Friday the 13th

Friday the 13th has long been regarded as an unlucky day stemming from various roots according to an article from National Geographic.  For my part, I've always joked around about it without ever really giving any credence to the phobia and I maintain that belief today.  I find it hard to grasp that my God would set aside a specific calendar day as being "unlucky" for all of mankind.  That being said, I know many people do suffer real consequences from this phobia to the extent that it affects their lives.  It's not my place to judge or condemn anyone about anything just because I don't feel the same.  There is a quote I found many years ago that sums up my feelings very well.  At the time, it was attributed to Mother Teresa (and in many places, it still is).  However, at the website maintained by the Mother Teresa Center, it is a quote that falls under the category "significantly paraphrased versions or personal interpretations of statements Mother Teresa made; they are not her authentic words."  It says:

According to my faith, it's my job to love. (1 Corinthians 13)

I chose the title I did because many will look back on yesterday and whether you attribute it luck or not, it was not a good day.  

First and foremost, the horrific acts violence that tore through Paris, France once again demonstrated that evil is free and loose in our world.  When I finally turned on some news late Friday evening, I was devastated and heart-sore.  My prayers and thoughts go out to everyone touched by those senseless acts of violence that were perpetrated by individuals from an organization that seems to have evil at its very core.  I can think of no cause or belief so great as to justify the slaughter of innocents.  All I can do is pray that this evil will be stopped.

The other reason yesterday was not a good day is that I received some news that is not good.  I had my sentinel node biopsy at Kennestone Hospital.  They discovered that three of the nodes had tumors that tested positive for cancer.  Based on that information, they performed an axillary lymph node dissection.  I'll be honest, I think I tuned out a little bit after that due to the disappointment from the three nodes testing positive plus still coming out of the anesthesia.  My sister said Dr. Robbins said they removed between 30-40 lymph nodes as part of the axillary dissection.  It is my understanding they will test these nodes and I will find out how many showed signs of cancer when I meet again with my oncologist on Monday, November 30.

I won't lie, I was very disappointed by this news.  I was hoping to get out of this with treatment consisting of radiation and tamoxifen only.  With this news, at best, we will be adding chemotherapy to the mix.  The battle is going to be a little harder than I was expecting.

I am also having some uncomfortable side effects from the surgery.  Due to the scope of what they had to remove, there were some sensory nerves involved.  I have some significant numbness in my underarm and back of my upper right arm.  Post surgery, I had quite a bit of pain in this arm as well.  It is some better today, but not completely gone.  In addition, I have a drain tube that I have to deal with for a little bit.  Because of this, I am trying to sleep in my recliner to keep from accidentally crushing it or crimping the tube from lying in the bed.  It and the numbness in my arm make showering an interesting affair.

In the famous words of a former co-worker, "It is what it is."  So now I take it one step at a time.

Google Maps GPS Navigation

Okay, I know this post isn't about Google maps or GPS, but by the end, you'll understand.

Today, I met Dr. Soltan and the staff at the Cobb office of Georgia Cancer Specialists.  What a fantastic group of people!  From the very beginning, everyone was positive, upbeat, and friendly.  Further, there was virtually zero wait time when I arrived for my appointment.  My appointment was at 9:45 am and I think Angie and I were in and out by 10:45.  During this time, I filled out my paperwork, they took my vitals, drew some blood, and I met with Dr. Soltan while he went over the results of my pathology report.

One thing I didn't mention about Dr. Soltan previously is that I did not randomly choose him.  This is not the first occurrence of breast cancer in my family.  My Aunt Gail and two of my cousins, Tonya and Avonda, have been through this as well... successfully!  Dr. Soltan guided Aunt Gail and Tonya along the paths to their cures.  We lost my wonderful aunt this past June, but by that time she had been cancer free for over a year.

So, what did Dr. Soltan tell me?  My cancer is hormonal.  Right now, the men out there are thinking, "Well, duh.. isn't everything associated with women hormonal?"  That's not *quite* what that means guys.  In this case, it means that the cancer (in my case) has some of the same hormone receptors that exist naturally in the breast cells that listen for the signal to grow.  My estrogen receptor score was 70% and my progesterone receptor score was 95%.  From cancer.gov:

Hormone-sensitive breast cancer cells contain proteins known as hormone receptors that become activated when hormones bind to them. The activated receptors cause changes in the expression of specific genes, which can lead to the stimulation of cell growth.

The plan here (at this time) is to attack this with the oral medication Tamoxifen.  The goal is to starve any cancer cells left of the estrogen and progesterone they crave.  Notice I said "at this time"?  Since I have not yet had the sentinel node biopsy (this will likely occur sometime in the next couple of weeks), we don't yet know if the cancer has spread beyond the breast.  Treatment plans right now are tentative pending the outcome of the node biopsy.  I will see Dr. Soltan again about one week after the node biopsy.

Will I have to have chemotherapy? If the node biopsy shows signs of cancer, yes.  Further, even if the biopsy is negative, they will still perform something called Oncotype DX to test my risk factors.  If this test comes back with a low risk (and no cancer in the nodes), chemotherapy will not be needed.  If it shows high risk, then even if the nodes are negative, we will still do chemotherapy.  If it is intermediate, Dr. Soltan and I will discuss it.  In addition (if I remember correctly - my notes aren't very clear on this), I think I will have some localized radiation at the area where the cancer was found.

All this being said, Dr. Soltan is extremely optimistic regarding my outlook due to how early this has been caught and the fact that it exhibits such high hormonal receptor numbers.

After we left Dr. Soltan's office, Angie and I went to a wholesale silk florist in Austell where she has purchased some flowers previously for Aunt Gail's grave as well as for our grandparents.  I saw several things I want to buy for Mom, Dad, Gramma, and Grandaddy's graves for Christmas.  We were a bit rushed since I had to get over to Kennestone Hospital for my MRI, but we are planning to go back this weekend when we have more time.

Once I got over to Kennestone, I grabbed some lunch then signed in for my MRI.  This was the first MRI I've ever had and I have to say, it wasn't too bad.  I was on my stomach for this test, instead of on my back, so it was a bit uncomfortable.  However, I had no issues with the enclosed space at all.  There is a bit more to this to tell that, honestly, is pretty funny, but it's not family friendly or safe for work so we won't go there.  The test took about 30 minutes in all.  I'll get the results from this when I go back to see Dr. Robbins next week.  I'm thinking that we will also schedule the node biopsy during this visit.  After the MRI, I met with a Nurse Navigator and we talked for a while about different resources available to me and she gave me some reading material and some other stuff.

By this time, it was about 3:30 and I opted to do a little shopping at The Outlet Shoppes at Atlanta.  I bought a couple pair of shoes from Naturalizer and when I came out, I saw that Yankee Candle was having a sale (you guessed it, I couldn't resist).  The drawback here is that now, it was about 4:30 and I knew I was going to get caught in traffic on the way home.  By the time I got down I-75 to I-285, it was pretty bad.  I got off at Cobb Parkway, then to Windy Hill.  It wasn't much better, so I pulled up Google Maps on my phone and told it I wanted to go home (it knows my address - how cool is that?).  Once I turned it on, I started getting turn by turn prompts from my phone.  I saw parts of Smyrna that I have never seen before, to my knowledge.  At one point, it carried me through an area that had a one-lane bridge followed closely by a one-lane covered bridge.  All in all, it was a fairly nice drive and I'm glad I got to see it (or what I could see since it was dark).  That is a drive I would have never made without the technology that lives in my phone, so thank you to my Galaxy Note 4 and Google Maps GPS.

Blessings to all and thank you for your thoughts, prayers, and support.