Busy Week!

Wow....it's been a busy week! I've been meaning to do a blog update for two days now - but I guess it's a good sign that life has been so normal that I haven't had much spare time to write!

On the cancer front, it's been a very productive few days.  I've been feeling perfectly fine, and I had a really good appointment with my surgeon on Wednesday. After hashing out the pros and cons of my surgery options with the doctor, we decided that a bilateral (double) mastectomy with immediate reconstruction is definitely the route that is best for me.  My surgeon gave me more information about what the procedure and recovery will entail, as well as an estimate of the timing of the surgery (mid-March).  It will be a long procedure (about 6 hours - but I'll be completely put out, thank goodness!) because in addition to the mastectomy, I will have an axillary node dissection (which means all of the lymph nodes removed on the cancerous side), a sentinel node biopsy (to check the lymph nodes for any signs of cancer) on the good side, and skin expanders placed for my reconstruction. It sounds like I'll be in the hospital for two nights, and will have about two weeks of being very much out of commission, but should do pretty well after that. She also did an assessment of my tumor, and was very pleased with the progress.  Although the size hasn't changed all that much recently, she said the density of the tumor was so much less and my lymph nodes have shrunk a lot.  So that was all very good news! We also talked through the fact that I will learn a lot more about my cancer about 3-4 days after my surgery when the pathology report comes back.  I felt really good after leaving my surgeon's office - she was so positive and reassuring and I can't even begin to explain how great it felt to be talking about my next steps in the process.  The office also set me up with a couple of new appointments for next week: on Monday, I'll meet with my plastic surgeon and on Wednesday I'll meet with a radiation oncologist (radiation begins 4 weeks after surgery).  So I'll have even more information soon about my next steps, but things are certainly starting to move along. And, hard to believe, but I'll be all done with chemo in just a few weeks! Just two more....it's so close....

On all other fronts, it was a fun-filled but busy week.  In addition to working, I made my return to playing in band (boy was I tired after a 2 hour rehearsal!), had a great evening out with my mom friends, and visited Owen's kindergarten class today to watch Ed do some piano music with the kids.  I've posted a few pictures below of our fun school visit today.

And finally, I'll end this mega blog post with some VERY exciting news that I've finally been given permission to share. As most of you know, I am fortunate enough to have a sister who is also my best friend.  Juli has been an amazing support to me and is an incredible aunt to her nephews Owen and Colin.  And we learned over Christmas that Juli (and her wonderful husband, Jeff) are expecting their first baby in late July!!! We are all so thrilled and I can't wait to meet my new niece/nephew later this summer! So everyone send lots of love and congrats to Juli - she just made it out of the first trimester and she and Jeff are so excited about Baby Russell!!

Kindergarten music time with Ed!

We joined Owen and his buddies for lunch - boy does that cafeteria bring back memories!!