Thank you Ninja - my body temp used to be 36.5 but now its 35C and I live in a hot country! I know metabolism works better if you have a more average body temperature and mine just seems to be going downwards. I am hypothyroid but that was checked recently and all is within normal ranges…
I am currently mourning everything, NOTHING is the same… and I don´t even feel like the same person
Sascha - say this aloud every day:
I am STILL the person I always was
I CAN be the person that I always wanted to be.
Sascha sweetheart, you are spinning around in circles getting yourself into a rigght pickle. STOP, think about what these lovely ladies are advising you about , think about how you would advise someone in a similar position and most of all accept that cancer is NOT necessarily the death sentance you think it is.
You need to get yourself a nice cup of tea, or whatever you fancy, a lovely biscuit to eat and RELAX and try to put your situation into perspective.
Node involvement does NOT mean spread. Your body temp , as has been said by some very wise ladies, varies from day to day, 35 degrees is normal for you while you live in a hot country.I live in saudi Arabia where it is stonking hot, my temp has gone down, I guess it’s Mother Nature’s way of keeping you cool…
As for mourning for your old life, well… part of growing up is accepting that every experience we have in our life, good or bad, shapes our personality and alters our perspective on things. Our minds,opinions and thinking has been altering since we were born. ACCEPT that this has happenend to you, yep, life can throw us a challenge at times, but you need to spin this situaition on it’s head and treat it as a challenge. It’s a challenge which you and your partner can overcome together, together you can be strong…
Why am I saying this???..I was you 14 months ago…scared,in a foreign country with 3 children to care for and feeling very sorry for myself. But it does not help. Be positive that you will both get through this, be stronger for it, and treat it as one of life’s little bumps…
Good Luck, xx
Hello Sascha
I am sorry you find yourself amongst us, none of us would wish a bc dx on anyone.
I wad diagnosed in January this year and like you, went into a pit of despair. The whole gamut of ‘why me’, overwhelming self pity, anger, bargaining - telling myself if I do so and so…
However, as many have said already, the treatment comes in stages, and we learn to deal with the next thing.
I had surgery in February and after that, the next thing was to get my results. After that, there was the next thing to deal with. And so it goes on.
I have Reynauds disease, so my veins and circulation are poor. So tomorrow I am having a Portacath inserted so no more hunt the vein or needles. I am telling you this as an example of how the medical teams want to make this as do-able as possible for us.
BC does have positives if we choose to see them. Prior to this, I had no idea how much love I had around me not only from family and friends but from other women who are unfailingly generous in sharing their experience, strength and hope. None of us need be alone.
Remember, worry is like a rocking chair; it keeps you moving but gets you nowhere.
Much love. Pixie x
Sascha… I’m so sorry you are finding it so hard but once again I agree with all the posts above…
I would like to add that it is important to try and see things in a positive way, I am triple negative which gave me less treatment options, which could be seen as a bad thing but I look at it as a positive… less treatment less side effects!
But you are allowed to have days when your world feels like it is about to end, we all do, just try to make those days fewer.
Myself I had a MX with ANC(1 involved)last march and followed with chemo. the inside of my upper arm and my side are still fairly numb, but I just love the tingle I feel when my husband touches my numb bits.
Good luck and heres to a more positive day for you x
THANK YOU everyone for your support. Went to hospital today, kept waiting one hour…
This is what they told me verbatim
Invasive lobular cancer
Infiltration and metastasis in axila
Aggressive as Ki-67 is 90% (this website shows high as anything over 20%)
Chances of survival for 5 years - 50-50
Oestrogen positive but also progesterone positive
I read up on it and it seems it is far more likely to appear in the other breast and other areas of the body than other breast cancers
Hi Sascha,
Golly, your like like to keep you waiting don’t they.
As you are overseas, they may use different means of describing ER and PR status - in the UK they usually use a score out of 8, so I can’t be sure what the two and three stars mean, but I assume they mean your cancer would response to Tamxofien or Aromoatase Inhibitors (AI), either of which would sunstantially improve your stats I’m sure.
Did they say whether the stats were with or without adjuvant treamtent (chemo or Tamoxifen/AI)? Very often those of us with poorer initial prognosis get more benefit from chemo and/or other therapies.
There is a free online calculator called NHS predict predict.nhs.uk/predict.shtml into which you can put your data and see what benefit you would get from different treatment regimes. As far as I understand it, the tool assume surgery and, where appropriate radiotherapy.
Also, a few thoughts on the stats - firstly they are based on people treated some time ago - they have to be, otherwise how can they know how many people lived 5 or 10 years? It’s obvious when someone tells you, but I didn’t think of it straight away. Treatments keeps on improving, and what we are offered is almost certianly better than the people whose dtaa they use. Also, no matter what the stats say, someone is going to be in the ‘good’ part of the stats… why not you? Also that bus with your name on it could come tomorrow… I hope not but you know what I mean.
So sorry it wasn’t better news. But please don’t throw in the towel, there are lots of ladies who post on here many, many years after poor prognoses.
Big hug.
Sascha,
Mine was lobular cancer with 5 lymph nodes cancerous and as you can see from my previous post that was THIRTEEN years ago. IT IS TREATABLE. Treatment has come on so much since I had mine & survival rates are going up all the time. I know it’s hard, I’ve been there remember but try & keep hold of the positive & take as much support as you can, it all helps.
Take care.
lbx157
Thank you all for your lovely replies, I am beginning to realise that I think the doctor gave me worst case scenarios with his statistics, and I have now made my own plan, starting with his which is surgery ASAP. As ILC prefers breast tissue I am really wondering if I should have both removed at the same time to cut my risk further - what do you think? This is so hard to pick up apparently and my appearance went from nothing to enormous in no time at all…I don´t think I want to live in fear of it appearing in the other breast…
After surgery I am going to get at least two opinions from oncologists about ongoing treatment, if any. Radiotherapy, chemo and hormone were mentioned yesterday but I am not necessarily going to agree to all those, depends on how many nodes are affected.
I shake inside at the thought of the surgery and looking at myself afterwards but I am focusing on getting the cancer out as it is very large area - almost half the breast and very uncomfortable.