Ahh, the waiting . . .

Hi everyone,
I thought that I would wait until I heard about the results of my PET scan and Her-2/neu analysis before creating a new post. I was told that Dr. Kenyon would probably get the results of my PET scan on Monday or by the latest on Tuesday, but I haven't heard yet. Then I figure that he's wanted to wait to get the Her-2 results before calling me. Anyway, waiting to hear about results does cause some anxiety, even though I try to be patient. This is probably one of the worst parts of living with cancer: the anxiety of not knowing and waiting to hear results. Today, I told my friend and colleague, Janet Lee, that NOT hearing the results yet might mean that it was good news - if it was bad (i.e., the PET scan showed something abnormal), Kenyon would've called me right away. That's what I hope, although I try not to make that assumption. If the Her-2/neu is positive (i.e., "overly expressed"), this might mean that I go on Herceptin for a year. I'll let you all know what happens . . .

I met with Dr. Faddis, the surgeon, yesterday, and with Dr. Havard, the plastic surgeon a few days ago. Their offices will coordinate to schedule the surgery, which I asked to be after November 9. At this point, it's a bilateral mastectomy with insertion of temporary implants, otherwise known as tissue expanders. After healing from the surgery, I will spend about two months getting "pumped up", that is, Havard will inject either 20 or 50 cc's of saline into the expanders in order to gradually stretch the chest wall muscles and the skin.

Dr. Havard and a couple of women that I talked to who went with reconstruction using implants used the term "pump it up". So, I decided to go into iTunes to find songs entitled "Pump it Up". There were almost 100 songs! There were several versions that were remakes by the same artists, which still makes a lot of songs with that title. Actually, though, the song I was thinking of is "Pump up the Jam" by Technotronic. If I can figure out a way to post that tune on this blog, I plan to do it, so that you all can think of me as I undergo "tissue expansion"!!! So, don't be surprised if you see me changing size over the holidays!