years ago didn't show anything and why the suspicious lump that I had, seemed to be around for years. Well the obvious answer is - cancer of the breast attacks normal breast tissue, and most of my breast tissue has felt suspicious! But it is "just normal" breast tissue, according to my oncologist. She assured me that the cancer I have did not show up 10 years ago and slowly grow over time, but that it started raging sometime in the past 2 years after my last normal mammogram. 

Another myth - if you breast feed your children you will not get breast cancer... Well I can tell you for sure I breast fed all 3 children and I have breast cancer now some 35 years later after my first born. It may offer some protection, but no guarantees. 

Breast cancer is inherited - well it may be in some women, but the majority of women who develop breast cancer are the first one in their family. It does affect one in eight women in the United States - so each one of us will most likely know someone who has breast cancer or develop it themselves.

Another myth that is out there regarding treatment of breast cancer is that a total mastectomy guarantees you will not get a recurrence. The reality is that a person who has a lumpectomy followed by radiation treatment has the same exact percentage of recurrence as someone who had a mastectomy. Mastectomy does not guarantee no recurrence of cancer. The choice here is whether you want to undergo the radiation treatment for 5-6 weeks five days a week to get that percentage or not. I chose to keep my girlish figure at a cost of time (30 minutes a day for 5-6 weeks) and probably some exhaustion and topical skin burning in the local area. It isn't for everyone, and everyone has to make their own decision. 

Also it helps to be well endowed.so I had something after lumpectomy.. thank you Grandmother Bertie for those genes!

In the weeks after discovering that I had breast cancer, I read everything I could find so that I would be knowledgeable and be able to make the right decision for myself and what to do. I decided against a completely non-aggressive wait and see approach because I have had very close friends die this way and it wasn't pleasant for them. I am a middle of the road person when it comes to alternative health options. I'm willing to try it if it truly can be shown as effective, but if it is one person tooting their horn about their healing and not much else, I find it difficult to trust that it is effective for the general population. I have been trained in science especially the medical sciences, so I tend to trust what I know of them, understanding they are limited as well in what works and what doesn't, and that they tend to over medicate. 

So knowing these things helps me to keep a gentle balance. When the times are tough and I am feeling depressed and have self-doubt, I think of the myths I have uncovered in my research and the truth that I am loved by a generous loving God who wants the best for me. So I put my trust in His love for me and ask Him to give wisdom to my doctors and to allow me the opportunity to minister through this time to those around me. Help me not to be overcome with my selfish desires that rear their ugly heads when I don't feel good and give to those around me who have less or don't even know they are loved. 

That reminds me another myth I always heard - when you tell people you have cancer they disappear!... Well my friends have not disappeared they have shown up for me, they have prayed for me and with me and shared their food with me. Thank you dear friends for dispelling that myth. :-)

WASH YOUR HANDS

So the weeks are flying by! My third treatment is this morning and I'm almost prepared. 

Things that have to get done that I tend to put off, are: 
a. filling out those state disability forms... and mailing them... 
b. Cleaning off my desk in my office - piled pretty high now, can hardly find the top of the desk (although my daughter-in-law Melissa cleaned it off for me several weeks ago). 
c. Preparing my go to clinic bag for the day to have reading, knitting and movies to watch while sitting in the chair. 
d. Bringing a stack of books for a coworker to help her with a paper she is doing for school. 

I'm looking forward to the next three weeks for these reasons:
1. Going to Disneyland with Craig, Melissa, Eden & Don! woo hoo it's been two years now. 
2. This is the middle of my treatment and I only have three more treatments to go of chemotherapy. 
3. Thanksgiving, family and friends, parties
4. Planning on staying well and resting as needed.
5. At peace with taking one day at a time.

Last week was difficult, this week is great so I really didn't have much to say. The biggest two side effects that seem to bother me at this time are losing the tastebuds (lasted 15 days this time) and headaches, had 3 days in a row, and then a couple more - real whoppers, make me rather dull and feel like I can't think, but fortunately for me OTC medications knock them off or at least lower their threshold to a dull ache by noon when I wake up with them. One doctor said that it is related to the hair loss and scalp pain that radiates to my head.  Had a lot of tearful days, but laughter through my tears as the joy of the Lord has been my strength. SO even though I feel like crying (headache days) I still can laugh at jokes and see the irony of the moment.


A highlight of this week was getting to visit my best friend's daughter in the hospital with her newborn baby. So precious a gift of God. Her little face was so sweet and she let me hold her for almost 45 minutes... Love love love! 


This week when I show up for dinners and parties (if I have the energy) don't feel bad if you have a cold and I don't hang with you, these next two weeks I have to be very conscious of staying well since my immune system is taking a big hit. So wash your hands a lot, cough into your elbow or a Kleenix and wash your hands, and oh yes... wash your hands... :-) 




 WHY I DON'T WEAR A MASK - My doctor told me I would have to wear a special mask that is specially fitted to protect me from the viruses in the air. The masks they hand out to people at clinics and that you can buy over the counter are really to keep people who have a cough and who can't cover their mouths fast enough when they sneeze or cough won't cough out into the air around them and spread their germs. They do not protect people from other people's germs because of the openings on the sides of them...


WHY I WASH MY HANDS FOR 15-20 SECONDS WITH SOAP: It works. I have stayed well for a long time now and I do know that I wash my hands a lot (counting to 20 under my breath or singing row-row-row, happy birthday). After I pet my cats, before and after holding babies, of course after using the toilet, and after shaking people's hands, or opening doors using the handle if I don't have a paper towel or a sleeve to
 open it. I use a lot more paper towels these days... :-) I plan to get some decorative paper towels for guests at my house, now to get them to wash for 15-20 seconds with soap... hmmm anyone with an idea how to do that? 

In case you are wondering, the picture above is of my cat Sweet Pea, he is very confused, we moved our futon's out of the family room and put in two Laz-y Boy rockers and a Love seat that has two seat rockers. Sweet Pea cannot figure out how to hang on these chairs yet; unless we are sitting in them. That is probably good... that way less allergens on my furniture!

For my parting words: 

WASH YOUR HANDS please...!

FUSCIA MY COLOR TODAY!

So the first thing I do when sitting down to write a blog is decide what color to make the ink on the page. Don't know if you can tell what color I chose here... it is a green tone, although on my screen it just looks black... Black and white how boring is that. I always like to choose colors to add to whatever I am writing. I prefer to print out my work wall calendar in color rather than in black and white - that way I can actually tell what the color codes indicate - pay day, holiday, etc.

When I was a teenager and they first came out with those soft tipped flair pens of multiple colors and went crazy! I would draw these very cool looking half circles and long rounded ended pictures and then proceed to color them in with multiple colors. It was my doodling. I used to take these to Dr. Pickthorn and ask him to analyze them... He would smile and say "you like lots of color". 

He as right, of course I was disappointed by this answer because I was sure there was some deep psychiatric reason I liked to draw these things and it should be the window into my soul.

Then I would try another point of view, but overall when I looked at my pictures they were pretty much the same thing, just different combinations of colors. Maybe that is why art was never my forte. So fortunately I had another talent, and that was to sing. 

Of course then I could knit, write good letters to my mom and friends, I have boxes full of letters that we wrote. I don't write letters like I used to. Got lazy after my mom died. Started using e-mail, but how do you save e-mail on those special pieces of paper that have beautiful colors and flowers and multiple scenes that say something special about the person who sent you that letter or that you picked out to send to that special person? It just doesn't hold the same romance re-reading them on flat white printer printouts... ooo maybe I should invent the Letter e-mail you can print and it will look like an old fashioned letter? Probably someone already has done that. Invention takes a lot of effort and time on my part to actually follow through on the wonderful idea I had. 

So now the color wheel has gone around and my ideas that I had when computers were first put on the desktop have mostly been done although not exactly the way I would have done them... I still think we need a birthday card from grandma that starts playing automatically on her birthday every year and it has the grandchildren saying or singing happy birthday on it! Then when grandma dies that could be a really creepy thing to put on her grave or there would be a chip to turn it off - just cause, you don't want to creep out the person who inherited all of grandma's stuff. 

So the color of my day will be fuscia today, I will wear a pink shirt, a pink hat and black slacks, and that brings my love for colors bright and beautiful to my friends and colleagues. Hope your day is fuscia like mine.