New to this and lost

I am 37 years old and was diagnosed with an invasive ductal carcinoma (all hormone receptors are positive as well - this is a good sign! It means you will respond well to hormone therapy!) in September, found out it spread to my lymph nodes when I got my MRI in October (my insurance has been a real pain on approving MRIs, so things keep getting delayed). It is definitely a lot to process, but we have the "best" kind to have if you're going to get cancer, they say, as it is highly treatable and very common.

Your oncologist should recommend a plan for treatment - mine is chemo, surgery, radiation, and then endocrine therapy. (My second opinion was my breast surgeon, who agreed. I know you said yours is fresh out of med school, but hopefully they're competent and maybe even know more about newer treatments.) I started chemo on November 17 and it is definitely a fatigue you've never experienced before, but it lessens a bit day after day. It's been 10 days and my biggest annoyance with treatment (so far) is how much acne I now have and how dry the inside of my nose is. But I have been able to continue working and living pretty normal so far. I know there is more to come and I'm only one treatment down, but it's just a blip in the road and you have to adjust as you go along.

I hope you don't forego treatment. I know how scary it is - mentally, emotionally, financially, and every other single way it can be! Just take it one step/one day at a time. Take a notebook with you to your appointments so you can make notes because it's a lot of information coming at you and you're not going to remember it all later. Also, I found keeping multiple calendars helpful - I have my phone, a travel calendar, and a dry erase board on my fridge to keep track of all of my appointments. I may not NEED every calendar, but I find it helps me feel less anxious to just be able to visualize what the week will be.