Shouldn't have looked

tootsie1

Karmar said:

Wow
Gail,

Reading your post-Wow-I dont have cancer at all but am sorry that you felt belittled by others. I agree with one post we are family. My dad was stage 4 but I never thought of stages ever. Cancer is a beast no matter how big or small. And none of us know who will get through it and those who will have a life long battle. I still plan on posting and reading. I truly hope you do to. Keep up the faith. And vent! cnacer or not stage 1 or 4 your still a gift as we all are.God Bless you
Karen

Thanks
Thank you, Karen. I hope you are getting checked regularly to make sure you don't get the beast.

Have a Happy New Year.

*hugs*
Gail

pamness

tootsie1 said:

oops
Sorry about the double post. Tried to copy and paste it under your remarks properly, but instead ended with a double post. Novice! *L*

*hugs*
Gail

I only wanted to try to make you worry less
I knew I would get slammed for my post, but I do wish, for your sake, that you could learn to worry less. (I wish I could learn to worry less). As I said in my post, be proactive - I hope that your new gastroenterologist can make you feel more comfortable. And I pray, that they will never find anything to make you feel scared or anxious.

I know that any cancer diagnosis provokes anxiety. You should feel free to vent, complain here or anywhere else. I just wanted to try to make you feel a little less anxious.

I hope the New Year brings you nothing but good things.

Pam

tootsie1

pamness said:

I only wanted to try to make you worry less
I knew I would get slammed for my post, but I do wish, for your sake, that you could learn to worry less. (I wish I could learn to worry less). As I said in my post, be proactive - I hope that your new gastroenterologist can make you feel more comfortable. And I pray, that they will never find anything to make you feel scared or anxious.

I know that any cancer diagnosis provokes anxiety. You should feel free to vent, complain here or anywhere else. I just wanted to try to make you feel a little less anxious.

I hope the New Year brings you nothing but good things.

Pam

Thanks, Pam
Thanks for the clarification, Pam. My new gastro appointment was not made because I worry all the time (which I really don't), but to see if he can help identify what's causing the pain I continue to have. This has occasionally been off the 1-10 chart even with morphine. So it's significant.

I guess it wasn't clear from the way I worded my post that the main question in my mind was, "Aren't they supposed to try to check at least 12 lymph nodes? Should I pursue the whys of that with any of my doctors"? I know that there were some symptoms prior to my diagnosis that I was aware of but put off as being part of my ongoing IBS. So I'm trying to be more aware of things I should/shouldn't discuss with a doctor. I was really hoping when I posted that someone else would say they'd been diagnosed a long time ago and not had 12 nodes checked. Just wanted reassurance that it sometimes happens, and it can be okay.

I honestly don't sit at home worrying all the time. I'm very busily involved in everything that has to do with my 2 (soon to be 3) grandchildren and the rest of my family and my church. I also captain a Relay for Life that I started as soon as I was on my feet after my surgery last year. So I really don't think I'm sitting home and moaning all the time.

I believe you meant well and wanted to help me, but it stung that the first sentence referred to me being a Stage 1 survivor. It made it sound like, "So what are you whining about, lady?"

I hope things are well with you.

*Hugs*
Gail

polarprincess

nodes
Is it possible all they had was 10 nodes to check? Stage 1 is a small cancer, so maybe that is all they got from your surgical specicmen. I am assuming you are thinking they just stopped at 10, right, and that there were probably more to check? Mine was a very small T1 cancer in a polyp, and i would have been stage I except they found cancer in 1 of 26 lymph nodes, with no evidence of extranodal extension, so i ended up stage IIIa, and they took out 8 inches of my rectosigmoid and they told me in that area there are more lymph nodes, so maybe if yours was higher up, there were just simply less nodes. If not,from what i understand they do save your specimens and freeze them, so you could request that they be rechecked if it would put your mind at ease.

pamness

tootsie1 said:

Thanks, Pam
Thanks for the clarification, Pam. My new gastro appointment was not made because I worry all the time (which I really don't), but to see if he can help identify what's causing the pain I continue to have. This has occasionally been off the 1-10 chart even with morphine. So it's significant.

I guess it wasn't clear from the way I worded my post that the main question in my mind was, "Aren't they supposed to try to check at least 12 lymph nodes? Should I pursue the whys of that with any of my doctors"? I know that there were some symptoms prior to my diagnosis that I was aware of but put off as being part of my ongoing IBS. So I'm trying to be more aware of things I should/shouldn't discuss with a doctor. I was really hoping when I posted that someone else would say they'd been diagnosed a long time ago and not had 12 nodes checked. Just wanted reassurance that it sometimes happens, and it can be okay.

I honestly don't sit at home worrying all the time. I'm very busily involved in everything that has to do with my 2 (soon to be 3) grandchildren and the rest of my family and my church. I also captain a Relay for Life that I started as soon as I was on my feet after my surgery last year. So I really don't think I'm sitting home and moaning all the time.

I believe you meant well and wanted to help me, but it stung that the first sentence referred to me being a Stage 1 survivor. It made it sound like, "So what are you whining about, lady?"

I hope things are well with you.

*Hugs*
Gail

Let me try one more time
I never thought you were just sitting home. I loved your post (I hope I am right about this - about going to your college reunion- or your first trip alone since the diagnosis), unless my memory has totally left me - which is possible - you had a blockage. I did too, wouldn't wish that on anyone. I wasn't aware that you continue to have a huge amount of pain. As they would say these days, "my bad."

I have trouble with stress, and worry that stress causes a decrease in the function of the immune system.

I hope that you find out what is causing the pain. My colon surgeon tried to blame the pain from a partial blockage on a stomach surgery I had 15 years ago. Might have been more effective if the surgeon for the stomach surgery was not his current boss.

Anyway, I hope you get some answers about the pain and continue to enjoy your interests and family.

Pam

MoonDragon

Hmmmm
They didn't even check my nodes the first time around when I had Stage I. I would have squacked if I'd known, but until I read your post, I didn't know they checked nodes at that stage. I was told that they got a "clean radius" and that's all that mattered. My second time around I'm a Stage IIA T3N0M0 and they checked 13 nodes I believe. Had they checked the nodes the first time, I might not have had to go through battle #2. Please keep posting because we all learn from each other and I just learned from you!

tootsie1

pamness said:

Let me try one more time
I never thought you were just sitting home. I loved your post (I hope I am right about this - about going to your college reunion- or your first trip alone since the diagnosis), unless my memory has totally left me - which is possible - you had a blockage. I did too, wouldn't wish that on anyone. I wasn't aware that you continue to have a huge amount of pain. As they would say these days, "my bad."

I have trouble with stress, and worry that stress causes a decrease in the function of the immune system.

I hope that you find out what is causing the pain. My colon surgeon tried to blame the pain from a partial blockage on a stomach surgery I had 15 years ago. Might have been more effective if the surgeon for the stomach surgery was not his current boss.

Anyway, I hope you get some answers about the pain and continue to enjoy your interests and family.

Pam

Thanks
Thanks, Pam.

It's amazing that you remembered that post! It was actually a sorority convention I went to (Beta Sigma Phi, not a college sorority, but a social and service organization).

Yeah, the pain is the pits, but it's sort of like a member of the family now. I'm pretty much getting to the point of accepting that it's just going to be there,and that's that. I really think my IBS just got kicked into high gear by the surgery. There is one part of the medical report that I will ask the new gastroenterologist about, referring to the area right at the incision. We'll see... At any rate, it hasn't stopped me from wrestling with my 20 month old grandson, which is a hoot.

*Hugs*
Gail

tootsie1

polarprincess said:

nodes
Is it possible all they had was 10 nodes to check? Stage 1 is a small cancer, so maybe that is all they got from your surgical specicmen. I am assuming you are thinking they just stopped at 10, right, and that there were probably more to check? Mine was a very small T1 cancer in a polyp, and i would have been stage I except they found cancer in 1 of 26 lymph nodes, with no evidence of extranodal extension, so i ended up stage IIIa, and they took out 8 inches of my rectosigmoid and they told me in that area there are more lymph nodes, so maybe if yours was higher up, there were just simply less nodes. If not,from what i understand they do save your specimens and freeze them, so you could request that they be rechecked if it would put your mind at ease.

not sure
I don't really know the answer to that. I plan on asking lots of questions at my next appointment! All I can see on the report is that 10 nodes were checked, but it doesn't say out of how many there are in that area. I just reread that section of the report. Of course I noticed something that I hadn't before. It said "lymphatic invasion suspicious." Right under that it said that they had checked 10 nodes, 0 positive. So I don't know if that means that it was suspicious, they checked, everything was okay, or what. I'll ask! I also will ask if the doctor feels there would be any value in rechecking the specimen. I'm not overly worried, but I do hope they checked as many as they needed to, you know?

*Hugs*
Gail

tootsie1

MoonDragon said:

Hmmmm
They didn't even check my nodes the first time around when I had Stage I. I would have squacked if I'd known, but until I read your post, I didn't know they checked nodes at that stage. I was told that they got a "clean radius" and that's all that mattered. My second time around I'm a Stage IIA T3N0M0 and they checked 13 nodes I believe. Had they checked the nodes the first time, I might not have had to go through battle #2. Please keep posting because we all learn from each other and I just learned from you!

That bites
Well, doesn't that just make you mad! I was told before the surgery that they wouldn't be able to stage me and tell me the next course of treatment until they got the pathology report back, including being sure I had clear margins, achieved by checking the lymph nodes. I'm sorry you had to have a second battle! Hopefully it will all be clean sailing from here on out.

*hugs*
Gail

polarprincess

tootsie1 said:

That bites
Well, doesn't that just make you mad! I was told before the surgery that they wouldn't be able to stage me and tell me the next course of treatment until they got the pathology report back, including being sure I had clear margins, achieved by checking the lymph nodes. I'm sorry you had to have a second battle! Hopefully it will all be clean sailing from here on out.

*hugs*
Gail

lymphatic invasion
I am pretty sure lymphatic invasion is different than lymph node involvement, and if your specimen was suspicious for that, yeah you are right for wanting to ask more and getting more info..good for you... we count on our docs though, and I am sure if they thought there was any need for chemo they would have offered it...i know i worried myself sick for quite awhile by something on my pathology report.. it said something about there being a 1 cm size necrotic fat deposit and i researched and assumed it was a tumor deposit, and when i finally asked it was just dead tissue from when i had the polyp removed..so all that worrying for nothing. Memorial Sloan kettering has a little calculator to determine your risk of being disease free 5 and 10 years from now, and for stage I even when you switch around some of the factors, the prognosis is still very excellent-http://www.mskcc.org/mskcc/html/83364.cfm
good luck with everything. I am stage IIIa with a T1 and 1 node positive i also get an excellent prognosis with the calculator.

tootsie1

polarprincess said:

lymphatic invasion
I am pretty sure lymphatic invasion is different than lymph node involvement, and if your specimen was suspicious for that, yeah you are right for wanting to ask more and getting more info..good for you... we count on our docs though, and I am sure if they thought there was any need for chemo they would have offered it...i know i worried myself sick for quite awhile by something on my pathology report.. it said something about there being a 1 cm size necrotic fat deposit and i researched and assumed it was a tumor deposit, and when i finally asked it was just dead tissue from when i had the polyp removed..so all that worrying for nothing. Memorial Sloan kettering has a little calculator to determine your risk of being disease free 5 and 10 years from now, and for stage I even when you switch around some of the factors, the prognosis is still very excellent-http://www.mskcc.org/mskcc/html/83364.cfm
good luck with everything. I am stage IIIa with a T1 and 1 node positive i also get an excellent prognosis with the calculator.

Thanks
Thanks for the info. I plan on asking when I go in a few weeks, just to reassure myself. I really wish I had seen all this stuff earlier, because I would have been able to discuss it with my oncologist at the first visit. Who knew, though?

I'll check out that calculator. I know my statistics should be good, which is wonderful.

*hugs*
Gail

Joy1216

Eight Nodes
I'm also a Stage 1 survivor, diagnosed March 2006. The surgeon took eight lymph nodes. I had never heard that 12 was standard, so for me ignorance was bliss. All I cared about was that the cancer hadn't spread to my lymph nodes. BTW, I do understand about being "only" Stage 1.
Joy