Please check if you have my email address, wtg. (Unsure where to look for confirmation as I haven't mastered use of this site - i.e., for PMs - so just tell me here.
Hmm. Just realized you could only write (if true) "Yes, I have it", and I won't know whether it's the right one. Guess I need to figure out the site's mechanics a bit more.
Aha! Better late than never. Poking around a bit, I DID discover the icons upper right, and one led to wtg's much appreciated query about my health and indication that others wondered too. (Still don't know how to send messages via PM but at least I see I can get such things as email confirmations by clicking on the "A" topmost right! A for Amanda perhaps.)
And I will take this opportunity to reply to your inquiry, though perhaps it would have been less wordy to report on a separate thread.
I guess the concern (thank you) in reference to the breast cancer (my second in 10 years, FWIW - but different cell type, different breast.). The first one led to double mastectomy with reconstruction (guess this one was somehow seeded mostly in the axilla.). With this one, they're letting me "go flat" for six months til I heal from radiation.
Not the most appealing, besides which I put on weight from stress eating (VERY disappointed not to lose weight with the radiation as I was told to expect!)
The self image change, reminds me of the handout they gave me after the second op: "How to prepare yourself for seeing yourself in the mirror after surgery." Black humor, but I found it amusing. (Samples: "Steam up the bathroom mirror first", "Look into a handheld mirror reflecting the mirror behind you", "Ask a friend to look first and give you a description". Who writes these things anyhow?)
Anyhow, the main thing is that the nasty little "invasive lobular" thingy (more fuzzy than solid ) is gone. It probably went undiagnosed for four years since I first THOUGHT I felt something, because this relatively rare variant of C is characterized as "sneaky". It remained uncertain to palpation and declared benign at all testing. All until the last ultrasound which led to the tissue biopsy which came back crummy. Alas, all the rest had been false negatives.
Shockeroo to me, gynecologist and ultrasound radiologist.
Many delays before eventual surgery as I wanted to get a second opinion about recommended treatment at first facility and that took a good while. (I downvote Anderson's scheduling department, among other things).
The first lumpectomy came back with bad margins so I needed another, which was declared "clean".
Having turned down endocrine therapy (based on research with software engineer son's AI program!) - I was only sent for radiation. Low-dose, short period. Word now is that I supposedly have only a 5% chance of recurrence - about as good as it gets with cancer. I am naturally greatly relieved.
I certainly learned the meaning of "gratitude" seeing (and sometimes getting to know) so many other patients. They had much more advanced disease and many had suffered the ravages of chemo. I know how lucky I am. (Think I was the only one with my own hair - for what that's worth! - in the waiting room for the three weeks of daily radiation.) Sadly, they were not only mostly younger than me, they were MUCH younger than me.
This is the little spoken of result of the (patriarchally decided) reg not to allow women under 50 to have mammograms covered by insurance. Hence, in due course, a great many victims were diagnosed in their twenties - and with very aggressive cancers. So sad - and maddening! (The insurance reg has been modified, but too late for too many.)
On the basis of my biopsy cell analysis, mine is characterized as "indolent" (good) and my Stage is now declared to be 1 Tc.
Main trauma was heartbreaking issue with one son, who let me down shockingly (and as yet unexplained) on commitment to be with me for surgery. Nothing at all hurt was except my feelings.
I'm now back to my formerly greatest cloud (thinking of Peanuts character), of having been diagnosed with wet macular degeneration. (For anyone who doesn't know, it's an incurable blinding eye disease though it seems to be delayable by newish treatment.)
Just had a relapse of that after reprieve of three years, so it's back to eye injections. (Not as bad as it sounds). Since thus far it's mostly the right eye, I can drive and g-d willing, somehow it will stay there. Whether it WILL spare the "fellow eye"(rare but it happens) seems to be based on certain patient characteristics as yet unidentified.
I hope I hope I'm one of them!
Thanks very much for asking, after me wtg and whoever else wondered about my goings on!
Somehow or other, the cancer, eye, and deteriorating orthopedic/neuro conditions (increasingly limiting mobility), have done a number on me in terms of communication. However, I have been lurking at critical moments and feel present on the forum, even if I wasn't contributing. (Whenever something major happened or was in the offing re national/world events, I wanted to see what you all were saying.)
And there HAVE been so many events, mostly very undesirable - as we all know....
Longer than intended. Guess I'm the kind of person with whom one takes ones chances asking: "How are you"?
Warm greetings to all! And best wishes for a very happy, healthy New Year, Chinese and otherwise. So many uncertainties loom, don't they?
), we have ahead of us.