Episode 16 - A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer Happy summer! It has been a minute since I’ve posted, and I thought I’d check in, and let you know what’s going on these days. A lot has changed, but some things remain the same - just life, I guess! Let me tell you what changes I have embraced for 2025. In late December of last year, I was thrilled to find my cancer so stable as to be virtually undetectable, with the original tumor having shrunk to nearly nothing, and no new lesions, or activity with any of the others. As I approached the 4 year mark since getting the dreaded diagnosis, this was surprising, and delightful news, indeed. Not only were the scan and blood test results great, but I had also begun to feel stronger, less fragile, and more physically resilient. I knocked wood, and embraced the notion I might b...
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Episode 15 - A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer Hello again! I hope you all survived this crazy winter, and your spring is off to a great beginning. I’m still here, and after the lovely health report I got at the New Year, hoping to remain so for the foreseeable future. While I’m enthusiastic and hopeful, I know I must remain present for the day to day stuff. The dumb, boring, but essential day to day stuff that I must do - and what all of us with this diagnosis must do - to stay strong, stay hydrated, and stay on top of the meds, procedures, and treatments designed to keep the cancer at bay. I am also concentrating on staying aware of new information, as well as on being a strong advocate for myself. This is the direction I will be taking today, and I hope you will benefit from what I’ve just recently learned and experienced. For the last four year...
A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer - Episode 14 Hello, hello and Happy New Year! I hope all you listening have had a splendid holiday season - I have! Not only have I enjoyed family and friends for both Christmas Eve, and the first night of Chanukah, but I also received from the gods of health an unexpected holiday gift. Last year at this time, I was busy jumping through hoops at the Cancer Institute getting a myriad of scans, blood tests, and doctor’s visits to determine whether it was time to surgically remove the original tumor in my right breast. Well, as I reported then, after all that sturm und drang, it was determined I should hang tight, and revisit the issue in a year. So! Here it is a year later and ANOTHER round of tests and visits was required. Just two weeks ago I had a breast MRI; ultrasound; 2 manual exams; two blood tests; a CT scan; and a full body scan. After all the results came in, I had a consult with both my oncologist, and surge...
A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer - Episode 13 Well! It feels as though I have been away for an epoch or two, but glad to be back. Since last time, I have been busy, busy, busy with life stuff. I am delighted to report I have moved to a pretty new place, and am settling in nicely. And, yes, the process was just awful, as moving always is. Still, I survived, and on to better things. I have also been happily involved with a local Seattle organization near and dear to my heart, and want to tell you about them, and how I came to know them. Two years ago, I was, due to a change in my health insurance, forced to leave the original oncologist treating me. Not surprising, this move was wrenching, at first, and left me pretty raw. However,...
Episode 12 - A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer Well, it has been a minute, but I am back. I must confess, I have been ducking this one for weeks, and have only just figured out why this, particular installment should be so difficult for me to write, and share. Shame. Just pure and simple shame. Why? Because the topic is the financial impact I, and many other women, are facing due to this lovely disease. But, why the shame? Ah, why, indeed. At this stage of life, I really “should” be in better shape, economically. I should have a lovely nest egg, savings, stock, a house — you know — all the trappings of a responsible woman facing her...
Episode 11 - A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer Hello again! Early March, already! My, time does motor on when you finally get past the free floating anxiety you’ve been needlessly embracing since early December. Huh. Who knew? Yeah, well. So! When last I posted, I’d found out I did NOT, in fact, have to endure a lumpectomy/mastectomy. And, me being me, was conflicted about it, and felt illogically blue about the whole thing. Well, I’m over that. No surgery! No disfigurement! No painful recovery! Yay! On to the next. What else should I worry about? Ah, what else, indeed. Well, I will tell you. As I have reported to you many times, one of the chief hallmarks of this stupid disease is uncertainty. You just never know when that Damocles sword you’ve got hanging over your pretty scrolled iron bed is gonna fall — in one way or ...
Episode 10 - A Day in the Life with Metastatic Breast Cancer Ah, here we are now in the first days of February. I promised I’d be back to let you know what was going on with respect to the surgery/no surgery situation I was waiting on last time I was here. Well! The only thing I can report, after sitting on the razor’s edge of anxiety, and apprehension since early December is…not a lot. And so it goes. As a recap, in early December, scans suggested some changes, but that I might be a good candidate to have the original breast lesion removed. My oncologist let me know she had already spoken with her surgeon partner, and they wanted to pursue a lumpectomy, as a way to forestall any future spread, and negate need for additional (read painful) chemo treatment. All I needed to do was have a breast MRI...