Second surgery on ol' lefty is done!

I had surgery on ol’ lefty Thursday morning; round 2. If you’ve been reading me, then you know that I had a mastectomy on the right breast, and what I teasingly call a “half-ectomy” on the left. Due to the area where they took the lump from the left side, the nipple pointed down and to the left. And, no, I promise I won’t tell any more jokes about it being all embarrassed, and how the “twins” are fighting with each other & making my life intolerable.

Anyway, they did a breast lift, and so far, it looks like it’s evened the girls up. Next, after I heal, they’ll put a nipple on the bionic, baby Barbie boob. Hopefully, that’s IT for surgeries due to this damned disease!

I have to be honest – I’m a little surprised by how painful this was. Dr. Topham had said that the implant surgery (the first to try to even me out) was more painful, so I was taken by surprise. After the last implant surgery, I needed additional pain meds, so I decided to be pro-active this time. I asked them to write for more, since they can’t phone them in. Plus, it’s an hour & 15 minute drive to the doctor’s office in Philly, & I wasn’t in the mood to make that trip for a prescription – even if I was really hurting. I tried to make the original script last, but honestly, it was difficult. I was happy that I’d asked for the additional medicine; we filled it. But, on the bright side, I don’t think I’ll be needing all of it for this surgery. I should be good by Wednesday & just be on aspirin.

The reason I bring this up is that I NEVER ask for more medicine before going home from surgery. I usually try to make do with whatever I’ve been given – and I’ve suffered. I guess I’m finally at the point where I’ve had more surgeries than I care to have had in the past two & a half years. I’m to the point where I know myself, and I know the possibilities of how much I’m going to suffer. I’m done doing it. And that’s why I’m telling you about it. If YOU, like me, have been mousy about asking for help with pain – knock it off! This stuff hurts and it’s no picnic. You’re not going to become a junky; don’t feel ashamed for asking for medicine. If you need to reach for a pill – reach for it. Don’t let the stigma of taking narcotics make you suffer.

The road we’ve traveled has been hard, difficult, hopeful, sometimes funny, often times frustrating, terrifying, full of inspirational people as well as those that aren’t quite so inspirational, sometimes silly, frequently embarrassing, and the list goes on. We’ve experienced more emotions in a few years than some people experience in their lives. Heck, our loved ones have experienced them as well, no matter how hard we try to shield them. Please don’t add misery without help intrude on an already difficult journey. Speak up!

 I hope that if you’re just starting out on this journey, this blog has been helpful. I hope I’ve told you what to expect as you go on. I hope that you know you aren’t alone. I hope that if you need to reach out, you’ll contact me. If not me, someone. This is not a journey that is best taken alone.

But most of all, I hope that I’ve given you a small bit of comfort, and maybe a smile. Laugh when you glue your eyes together trying on a pair of false eyelashes or when you almost blind yourself trying to take a picture of them growing in. Giggle the first time your wig goes askew or flies off in a good wind. If something strikes you funny while you’re sitting at chemo, laugh! Strike up a conversation with those around you; I did. And boy, did I meet some amazing women and heard some fascinating stories.

No matter what, life is what we make of it. This cancer thing sucks – hard. And it isn’t easy. Still, I hope that as you go on, you find the humor in it. It gets better. I’m living proof.

Happy Mother's Day!! Here's a video that my kids presented me with; but I'm not proud or anything!!

The Hat Song

I’m Still Here, just busy!!

Sorry for not writing in a while; just want to let you know that I’m alright. Things have been crazy. I’ll update you with what’s going on with my boobs first. Men, if you’re squeamish about reading about my boobs, I’ve sectioned off that part so you can skip over it. OK?

Lots of boring boob talk – men, feel free to skip:

When I last wrote, I told you that the saline implant in ol’ lefty doesn’t match my new bionic, baby, Barbie boob (also known as ol’ righty). One of Dr. Topham’s interns actually asked me, with a straight face, if I’d prefer to have them reduce the size of the new Barbie boob rather than try to increase the left one. I almost slapped him.

Here’s the thing; I’ve gone through life with medium sized boobs (also known as a B cup). After having one removed and half of the other taken, I was bound and determined to know what a C cup looked like – on me. So when Skippy dropped that ridiculous bomb shell, I actually laughed out loud. And then I realized that he was serious. Thoughts of tackling him came to mind, but instead, I managed to compose myself. I figured I’d show my petulance in prose (awesome sentence right? Took me about half hour using the thesaurus and the dictionary to come up with that one!).

I explained, through gritted teeth, that there was NO WAY I was going to have my brand new perky Barbie boob that was even bigger than a C cup, reduced. In fact, the only way that a scalpel was coming anywhere near Barbie was if, like its predecessor, it tried to kill me. So, now I’m going to have another surgery – hopefully, my last.

The thing is, the implant on ol’ lefty seems to have traveled – to under my arm. So now the nipple is not only looking down, it’s looking to the left. It’s a very sad thing to see and I try to give it a pep talk every now and then to cheer it up. And I meant, literally hoping it would perk up – vertically. Sadly, it still hangs its head in shame.

Soooooo, up next, appointment with Dr. Topham. Now, going to be honest here. LOVE Barbie boob, kind of annoyed that I have to have surgery once again to try to even the two girls out. If things don’t go well – again – then I think my next move will be to go see my original booby daddy, Dr. Morrissey. Bonus, he’s just a 20 minute drive away as opposed to the hour & a half it takes to get to Philly. Here's a reminder about what he looks like:

My appointment is this Friday, April 27^th. I’ll let you know when the next surgery is scheduled for! Keep your fingers crossed.

Boob talk over men, you may resume reading!

The miracle that is my son, Dakota:

The reason I had to reschedule my appointment with Dr. Topham was that Dakota was at Children’s Hospital – for the third time in 6 months. That sucks, but the good part about it is that he’s alive. He was born with a very rare, severe birth defect called, “Pentalogy of Cantrell”. It’s comprised of 5 defects – holes in the heart, missing the outer covering of the heart (pericardium), cleft sternum, holes in his diaphragm, and a large omphaloceale (stomach doesn’t close – intestines & part of his liver grew outside his body). It’s almost always a death sentence. In fact, Matt & I have only located 15 other survivors. He was stabilized at St. Luke’s in Bethlehem, then taken to St. Christopher’s Hospital for children where the diagnosis was made.

It’s the omphaloceale that keeps sending him to the hospital with bowel obstructions. When he was three, we went thru the “summer from Hell”, where he had three bowel obstructions resulting in one surgery for the obstructions and it was also determined that he had a hernia. He had another surgery that summer.

The thing is, we never knew that bowel obstructions were common after omphaloceales. The first time it happened, I just thought he had a stomach flu. We rushed him to his pediatrician, who sent us to Grand View. That’s where he was air lifted to Children’s Hospital. Before they left with him the nurse told me to kiss him goodbye. I don’t remember exactly how she put it, but she basically made no promises that he’d survive the flight. Scary stuff.

If we hadn’t lived in the Philadelphia area and had not one, but two of the best children’s hospitals in the world, Dakota would not be alive. Period.

Writing news.

My latest that’s running in Patch is about not having a clue about abbreviations used in texting. Here's the link:

Have U Mastered Txting Shorthand?

Next up, I’m going to post an article that was written by someone who is disillusioned with Susan G. Komen. It’s very eye opening. Look for that in the next few days!

Before I let you go, thank you. Thank you for taking the time to read about me, keeping up with what’s been going on, and for your prayers. I love the emails as well. I’m very, very lucky to have people, many who I don’t know, check in on my progress.

Thank you so much.

New Boobies are here!

Boy, have I been remiss! Things around here have been crazy, so I haven’t posted in a few weeks. I’d wanted to post right after my visit with my oncologist, Dr. Nakajima. I’ll write more about that after I tell you about my new boob surgery. If you’ve got some time, I’ll give you the update!

First, thankfully, my column is doing well. You can read my latest about Valentine’s Day here.

Secondly, the reconstruction process. I’d told you about the right side, and how they took fat & tissue from my lower abdomen to fashion a new, and quite breath taking, boobie! All it needs is for the scars to fade and then we’ll slap a nipple on that bad boy & it’ll be good as new.

I had surgery, which I told you about in my last post, on the left side. They had taken about half of that breast, but left the nipple & stuff. However, now that ol’ righty is looking good, I kind of wanted them to match. Call me crazy.

Here’s me directly after surgery – no makeup on. I’ve never in my adult life allowed anyone other than my family (and of course surgeons & nurses) to see me without it. You can now see why. I promise, though, I don’t have a double chin. I had my shoulder up, cradling the left boob so it looks like I’m HUGE. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no skinny little thing. Still, my face isn’t that bloated looking. I think I'd been awake for about half hour at this point.

Hey, I posted a photo after surgery – I’m allowed to be a little defensive about it. Right? Anyways, here it is; don’t hurl:

 

Dr. Topham inserted a saline implant under the muscle on that side, hoping that would be all I’d need to balance the girls out. Unfortunately, the left nipple is still looking at the floor, which is weird, but mostly sad. It looks like it’s depressed. Dr. Topham said that it’s because of how much was taken out of it, and then when they sutured me, it kind of sealed the deal.

So, what does that mean? Another round of surgery for me! Woo Hoo! They’re going to do something called a mastopexy, which is the big, doctorfied way to say breast lift. I’ve looked it up, but I still don’t understand. They’re going to make an incision around the nipple and vertically below. How in the world do you lift something up from the bottom? I guess I thought that the incision would be on top of the breast. I have visions of them putting little jacks under my boob & using hydraulics to lift it up. But I’ll ask Dr. Topham & get back to you on that.

I went to see Dr. Nakajima, my oncologist. He’s such a nice man; and he’s cute, but I don’t think he knows it. I wanted to take a photo of him, and he insisted that everyone in the office be in it. He said that it’s not just him who takes care of me – isn’t that adorable??? Thing was, I was running late & left my camera on the kitchen counter. Not to be deterred, I took a few with my Blackberry.

Here’s the thing – I can’t take a clear picture of a snail taking a nap under normal conditions. But with a phone camera, the odds were really stacked against me.

The irony that I have a daughter who owns a photography studio and runs around taking pictures for a living has NOT escaped me here!

Still, I took about 4 photos, which in the view finder, looked OK. I got them home and plugged them into the computer and sat staring at 4 unbelievably fuzzy pictures. You could make out the faces, but it was kind of like one of those Magic Eye photos. Ugh. So, I’ll be sure to bring my camera with me when I see him in a few months.

Since I’m now the big 50, we need to determine if I should stay on Tamoxifen. From my understanding, after cancer & chemo, your ovaries stop working. Still, that doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re in menopause. So since I wasn’t menopausal (is it just me, or does that sound an awfully lot like homicidal?), I was put on Tamoxifen. If the blood work shows that I’ve now slid headfirst into menopause, they have to change the medicine. I’m really not sure of all the particulars, but I trust Dr. Nakajima.

In order to test me, however, I have to stop taking the Tamoxifen for 2 weeks, then have my blood drawn & tested. That’s how they’ll find out if I’m undergoing “the change”!

That sounds like I’m turning into some type of beast. Although, from some horror stories that I’ve heard, that may be what it is – yikes!

Anyway, if it looks like I’m changing, I’ll have to take another drug called Arimidex. At least I think that’s what Dr. Nakajima said.

So there you have the update in a nutshell. 

As for my career, I'm kind of up in the air if I want to still keep writing "real" journalist stories for Allentown Examiner. I kind of want to, since it was because of that job that I got to meet Donovan McNabb & Scott Palmer. This year, I want to interview Michael Vick at training camp. Even though I work for another "real" paper, I don't have press credentials with them; I'm just a dumb columnist. I guess now that I've written it down, I'm pretty much leaning with actual work - for once. 

Necessity may be the mother of invention, but laziness is her red headed stepchild who occasionally comes down from the attic to actually do something. I guess it's time to lower the stairs.

Holy Crap!

K, before I toddle off to bed, I checked out the description that my blog was given. I swear, I didn't write this; apparently one of my readers sent this in. Anyways, here it is:

The Brunette Lucy

Directory: www.breastcancerblogs.org

Description: This writer refers to herself as dark-haired version of the famed comedienne to lighten the dour mood of her cancer writing. She uses a casual confessional tone to great effect.

This is making me feel something foreign - flattered. THANK YOU to whomever submitted this!! Write me at my email, tamkells@gmail.com, & let me know who you are. As Ricky Ricardo would say, "You've got some 'splainin' to do!" 

Seriously, though, thank you. I'm truly, truly humbled.

Update!

Hi, Everyone,

Yet again, I'm behind! Sorry! I have an article that I'm writing to describe the reconstruction process, which I'll post soon. 

I want to say, again, that if your doctor recommends a mastectomy, please consider it! It was a hard decision (I wrote about that in Mastectomy  - the hardest, and probably best, decision I ever made), but it was the best decision for me. Having a breast removed is hands down one of the worst things a woman can hear; my stomach hit the floor. BUT, these days, they can do amazing things! My plastic surgeon is Dr. Neal Topham of Fox Chase Cancer Center - I wrote about him in "New boobies are coming, new boobies are coming" (you can see a photo of him in that article). He's very quiet, but he does amazing work! I thought that due to all the surgeries I'd had on my abdomen due to c-sections and endometriosis I wouldn't be a candidate for the TRAM flap. Most other surgeons would have agreed - not Dr. Topham. You should SEE my new boob! It's awesome. Plus, I got a tummy tuck. So there really, truly is light at the end of the tunnel. I'll post the full, in depth process in about a week. 

Also, my column is going crazy! People are actually reading my drivel. It's a Festivus for the Rest of Us miracle. My latest one, "Would you Buy a Smart Car" has lit up the comment sections in all the cities I'm being carried. I've provided the link to Upper Southampton, where a guy was really a snot. I thought the girl that he tried to lambast made him look like a troll. Good for her!

OK, back to laying down & moaning. I had an implant put in ol' lefty on Thursday, and it feels like my rib is broken. Besides, moaning & groaning is one of the few things I do with such staggering efficiency. Will write more.


PS Did you SEE that BreastCancerBlogs.Org gave me a badge for being one of the best breast cancer blogs? Folks, this is a sad state of affairs when people are giving ME any type of award, badge, or recognition. It only encourages me to write more drivel. Well, anyways, now me & my big swollen head are off to bed to continue the aforementioned moaning and groaning.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Sorry I haven’t written; my son, Dakota has been in and out of Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia that last two months. He’s fine now, but naturally, he’s really nervous about recurrence. I’ll write more about it later.

Today, I just want to wish all of you a very Merry Christmas & to ask that you remember to say a prayer for our troops. Many of them won’t be home today to celebrate with their families. God Bless them!