Recovery

 

I was trying to google a quote that accurately portrayed how my recovery is going. 

Then I stumbled on this beauty. It totally represents how I am feeling. I am super happy the surgery is over but then I try to do my "normal" life things and am reminded that I am still recovering. 

I get asked a lot "How are you feeling?" How much of an answer I give depends on my mood at the time. Sometimes I say, "Good" and leave it at that. Other times, I go into great detail of the whole recovery process. I never know how much people want to know! 

So here are the 'details' of how I am feeling and how recovery is going..if you want to know. :)

Explanation of the Pain Over the Last 10 days

I was not in a huge amount of "pain" right after my surgery, but I was extremely sore. When I had my surgery they did a "peck block" to help numb the nerve endings and that lasted about 48 hours.  I wasn't constantly in pain, but I had a hard time moving around and getting comfortable. My range of motion is limited so getting up off the couch and getting out of bed was difficult because you need to use your peck muscles and arms to do that. I would have painful "zings" that would shoot through my body like electrical jolts here and there and was very achy. I was on a pretty regimented schedule of Tylenol, Ibuprofen and an occasional 1/2 pill of Oxycodone---when I just needed something a little stronger to help numb things. 

Kaden was an awesome nurse and kept track of all my pill intake. I had to keep under a certain amount of milligrams of each medicine per day. He was always writing things down and calculating how much I had and how much I could still take and when I could take my next dose. (See pic below) 

The pain subsided rather quickly. As you can see I only had to supplement with Oxycodone on Tuesday and Wednesday. By Thursday I was down to only Tylenol and Ibuprofen and the doses got lower and further between until Sunday when I took my last dose. 

As for now, the best way I can explain the "pain" I am feeling is just mild soreness. I explain it like, "Have you ever fallen down the stairs awkwardly and caught yourself, but your muscles in your arms, chest and back are sore for the next couple of days?" That's how I feel. Just a deep muscle soreness. 

Or maybe I can liken it to doing "arms and chest day" at the gym and you are sore for the next couple of days after that. It's not like a constant pain, but when you have to move your arms in certain ways, or open a door, or reach for something out of the cupboard, you feel the soreness. 

Each day it lessens, so I am hoping to feel better as time goes on. I told Kaden that at first I was thinking, "Tomorrow I will wake up and be pain free, but I am thinking now it's more like I am slowly crawling out of a hole, with each day feeling a little better than the one before it." 

So although I am not waking up magically pain free, I can feel the gradual difference each day and know it won't be too long where I won't even be thinking about the soreness any more.  

Speaking of waking up, look at my nighttime set up! I have to sleep on my back and propped up for these first couple of weeks so every night when we get into bed, Kaden makes a delightful mountain of pillows for me to sleep on. (Yes that's 4 pillows and one body pillow all strategically placed for my sleeping comfort! Isn't he good to me?)

The last thing I am dealing with is drains. I have two drains on each side of my body. They each look like this: 

The big plastic bulb is outside my body, while the long tube is inserted under my skin to the side of my belly button, up my body, and around my breasts.  It is a slow suction that drains out fluid that my body is making after the surgery. This is so fluid doesn't build up under my skin. They don't hurt at all, but let me tell you, they are super annoying. The bulbs safety pin to my clothes or I have a hoodie with pockets in it and the tubing that is outside my body is semi loose. This makes for interesting bathroom trips, showering, and trying not to get caught on drawers and cabinet knobs. I have to drain each bulb 2 times a day. When my "output" is 24cc's of fluid or less per day for 3 days in a row, they will remove them. One of my drains has already hit that mark, and the other one will be there shortly. It looks like I am on track to have them removed on Tuesday(15th) when I go to my cancer surgeon appointment. (Yay! Happy dance!)

I have been up, moving around, and doing most of my daily activities---although slightly modified adjusting for soreness and the fact that I am not supposed to lift anything heavy for a bit longer. All in all it's pretty textbook and couldn't have asked for a better recovery! 

Results of Genetic Testing 

On December 2, I got a call from the genetic testing counselor. She was calling with my results. I was surprised because I was not expecting them until mid January. She said that the test came back NEGATIVE for all of the 47 gene mutations that they were looking at. This was a HUGE sigh of relief for me and for my girls! Since I am negative, my girls did not inherit the Breast Cancer gene mutation from me! Since Kaden was tested last year and he was negative as well, we know that my kids are 100% in the clear as far as the Breast Cancer Gene mutation goes! Yay!  (Happy dance! Very slow and pathetic happy dance, but happy dance nonetheless! See pic at top of post. Ha!) 

What this means for my girls is that they don't have the genetic mutation that would give them an 85% chance of having breast cancer before they were 70. 

They do however, have an increased "risk" of cancer simply because their mother had it and they will need to start their breast cancer screenings at the age of 31. (10 years before their mother was diagnosed.) 

To put numbers into perspective all women have a 13% chance of getting breast cancer in their lifetime. If having a mom with breast cancer increases your risk by double, it still only brings it to a 26% chance of getting cancer and a 74% chance of not getting breast cancer. 

This just means that by doing earlier screening, if they get breast cancer, the doctors will detect things much earlier, and will increase their survival rate exponentially. So good news all around. 

Results of Pathology

On December 3, I received a call from my Cancer Surgeon's office. They were informing me that the tests on my sentinel node and the other 2 lymph nodes that they took were negative! This means that the cancer was only contained in the duct and that it has NOT spread to any other parts of my body. The even greater news was that this was a surgical cure.  I am cancer free! There is no need to do any follow up chemotherapy or radiation!! (Very happy but slow happy dance!) 

What Does All This Mean?

I am extremely grateful for this news, and yet, there is a part of me that feels so sad for others who don't have the great news that I got. Maybe it's a bit of survivors guilt? I had researched all of the "possibilities" of treatments that I might have as a breast cancer patient, and to be honest, they are scary as hell. 

Over the last couple of days I have had thoughts like, "Why me?" "Why was I spared, when there are so many who are not?" "What am I supposed to do with this?" "Am I supposed to go do something great now--live for some greater purpose?" It's like Spiderman says "Great power comes with great responsibility." "What am I going to be responsible for?!" "How do I make up for the fact that I don't have to endure what others did and do?" And last but certainly not least, "Can I even live up to that kind of responsibility?"

I don't know why some people have to endure more for their cancer treatments than others. One conclusion I came to is that cancer doesn't discriminate. It is random. It is no respecter of persons. It does not care if you are old, young, black, white, male, female, etc etc etc. It comes if it wants. I can't control the situation and "what if-ing" doesn't help either. People are cured of cancer in many different ways. Just as random as it comes, it goes. The much harder way does not diminish the "easier" way. We do not need to get caught up in a game of, as Brene Brown calls it, "comparative suffering." 

We all have our trials, and believe me, amputating part of my body was not easy. Nor is someone's chemo treatment without a mastectomy easy. Nor is someone's treatment who has to have a mastectomy and chemo easy. It's all hard. No one needs to compare their suffering and say things like, "Well, yeah it was hard, but 'so and so' had it harder, so therefore, I shouldn't complain." We need to allow ourselves to acknowledge the suffering, but not let it take us down. So that is what I will do. Acknowledge that this was a crazy weird experience and try not to sort out the underlying message that the "cosmos" are trying to teach me. I am not going to figure out the meaning of life through all of this, and no one is expecting me to. 

I am not sure what life has in store for me. I can't say what I am going to do, or if I am even up for the task, but I do know this, I am grateful. Grateful that I get to live without this cancer cloud over my head. Grateful that I get to see my kids graduate, get married, and that I get to snuggle my future grand babies. Grateful that I am blessed with an amazing family and support system of friends and neighbors who have done nothing but reach out and show me what true love is. Not to get too philosophical, but it is not lost on me that all of this is happening during the time of year where we give thanks to others, and then go right into a holiday season where we are to focus on the Savior, someone who we owe the greatest thanks of all to, and who we try to emulate. 

I am reminded of the scripture in 1 John 4:8 where it says, "God is love." I have seen His hand of love through family support. I have seen his love through the support of loving neighbors and friends who have so graciously offered service to me. I have seen His love through random phone calls and texts from friends old and new. I have seen His love through His constant guidance and protection over me and my family as we have had some tough decisions to make in a relatively short amount of time. And I have felt His love through the peace that comes in the moments when I feel down, scared, and confused. 

So, while I am not saying, "Everything happens for a reason," maybe, just maybe, I can find some lesson in all of this. :)