Update on Mom - August 25, 2008

Hello Family and Friends,

It's been a little over a month since Rebecca's surgery, and she just keeps getting better. She is my hero, my best friend, my love, my strength. I can't express enough how much I admire her, and though she thinks she leaned on me during this test, how much I lean on her now. She is truly beautiful and strong.

Rebecca has made marvelous progress in her health. Although the initial surgery went very well, and the results gave us the best news we could have possibly hoped for (she is now cancer-free!!!), she did have one speed-bump after surgery.

Nine days after the lumpectomy, Rebecca had an artery start leaking. "Leaking" may be an understatement, because she immediately began swelling up within about 30 minutes. At 2:30am sudden swelling and pain can be particularly disconcerting. But, it was even more so because we were, at that time, on a much-needed family vacation in Virginia. We had to take her to an unfamiliar emergency room at an unfamiliar hospital in an unfamiliar town to be treated by an unfamiliar surgeon. By that afternoon, Rebecca had to have emergency surgery to go back into the area of her lumpectomy to repair the damaged artery. Fortunately, it went very well -- and the doctors and nurses were great -- and she was back at the hotel resting that night.
We were able to finish our trip and enjoy the rest of our time with Alyssa -- though at a little more leisurely pace.

Since then, Rebecca has been improving greatly -- mostly healed now and swelling almost back to normal. Most of her energy has also returned, and she has gone back to work. Her hair is even growing back -- it's out between and quarter inch or half inch now! I think Rebecca is every bit as beautiful with this new hair as she was before we "buzzed" her about 6 months ago.

She seems to have two lingering symptoms, though, from all of the chemo and other treatments. She still has a lot of insomnia (despite some sleeping aids), and a lot of pain in her hips (similar to that experiened during chemo and the "day-after" neulasta shot). The doctors don't seem to be very concerned about the insomnia -- though it's very frustrating for Rebecca. Perhaps she is just having anxiety about the next phase (radiation) or my current unemployed status now (which gives me a lot of insomnia, too). The hip pain is apparently a somewhat common side effect that the doctors said could last a while.

Regardless, Rebecca is a good sport, and really doesn't let it affect her spirit and attitude.

After we returned from vacation, Rebecca was recommended by her Huntsman surgeon to go to a unique massage therapist, who helped showed us techniques for improving the recovery and drainage of Rebecca's lymphatic system. This seemed to help reduce swelling fairly quickly and relax her somewhat.

Today, Rebecca starts the last phase of her treatment -- radiation. Initially this gave her the most consternation during this entire journey -- because of the horrible experience her mother had with radiation well over 20 years ago. However, techniques and treatments have gotten dramatically better since then, and most of her concerns have been addressed. Today is the final "fitting" session, in which the radiation oncologist prepares everything for the 15-minute treatments Rebecca will have every day (except weekends) for the next 33 days starting tomorrow.

As tedious as this will become, we are thankful to be in the final phase and know that she is cancer free. The only side effects we expect are loss of energy and tiredness, and possible redness/burning (like sunburn). Virtually no one gets sick or loses hair anymore like they did 20 years ago.

A logical question is why does Rebecca need to have radiation at all if she is cancer-free? "Cancer-free" means that they believe that they have either killed all cancer cells or removed any remaining ones during surgery (that's what "clear margins" means). There is no detectable remnants of any cancer in her body. However, cancer can still recur down the road, particularly in the same breast. Statistically, radiation after lumpectomy has been shown to significantly reduce the risk of recurrence. So, we're basically taking preventive measures -- not treating any remaining or detectable cancer. It's just an "insurance policy", and it's all confined to the same breast. They take special precautions to prevent/minimize radiation exposure to any other part of the body.

I know this has been a long update -- but I hope it helps our friends and family see that we're doing pretyy well, and we're almost through.
Updates will come more slowly now, as things aren't changing as quickly now on the downslope of our journey.

I also hope these updates give hope to any others who might have to take this journey themselves or with loved ones sometime down the road. There is hope -- and we've certainly gained a lot of strength and love from all of you who have supported us on our way. We gained a lot of new friends in the process, and learned to value our former friends more.

Many thanks and much love to you all,

Mark