Which Cancer is what now?

Did you know there are different types of breast cancer? I didn't until April. So which do I have? The kind that is harder to treat of course.

My cancer is called Invasive ductal carcinoma. It is triple negative as well. What does that mean you ask!? Invasive means it is aggressive. It likes to spread fast. Ductal means it is formed in a milk duct. Carcinoma means cancer. Triple negative is the bad part (worse part?). It means it is not responsive to Estrogen, Progesterone, or HER2. But that sounds like a good thing right? Nope. It means they don't know what causes this type of cancer to grow. So therefore they don't have a clear cut way to make sure it stays the eff out of me when we are done. It has a higher recurrence rate. And when it comes back, usually it isn't in the breast. So basically it sucks.

They only really discovered this type of breast cancer about 10 years ago. So it is still relatively new. Which means they don't know how to really deal with it. So when you hear about breast cancer, and ways to reduce your risk, it does NOT apply to triple negative. In fact they believe that the more pregnancies you have, the higher risk you have of developing it. And I breastfed my first for 13 months and my second until about 6.5 months when I was forced to quit to fight this tumor. I'm young, which is also a risk factor for 3- cancer. And for some reason, it has a higher likelyhood of being found in African American young women. The highest rate of trip - cancer I read was from young women from Nigeria. Weird huh? I'll link articles later when I find them again.

But this is why I am doing neoadjuvant chemotherapy. (What does that big ol' word mean?) Neoadjuvant means that I am doing chemotherapy before they remove the tumor surgically so that we can see how the tumor responds to the chemo. Hopefully we will end up with a total pathological response (the chemo will completely kill the tumor). But at this point I would be damn happy with just partial pathological response. Talking to Dr. M last week we discussed continuing chemo after surgery. We most likely will, at try gemcitabine, which when said sounds a heckuva lot like Jim Bean. Which got us into a long discussion about what type of drinks we like. For the record, I could down a million Malibu and Pineapples because they taste delicious. In fact if I could find a bottle of Malibu that was alcohol free, I would be the happiest person EVER! Seriously, its that delicious. I could also be persuaded into drinking some B-52s. Kahlua, Baileys, Cream, um yum! What was I talking about? 

Nervous...Anxious...Scared...

Every feeling under the sun is what I've feeling.

I'm nervous that the A/C treatment won't work. I am nervous that the side effects will be brutal. How am I going to take care of my sweet boys if I can't  function.

Also, just fyi, and I din't know if this is how it is for everyone, but my armpit with the swollen lymph nodes, feels like it has been kicked by a steel toe boot. It a tender and painful and it sucks.

My older son starts school in 3 weeks. I am nervous that he is going to bring home the sniffles and because of my lack of immune, turns into the flu for me. Mothers of young children should not be allowed to get sick. Like we should get immunity for it for at least pre-school through 3rd grade. Its the least mother nature could do after putting us through child birth. Like a just pass go, collect $200 card.

I wish Thursday would just hurry up and get here. Where is life's FF button? Because it sure would come in handy right about now!

And I know this post is scattered full of random thoughts. But thats how my head is working right now. It is crazy.

Well...that sucks

I've been feeling down lately. In fact, I finally cried. Took a few months, but the tears finally fell. I don't know why, but the reality of it all finally hit me. It sucks finally feeling your mortality hanging in the balance. But I also have a reason to feel it hanging in the balance. I had another MRI done last Wednesday. My tumor had felt smaller and soft a few weeks into my Taxol treatment. But the last couple weeks it felt bigger and harder. So we wanted to check on it.

The news we got back was not so good. The tumor has not shrunk. In fact it has gotten bigger. And Wednesday evening, but right armpit was very tender. I felt it up and there is a new lump about the size of a golf ball. So now I have lymph node involvement. Yipfreakingeee. The MRI also showed it. I have got to be getting close to the bottom of the bad luck tree surely!

So what now? I had my last dose of Taxol yesterday. We are cutting it 1 week short. Both my oncologist and I feel that it is obviously not working. So next Thursday, I am starting the A&C chemo. I am incredibly nervous about this chemo. New side effects, new meds, back on steroids. I have all sorts of new anxiety now. But I feel this is the best thing to do. I've read how this chemotherapy is kick butt and will do the job. Hoping it will create a complete pathological response (in other words, the tumor will be dead when they cut it out). They have also upgraded (downgraded?) my staging. Its now 2b. Could be 3 depending on how many lymph nodes are involved.

BUT the good news in all this is that the cancer is still pretty much localized to the breast/armpit area. There were no other spots in my body. Silver lining right?