newbie and waiting

Sharon912

What a way to celebrate breast cancer awareness month...finding out I have breast cancer (stage 2). Surgery on my left breast(sentinel node, lumpectomy and axillary node disection) was this past thursday. I find waiting the hardest in this process - my next visits are thursday w/surgeon and oncologist. How does one get through the emotional part of waiting and not knowing?

Skybuf

I was dx Oct 29th 05, had mastectomy w/17 malignant lymph nodes removed.....chemo then rads, yesterday had my CTScan....all is GOOD. Waiting is the hardest thing to do....I put my trust in God without Him I couldn't do this. He hears and answers prayer Sharon......I believe!
Keep a positive attitude and just do what you have to do to be well.....that's all we can do.
God can give us peace thru this.....my prayers are with you.

seof

I don't do well waiting either. If you feel up to it, get some good movies and good company to watch them with, or get someone to take you out of the house to a scenic drive, if there's one that won't wear you out. Or go on-line to a library and check out a book and get someone to pick it up for you and read. Or start a new hobby...anything you feel up to that will provide a distraction. You are a survivor! Live as well as you can every day! I agree with skybuf too, my faith, my family, and my church community are my lifeline. If you aren't into church, get into a support group of some kind. Look on the ACS website for a local chapter. They have lists of support groups of different kinds as well as people who can provide transportation, or a listening ear.

Best wishes, seof.

Susan956

I too found waiting to be the hardest part. As I waited from the time that they did the biopsy and lumpectomy until I started chemo.... I did everything possible to stay busy. My house was spotless... every closet and drawer was organized... this is so ever not me.... But I found that moving and doing anything helped me keep my sanity....

You will find out that what ever path you must take that somehow you will manage... All of us on this site has walked some version of this walk and we are all still here... Living... and Laughing... well at least most of the time...

Take Care... God Bless....

Susan

KathiM

Same thing happened to me (stage 2, lumpectomy, sentinel node and axillary node removal)....except breast cancer was my second in 6 months...stage III rectal cancer first...

Waiting IS hard, but patience is an important skill to master. Sadly, you will be doing alot of it during treatment. I bought some pocket word search books to keep me entertained while waiting for doctors. I still use them now, after all treatment is finished.

Realize that this is a process. It had a beginning, it will have an end. Take good care of your body....treat it like a faithful old friend, it is taking this journey with you. And have faith in your docs and your treatment..I did, and am sitting here, 1.5 years later, cancer free from both....

Hugs, Kathi

inkblot

Hi Sharon,

I'm so sorry to hear of your dx. I recall well, how it feels.

It's a difficult thing, the waiting. It's natural to feel anxious and frightened. Add to that, the fact that we feel overwhelmed and that our emotions feel as if they've been short-circuited and there you have it...Anxiety trip ticket!

It may not help much right now, but know that we've all been exactly where you are...awaiting the doctor consults, in order to find out "where we go from here", so to speak...getting advice and then making treatment decisions. It's all stressful and can be exhausting. Try to decide to take charge and keep the volume down as much as possible.

Try to realize that there isn't much which you can do, until Thursday. Worrying about it excessively will only make you more tired and more stressed. Do your best to relax, eat and rest well and do whatever things you have always relied on, in the past, to help you through stressful times. Your tried and true stress-busting strategies should work as well for you now as they always have. We're all different in what things help us to cope best, so whatever that is, do it and also remember that you're still healing so be kind to yourself. You've just been through surgery and that alone can be draining, so take it easy.

Perhaps give some thoughts to what questions you may have for your doctors on Thursday and write them out, so you can take them along to your appointements?

Maybe also go ahead and consider arranging at least one 2nd opinion with another medical oncologist. We're all different but I'm a huge proponent of 2nd opinions...even for far simpler things.

Thursday will be here before you know it and you'll have those visits behind you and be ready to move on to the next step of your list. Try to envision it as climbing stairs...one step at a time, and with each step, you're moving closer to your objective.

My final path reports only took two days to get, but your surgery was on a Thursday, so that automatically indicates a wait of at least a few extra days, due to the weekend. My surgeon was there when I woke up from surgery and gave me the preliminary path report, as he had gotten it during my surgery, so in my case, I had that bit of info, to go on, until we got the final report. Seems that every facility and every doctor is different in how these things are approached and that's just the nature of the medical wheel. I think all of us here appreciate the rigors of the "waiting" and we've all been just where you are and we understand.

Please let us know how your Thursday appointments go and here's a basket of warm hugs, with your name all over them! I'm a bit over 6 and 1/2 years out now and one thing I've never, ever grown tired of, is BIG WARM HUGS.

Love, light & laughter,
Ink