My Vital Plan for My Brain Mets

So, pull up your pants, put on a belt if you have to, here we go.  I will get to the Vital Plan, I promise.  But, I feel like I need to clarify a few things first.

My original diagnosis on April 27, 2009, was Inflammatory Breast Cancer.  If you don't know what it is, please look it up.  It is almost opposite what we've been taught about Breast Cancer.  IBC is a very, very fast growing and aggressive cancer that has some physical symptoms:  purplish rash, itchiness, inverted nipple, warm or fevered breast, peau d'orange (patch of skin that looks like an orange peel), a pulling of the skin, almost like a crease.  Oh, and by the way, possibly NO LUMP.   IBC grows in sheets, not typical "lumps" and is often undetected.  Most mammograms don't pick it up, but an ultrasound usually does.

Mine came up quickly.  I figured it was a cystic fiber, which I had a history of in the past.  The other symptoms--well, I kind of thought other things--bug bite, bra, etc. etc.  But it was only a couple weeks and I called my GYN on Monday and went right in.

Now, I have to tell you that my GYN and I have a "twisted sense of humor relationship" and I love that about him.  So, when he opened the door to come into the room, he was telling a nurse to go get something for my husband. Ha! Ha!  But when he turned around, his face dropped.  He walked over, didn't even touch the breast, pulled me up and said, "We need to send you to the surgeon right now.  Get dressed and come right in to my office."  I went into his office and he called the surgeons across the street.  I went right over.  Now, I have to tell you that, for someone who has been afraid of hearing about the "C" word all her life, I was not buying it.  It was too "physical"--too many symptoms.

I called my husband and told him he didn't need to come because I was sure it was nothing.  Now, I had just lost my mother to lung cancer 6 months before and, now, looking back, was still grieving.

Well, my husband came, thank God!  The surgeon took one look at my breast and said, "This is what I think it is.  I think it is Inflammatory Breast Cancer, a very aggressive cancer that has probably already spread.  There is a 25% chance of survival.  I'm going to send you over to a radiologist for an MRI and an ultrasound.

And, the radiologist said the same thing.  I am so fortunate, though, because so many women and men (yes, this is the primary breast cancer men get), are misdiagnosed with mastitis or an infection and put on 1, 2, or 3 rounds of antibiotics.  By the time they figure out it's cancer, it's too late.

Within 10 days, I was doing my first chemo.

I'm sorry to end right here.  I'm pretty tired.   Please bear with me.  I will continue more tomorrow.  Hang in there with me!