Textbook Case

I got the call I had been waiting for late this afternoon from my surgeon - my pathology report from surgery was finally complete! From everything she said, it sounds like my cancer had an excellent response to the chemo and behaved exactly as she expected and I hoped it would.  There were still some remaining cancer cells scattered over a 7cm area in my breast, but there were so few of them that she said she would classify this as very close to a complete response to the chemo.  She also said they only found a few remaining cancer cells in 1 lymph node (out of the 26 that they ended up taking from me) and that she was very confident that there were no more cancer cells remaining in me. She'll go over the report with me in more detail when we meet next week (she was kind enough to call me while on vacation in Florida this week), but she seemed very pleased with my overall chemo response and it sounds like the route we took (chemo, followed by bilateral mastectomy, lymph node removal, and radiation) was the absolute perfect course of action.  Thank goodness for smart doctors and dumb cancers!!!!

As for my recovery, it's going pretty smoothly so far.  I had home care nurses visit me Friday and Saturday and they both said I seem to be healing well.  I'm still on pain meds every 2 hours (thank goodness for my excellent "nurses" who even wake me in the middle of the night to make sure I stay on schedule!) but what I'm on doesn't make me groggy and keeps my pain under control so I'm not cutting back just yet.  I have four drains coming out of my incisions which are very annoying, but I'm hoping to get at least one of them out when I go to an appointment at my plastic surgeon's office tomorrow.  I've been spending most of my time trying to rest and recover as much as possible, but I did manage to spend most of the afternoon outside yesterday, soaking up the sun and watching my boys play with their new basketball hoop! I also went walking both yesterday and today, so although the recovery process is slow, I think I'm definitely getting a little better each day.

A couple of pictures below from the weekend....I'll post more updates soon (it's bedtime here so not too much time to spare at the moment!!)

My boys and their new hoop - thanks Great Grandma and Great Grandpa!!!

Ed and Owen practicing their shots

Colin practicing his newest skill....can't wait for a real family bike ride this summer!