Disturbing News

seeknpeace
seeknpeace Member Posts: 259
edited March 2014 in Breast Cancer #1
I mentioned a week or two back that the skin on the top of my foot has turned dark, almost purlish, and has thickened to look like elephant skin and never dreamed that it could be something more than a unfortunate derma issue.

I had a biopsy and went in for the results and it seems that there is a possibility that this is related to an aggressive cancer in my body somewhere else. The condition is called Acanthosis Nigricans. The dermatologist said that it looks exactly as it should to be that, that acanthosis is present in the disorder from the biospy. You can get this condition from being obese, more than 200% of your normal body weight, which I am not, or from diabetes, and that can tie into the obesity. Or it can be as a result of an agressive cancer in the body, most times in the gastro region. I have some of the symptoms beyond that but, I do not have some of the others. They are going to extract dna from the biopsy that they took and try to run it down. The scary thing is that the average life expectancy after diagnosis is two years, so they have to get on it and rule it out immediately. I am just reeling from this info. I never in one million years would have thought that something like this could be the issue. I called them yesterday to see if I could just get the biopsy results by phone and not go in today, and they said, uh, no. You need to come in. It is rarely on the foot but, can be and when it is, it is on the top, like mine. The pathologist report says that it has some appearances as a wart or a mole like thing called epidermal nevus.

Has anyone here ever heard of this? I had one lady tell me that I had a spider bite, and I told her that I did not. It has never hurt, it does not itch, but, it just is getting more and more thickened. The darkness has lessened a tad.

Jan

Comments

  • wildangel
    wildangel Member Posts: 81
    #2
    Dear Jan,
    I am so sorry for this frightening news you just heard. Are they 100% sure? Please don't read statistics. I hate statistics! Look at Lance Armstrong- his statistic was he had a less than 30% chance of surviving and he just won his sixth Tour de France!
    Sometimes stats are old and not up to date with the new treatments available.
    I pray when the full path report comes in it is something else- or somthing they can treat successfuly.
    I will be thinking of you,
    Angela
  • seeknpeace
    seeknpeace Member Posts: 259
    #3
    wildangel said:

    Dear Jan,
    I am so sorry for this frightening news you just heard. Are they 100% sure? Please don't read statistics. I hate statistics! Look at Lance Armstrong- his statistic was he had a less than 30% chance of surviving and he just won his sixth Tour de France!
    Sometimes stats are old and not up to date with the new treatments available.
    I pray when the full path report comes in it is something else- or somthing they can treat successfuly.
    I will be thinking of you,
    Angela

    Hi, and thank you so much for the encouragement. They just have to rule out the malignant form of AN and find what it is. The body is so weird, how it can respond to cancer. Unfortunately, the report is very recent, I wish it were old.

    I love Lance Armstrong. I have read both books too and I wear my yellow wrist band that he has sold to millions to support his organization LAF, Lance Armstrong Foundation. The bands are yellow, like the winning jersey, and say Livestrong, which is another of his sites online to help survivors. I contacted Sally Reed, if you read the book,she is the woman that is older than him who had breast cancer and volunteers for him, and we have spent some time chatting online. She sent me a beautiful scarf from the foundation and some stickers that my husband put on his suv and his bike. Lance is a remarkable person. He is truly an inspiration. He says that as a survivor of cancer, you are obligated to live life to it's fullest to give others hope.
  • krisrey
    krisrey Member Posts: 194
    #4
    seeknpeace said:

    Hi, and thank you so much for the encouragement. They just have to rule out the malignant form of AN and find what it is. The body is so weird, how it can respond to cancer. Unfortunately, the report is very recent, I wish it were old.

    I love Lance Armstrong. I have read both books too and I wear my yellow wrist band that he has sold to millions to support his organization LAF, Lance Armstrong Foundation. The bands are yellow, like the winning jersey, and say Livestrong, which is another of his sites online to help survivors. I contacted Sally Reed, if you read the book,she is the woman that is older than him who had breast cancer and volunteers for him, and we have spent some time chatting online. She sent me a beautiful scarf from the foundation and some stickers that my husband put on his suv and his bike. Lance is a remarkable person. He is truly an inspiration. He says that as a survivor of cancer, you are obligated to live life to it's fullest to give others hope.

    Hi Jan,
    I have been reading your post. I just wanted to let you know that I am thinking of you and will keep you in my prayers that you receive some good news. These things that crop up with our bodies after undergoing cancer is enough to send us into a tailspin of emotions!
    Also I have posted in regards to Lance. I remember the women in his book that you speak of (the breast cancer)how wonderful that you got to chat with her online! Lance is truly an ispiration he is so driven! I wish they would leave him alone in regards to all the dumb drug testing, he has gone through so much trying to prove his innocents!
    Jan, please let us know how you are doing and I hope your screen name seeknpeace....happens for you. Thats a great screen name...I think we are all seeknpeace here...
    Kris
  • wildangel
    wildangel Member Posts: 81
    #5
    I hope and pray it all works out for you.
    I think it is so cool you got to speak with that woman- I remember reading about her.
    And I think Lance is such an inspiration.
    And I loved his response to the reporter who questioned him about drug use after he won his 6th Tour de France- the reported said "Have you used drugs?" and he said " Yes, Chemotherapy" You gotta love him!
    Angela
  • inkblot
    inkblot Member Posts: 698 Member
    #6
    Hi Jan:

    The waiting and not knowing is always emotionally
    difficult. Sometimes it helps to try to distract yourself. If it works just some of the time, it's worth the effort.

    Wanted to share with you that I had a strange thing on my leg about a month ago. It wasn't large or discolored as your foot problem is but it needed checking out. It was an extremely dry patch of raised skin, a bit smaller than a pencil eraser. It kept flaking off on top and underneath was a tiny pink round bump. I initially suspected an insect bite and kept an eye on it. It was located on the inside of my leg, about 3 or 4 inches down from my knee. No itching or pain. About 10 days after I discovered it, it began to bleed just a bit when the top layer of skin flaked off. UH-OH, I'm thinking. As much as I didn't want to think about it, I considered that it could be a skin cancer. Since some skin cancers can be skin coloured, brown, purple, red, black or anything in between, I thought I should have it checked out.

    Saw the dermatologist. In addition to checking the bump on my leg, he did a complete skin exam. He said that he didn't think it was anything more than a "keratosis". We talked a bit, then he blipped out of the room and a nurse blipped in and they set up for a biopsy, just to be sure. It took all of 20 seconds. He gave me an injection of anesthesia next to the bump and before I knew it, he'd sliced the whole thing out. He cut underneath it and just a bit wider than the bump and nothing of it remained. Got a bandaid and went home.

    About 3 days later, he rang to tell me that it was indeed nothing. Being me, I wanted to know precisely what it WAS. He said it was a keratosis and that a small protion of it had some wart characteristics. I'm thinking that the leg is a strange place for a wart. I guess they can appear anyplace though. It didn't look like a wart to me. I thought warts were rough surfaced but the doc said not so. Anyway, he told me there was absolutely nothing to worry about and to come in for another skin exam in one year. Says that he recommends that to everyone over 40 as a screening for skin cancer and/or any other developing skin problems. So, that ended that. I did some research which further put my mind at ease and forgot about it, until I saw your post and the wart connection.

    My thought is that some very strange things can happen to our body systems and the skin being the largest organ, I guess it's prone to what I'll call more "weirdness" than some other of our systems. It bears the brunt of all the seasons, is our barrier to all that's in our environment and changes can signal outer or inner problems in other systems, so it's an amazing thing, this skin of ours. From my own little bit of research, there must be a gazillion things which can crop up in or on our skin and that explains why it can be difficult to diagnose some things, expediently.

    Try not to focus on the negatives, exclusively, since your doc said there's a "chance" it could be related to an aggressive cancer elsewhere in your body. Your doc put a lot of info out there, and it's a lot to consider I know, but until ALL the tests are done, no one can know for certain just what it is or isn't. Maybe it could be something extremely unusual, which the docs just don't see enough of to have any idea about, initially. Such things happen and some things can mimic other's and after all the investigation is done, the dx can be something totally unexpected. I have my fingers crossed for you!

    I'm hoping that you'll have a definitive dx soon and that it will reveal good news...at least the lesser of the possibilities! Try to believe this will be the case, until you know, beyond any doubt, that it isn't. If at any point, anything in the path report seems unclear, know that you can take your slides to another pathologist for an additional assessment/opinion.

    Please keep us posted. Sending good wishes, hopes and hugs your way.

    Love, light and laughter,
    Ink

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