My Cancer Story: The Lumpectomy

If you haven’t yet read the previous posts about my cancer journey, you can start from the beginning right here.

As September 10 approached, I began making plans for the surgery.  Of course my husband offered to fly back to Texas and be with me for it, but I told him not to.  It was only a day surgery and I had lots of friends and family members to help me out.  Also, having just started a new job, he had fewer vacation days during his first year than normal and I wanted him to save those for actual vacations.  I asked my mother-in-law to be with me at the hospital and my parents to watch the girls.  Everything was set.

The morning of my surgery, my mother-in-law drove me to the hospital bright and early.  I think I had to be there at 6:15 am.  I got checked in and did all of the usual pre-surgery stuff.  The main thing I had to do was go to the radiology department, where a radiologist would insert 2 metal wires into my right breast to mark the spots for the surgeon to remove.  It was a very strange experience.  They basically put my right breast into the mammogram machine, squeezed it, and the doctor used it to find the 2 tiny metal clips left behind from the biopsies.  He stuck a long hollow needle to each clip and then through the needle inserted a wire.  When he was done, I had 2 wires sticking out of my breast that led directly to the metal clips, and thus, directly to the spots that the surgeon needed to remove.  It was not the most pleasant experience, but it wasn’t terrible.

 When I was done in radiology, I went back to my pre-op room and began waiting for my turn in the operating room to arrive.  My surgeon came and talked to me, as did the anesthesiologist, and I was a little bit nervous but not too much.  After a while, my nurse came in and told me it was time to go.  I remember her wheeling me to the operating room, the freezing air as we entered, transferring onto the skinny little table, and then someone placing the breathing mask on my face.  That is the last thing I remember.

When I woke up I was immediately aware of my situation and only a little bit uncomfortable.  I moaned to my nurse that I was feeling nauseated and she immediately put some meds into my IV which worked very fast.  After a few minutes I was resting comfortably as my nurse scooped ice chips into my mouth every few minutes.  I don’t know how long it actually was, but it didn’t seem like very long until they took me back to my pre-op room where my mother-in-law was waiting.

I spent an hour or two recovering and was then ready to go home.  My mother-in-law drove me home and stayed with me overnight.  I never had much pain and slept really well for the next 2 nights.  Other than tenderness, I really was pretty much back to normal after 1-2 days.  I had a follow up appointment with my surgeon scheduled for exactly one week after the surgery, on Thursday, September 17.  This was when I received the pathology results from the tissue that they removed during the surgery.  Well, some of them anyway.  At the appointment, my surgeon told me that the results showed that they removed all of the small piece of DCIS, but that it appeared that parts of it had “invasive components”.  I am not exactly sure what this means since DCIS is a non-invasive form of cancer, and I refuse to Google health stuff anymore (hello panic attack!), but my surgeon told me that if it did in fact have invasive components, that it didn’t change my prognosis in any way, but I would need to have a second surgery to have a lymph node removed and checked for cancer.  She assured me that never in her career has she seen a lymph node in a situation like this come back with any cancer in it.  So, while she obviously couldn’t tell me with 100% certainty, she was confident that it would come back clear.  The only thing was that the pathologists were still processing the samples and we would need to wait a few more days (UGH!) for them to be finalized and know for sure what we were dealing with.

She also told me about the larger sample of the LCIS that they removed.  The lab results showed that there was in fact some DCIS (cancer) in this area as well, but that it appeared that they had gotten it all out, and if not, whatever was left would be killed by the radiation treatments.  This did not alarm me very much .  I was more concerned to hear if I would need another surgery to have a lymph node removed and checked for cancer.

A few days later, on Thursday, September 24, my surgeon called with the final pathology results.  It was not at all what I expected to hear.  She told me that the DCIS did in fact have invasive components and I would need to have a lymph node removed.  The more significant finding, however, what that the entire 5+ cm area of what they thought was just LCIS (abnormal cells) was in fact DCIS (cancer) and the entire section now needed to be removed (they had previously only removed a small portion of it).  Because of the size of the area that needed to be removed, it was no longer an option to have another lumpectomy.  The entire breast must be removed.  The surgeon went on to inform me that only the right one needed to be removed but I could elect to remove the left one as well even though my long term prognosis would be the same either way.  I was in shock.  This was not fitting into our plans very well.  The girls and I were hoping to sell the house soon and move to our new home in another state.  My husband was not here.  Would I have the surgery here or there?  We had a cruise in less than 2 months.  And most of all, this is a major surgery with a very difficult recovery.  I held it together on the phone and when I hung up, I sat there for a minute gathering my thoughts.  My girls were home with me and I could not fall apart.

After a few minutes, I made sure that the girls were occupied with activities and went onto the back patio to call my husband.  Once I started talking to him, I couldn’t hold back the tears.  I didn’t all out sob, thank goodness, but there was a lot of wiping going on.  I quickly decided, with his full support, that I would have a double mastectomy.  If I was going to go through the trauma of removing one breast, how much more difficult could it be to remove the other one as well?  Also, if I still had my left breast, I would have a much more intense screening process for the rest of my life that I wouldn’t need if I removed it also.  I also quickly decided to have it done in Texas, as soon as possible, with my same team of doctors and my family and friends close by for help.  However, my husband would definitely be coming back for this one.  I called my doctor back and let her know my decision and she said she would get me an appointment with the plastic/reconstructive surgeon ASAP, who would also be a part of the surgery.  She called just a few hours later and asked if I was available tomorrow morning at 8:00 am.  Yes, of course I was!  Once again, God provided me with the ability to not have to wait.

Up Next:  The Mastectomy