We met with the surgeon today and were hoping to get a lot of questions answered. Unfortunately, we didn’t really get many answers. We still only know that she has cancer. We don’t know what stage it is or what is going to happen. The clinic that did the initial scans and biopsies gave my mom an envelope with her test results in it. They failed to put tumor marker information in that envelope, so the surgeon does not know the hormone receptor status yet.

Here’s what Dr. Clifford (the surgeon) did tell us:

Staging Studies

She has to do the “staging studies” which means doing the following additional scans this week to help determine what stage the cancer is.

• CT scan of her chest, abdomen, and pelvis
• Bone scan
• Breast MRI
  • Chances of finding cancer in her left breast (currently it is only confirmed in her right) is 2.5%

These scans will help determine how extensive the spread of the cancer is. We’re hoping it’s only spread to one of her lymph nodes.

Hormone Receptors

There are three hormones we’re dealing with: Estrogen, Progesterone, and Her2.

What we would like to see from her tumor markers:

Estrogen – positive

Progesterone – positive

Her2 – negative

Here’s what we’ll know after that:

If E+, P+, Her2-, then they will determine whether she will have chemotherapy or surgery first. Starting next week. This will depend on the scan results as well.

If E+, P+, Her2+, then they will definitely start with chemo first.

What we don’t want:

Triple Negatives – That is harder to treat, but there’s still treatment.

Chemo and Radiation

She will definitely do chemo, and will possibly do radiation as well. It all depends on those dang receptors and what they find in the scans.

Surgery

There are a few options (lumpectomy, single mastectomy, double mastectomy). Mom wants to do a double mastectomy to be the most aggressive. The surgeon said that if she were to do a lumpectomy or single mastectomy, the chance of finding cancer in the breast that was left would be 15-20%. That’s a higher number than we’d like to deal with, so mom says “just lob them off”. She’s convinced she’s walking away from this with a new rack no matter what, haha.

Also – They’ll definitely remove at least one, if not more lymph nodes.

Hopefully she’ll get all three scans done this week so we can get those results and know what we’re dealing with. I’ll keep you posted! We should receive the hormone receptor info tomorrow, so I’ll do another post when we have that info.

In the meantime, I’m stocking her fridge with actual food (a foreign concept in this house). Healthy eating starts tomorrow. Tonight we’re eating pizza and watching the debate, completely “unplugging” from cancer stuff as my mom says. 🙂

Thank you always for your support!

Love y’all,

Sydnie