I love ladybugs, by Judy

No, not for any international adoption reasons. For a very special, personal reason.

I was reminded of why I love ladybugs when I read Susan’s post, Signs of hope.

It takes me back to a day in the Fall of 2007 — September and October — when I was getting radiation treatment for my Inflammatory Breast Cancer. I had already had six months of once/week intensive chemotherapy and was still getting once/week of one kind of drug via chemotherapy. I had had a mastectomy in August 2007. I was then in an intense radiation treatment. All of these treatments were done in the hopes of saving my life from an aggressive and rare type of breast cancer, one that I unfortunately already had in Stage IV. I went through the year not knowing if I would live or die.

I was in the last part of my radiation. Radiation doesn’t have the side effects that chemo does, but it does have its own side effects, mainly of being tired and of getting very burned where you’re being radiated. I was burned, very burned. I’m fair skinned and burn easily in the sun. The radiation was burning me so badly that the area was getting severely burned. I was tired, scared about my future, and sad. I was basically just downright weary.

I had my radiation treatments in the afternoon, and one particular afternoon after treatment, I went to JC Penny on the spur of the moment. I parked my car, but I didn’t get out of it right away. I was so tired, so weary that I sighed as I put the car into gear and sat for a moment, building up my strength to go into the store.

Just then a ladybug flew through the window, and landed on my left chest, right where I was getting the radiation. And it stayed. I don’t know how long it stayed there, but longer than I would have anticipated. I was quiet and still. I watched when the ladybug flew away, and whispered a quiet “thank you.”

I felt a peace come over me after that. Oh, I’m not saying that the peace has stayed with me since then. But at that moment, that ladybug, in legend said to be lucky, helped bring me peace.

As this site says:

Nearly ALL cultures believe that a Ladybug is lucky.
Killing one is said to bring sadness and misfortune.

I don’t think I survived just because that ladybug landed on me. I think many things — God, good medicine, a great medical team — contributed to my survival.

But that day, that ladybug did bring me luck in the form of peace of mind.
__________________________________________________

Cross-posted to Just Enjoy Him.

Signs of hope

(by Susan, diagnosed with a recurrence of inflammatory or infiltrating breast cancer and locoregional metastasis in March 2010.)

Way back in 2003, I was deeply involved in animal rescue, fostering beagles and helping them become ready for new homes.  I did telephone interviews, homechecks, ran an online auction site, and participated on an email list for beagle owners.

One of the contributors to the I-BARC listserve was a man named Bruce, who lived alone with four beagles who he doted on.  One day, he lost his first dog, a beloved little beagle named Duncan.  Duncan’s death just about broke Bruce’s heart, and he talked about it online with his friends, who understood and provided support.  Bruce grieved deeply, talking about the loss of his little friend, not knowing how he would move past his grief.  It was my first brush with public grief, and I grieved along with him, as did we all, for we were learning that an internet listserve could be a very tight community.

Then, one day, the tone of his posts changed, and he told the list about the everyday magic of a bright yellow butterfly that visited him as he took the beagles out to the back yard.  The butterfly lingered longer than most, flitting around as if to be sure that Bruce noticed him, and staying longer than he should.  Bruce took this as a sign of hope, a message from his lost Duncan, and at that moment he knew that he would be okay.

As a scientist, I admit I scoffed.  Quietly.  But as a person with a heart, I was so relieved that no matter the source, Bruce had received comfort that day, and that he took the passing of the yellow butterfly as reassurance that Duncan was at peace, that he didn’t want Bruce to worry, and that Bruce would turn the corner and his heart would begin to heal.  I was amazed as over the next weeks it did.  Bruce’s tone became cheerier and cheerier, and he began to delight in the antics of his other beagles, coo over the list’s puppies, and celebrate adoptions with the rest of us.

I told you that to tell you this.

The week of my surgery, a pair of doves moved into our garage.  They laid eggs, tended the nest, and raised their babies until they were able to fly on their own.  We watched them from a distance, feeling comfort that our home was peaceful enough for doves to thrive in as lowly a place as the garage.  We parked in the driveway, tiptoed in and out of the house, and saved the “brrm-brrms” of the boys’ trucks for the sidewalk.  When the baby doves began to fly, they came around the house into the back yard, and they took practice flight after practice flight across the yard as my children and I sat on a blanket and watched them, amazed that they would do all this so near to us.

Not two days later, another mama dove moved into the nest in the garage.  She and her partner laid eggs, kept them warm, and hatched another pair of baby doves in that same nest.  They’ve been growing and growing, and the mama dove chirped to her babies from the driveway, coaxing them out of the nest, this weekend.  They took practice flights to the windowsill and back, finally moving out late Sunday afternoon.

On Monday morning, my husband and I went to Sloan-Kettering for a second opinion on our treatment.  We’ve been worrying over it for weeks.  We were gone all day and into the night.  I’ll tell you more about it in my next post, but I will tell you this.  When I left for radiation Tuesday morning (#19 of 35), two young bunnies emerged from a hole in our small pile of wood chips (where our giant maple used to be) in the front yard.  They hopped a few feet, looked at me, and sat down, as if to tell me that they were moving in.  And for reasons I can’t quite explain, I not only heard the message, I felt reassured.  I went to radiation surrounded by a sense of calm acceptance, and I daydreamed through the treatment.

I’ve been having a lot of trouble blogging this cancer, as I feel much more private this time.  I want to keep talking about it if it helps others, but I’m not interested in blogging for sympathy.  I need to be a big girl about this, and keep my mind on other projects in order to finish them up and to not get dragged down in the pit of questions (is my cancer metastatic? is it a recurrence? is it a new stage 3 cancer? why am i so lucky as to get three cancers in three years? what did i do to deserve this?).  You know this, as I haven’t been posting every day like I did last time, and I don’t always talk directly about the experience.   But today this was on my mind and my heart.

We don’t know what causes cancer like mine.  We don’t know why some cancers respond to treatment and some cancers don’t.  We don’t know a lot about it.  As always, I am hopeful for research to make breakthroughs that will help cure my disease and prevent others from developing inflammatory breast cancer.  I work to raise awareness of the symptoms, to encourage people to join the ACS Cancer Action Network and to sign up for studies through the National Institutes of Health or the Love/Avon Army of Women, and to raise money by supporting Relay for Life.  But some days, like today, it is enough for me to fight my cancer as the doctors tell me, to love on my children, and to take hope from everyday miracles like the constant company of small creatures.

Crossposted at Toddler Planet.

Burned, through and through.

(by Susan, diagnosed with a recurrence of inflammatory or infiltrating breast cancer and locoregional metastasis in March 2010.)

18 radiation treatments down, 17 to go.

I’ve committed to treating this part of treatment as no big deal, just part of my morning routine, but the truth is, it makes me tired. big time. I can still get out and about once a day, if I rest, but I am so tired afterwards.

My chest is turning red as well, slowly, so slowly, as if I were out in the sun on a summer day at the beach — but then I keep going back and doing it again! Every. Day.

I want to show you a picture of what it looks like inside the treatment room, and on my chest, but I’m sure I’d run into decency laws along the way, so I won’t. if you’re curious, though, here’s how it is for me.

Radiation treatments are always carefully planned and targeted so that the tumor is attacked but the lungs and heart are, mostly, spared. (You do have to watch that, though — a woman I volunteer with through the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Action Network told me yesterday about the damage to her heart she sustained during radiation, called pericarditis, that will trouble her forever.). Although some women have spot radiation, the area, in my case, is large. How large? Hmmm.

Imagine yourself standing in front of a full-length mirror. Yes, naked. Sorry about that. Put your finger on the little bone in the middle of your chest, between your ribs and under your sternum. Yep, the zyphoid process. (Don’t say I never taught you anything!). Move your hand one inch to the left. Now, take a tape measure and stretch it from this spot in the center of your chest under your breasts if you have ‘em, and stretch it around under your arm and to the back. Nine inches. Make a little mark here. Sure, with Sharpie. The radiation techs dot me with Sharpie every day, so it’s probably not a carcinogen.

Then go back to that funny little bone called the ziphoid process and stretch the measuring tape up towards the neck seven inches. You probably don’t want to mark this one with a Sharpie, as it would show like mine do above the neckline of my tops.

That’s the area I get radiated each day. 9 inches by seven inches, front and center, under the armpit, and around the back.

It burns clear through.

I know this, now, because my back is red and blistering, burned as badly as my front. I was surprised by this, as it didn’t happen last time, until my radiation oncologist said, “Well, Susan, the radiation is 6 to 10 million volts.”

Oh.

So my front and back are somewhat red, with blisters on the back, and deep red crinkly skin under my armpits, which are thoroughly blasted from four different angles.

It’s not that bad, but it is something.

Any questions?

Crossposted at Toddler Planet.

Mothers With Cancer

Welcome to Mothers With Cancer, a group blog written by twenty women who are mothering through cancer and surviving to write about it.  Whether you are here to read, learn, or discuss diagnosis, chemotherapy, radiation, surgeries, metastasis, mothering through treatment, survivorship, side effects, or anything else about life as a mother and a cancer survivor, we welcome you.  Use the categories on the right menu to choose a topic or the top menu to find resources — and please leave comments on the posts to encourage our writers and survivors.  We’re here for you.

my breast reconstruction, by Judy

It can take a looong time, but it will certainly be worth it in the end.

I’m in the midst of breast reconstruction. I had a mastectomy of my left breast in Aug. 2008, followed by radiation in Sept. and Oct. of 2008. I was told to wait a year after radiation to start any breast reconstruction process.

So I did. I waited a year, then saw a plastic surgeon I like to call Dr. Boobala (nope, not his real name) and have been seeing him for almost a year now. I had my initial consultation in early Sept. 2009 and had my first surgery on Oct. 12, 2009. That surgery was a latissimus dorsi flap breast reconstruction. That involved taking muscle from my back and moving it to my chest, forming a small breast mound. There wasn’t enough to make a full-sized breast, so I then had another surgery on March 15. That surgery was to reduce Righty and put a tissue expander into Lefty. Dr. Boobala did it that way because he didn’t think he’d be able to make Lefty as big as Righty (the remaining breast) . . . and that was fine with me. I don’t care that much about the size of the breasts; I mainly didn’t want to deal with prostheses anymore and wanted a breast back. Losing a breast was harder for me than I initially thought it would be.

After healing from the implant/reduction surgery, Dr. Boobala started the “fill” process. Every week since March 31, I’ve gone into the office, and they’ve “filled” my expander with saline. This stretches out my skin so that, when there’s enough skin, I’ll wait for six weeks, then have another surgery to put a permanent implant in.

Dr. Boobala recently told me that he might not be able to get Lefty to quite the same size as Righty, so if I want, I can have Righty reduced even more at the same time that they put the implant into Lefty.

After all of that, I’ll have to have another small surgery to form a nipple and aereola.

It’s quite a process, as you can see, but I already feel better about myself, not having to use a prosthesis and having two breasts, even if one of them keeps getting “inflated” each week. I think we’re almost done with the fills — maybe two or three more of those, but I’m not sure about that. At any rate, once those are done, I’ll take six weeks off to let the skin settle at its new size. Then I’ll have the surgery to put an implant in Righty and I’ll go ahead and get Lefty reduced again if needed and if insurance covers it.

So. There’s the story of my Righty and Lefty. I’ll admit, I’m getting tired of going to Dr. Boobala’s office each week, but that’s really a minor complaint. As I tell them when they say “back for more torture next week!”,

I’ve been through much worse.

And no, there will be no pictures of the new boobs. Well, Dr. Boobala will have those, but I certainly won’t be sharing any. *ahem*

Heh.