National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc.

Last I wrote, I was trying to decide whether to have a mastectomy or lumpectomy. Surgeon was not positive my DCIS was in fact insitu. There was suspicion of some possible early micro invasion. I did my due dillegence and went to 2 different plastic surgeons in the Boca Raton area ( this town has a thousand plastic surgeons that do boobs). My surgeon recommended 2 that she thought I would like and she highly recommended. I must tell all of you that if you are thinking of mastectomy - reconstrustion today is so good, don't hesitate as to what you will look like. When I came out of one of the pastic surgeons office - there was a group of 6 women waiting to see the doctor. All had mastectomies with reconstruction. All were laughing it up telling their stories and loving their new perky breasts. I was almost convinced I should do it since my surgeon told me I had busy boobs and would always be manufacturing something - mostly benign stuff but....??? After lots of soul searching, I decided to go the lumpectomy route with radiation and tamoxifen for 5 years.

My surgery was on feb 28th. My recovery has been great and my female breast surgeon did a great job. Lymph nodes were free and clear of any cancer as well. Now the kicker....the pathology report from the surgery showed no signs of cancer cells. Lots of other benign stuff but no cancer! It was confirmed by another pathologist at Vancderbuilt Cancer center. It is possible the cancer was removed at time of initial biopsy. To be sure , I had another breast MRI last Thursday - I am anxiously waiting for the result of that. Hopefully - nothing new will show up that the surgeon missed. At a minimum, I will need to take tamoxifen. I may escape radiation. The wait is always the hardest.

I am very lucky I self examined and discovered my cancer early. When I made my decision to only have a lumpectomy, I promised myself not to look back. That's the best advice I can give anyone. If you choose to have a mastectomy electively- reconstruction today is great - don't look back. I will post another journal when I get the MRI results.