Update after the surgeon

Clare,

I just returned from the surgeon's office…
I like him.
He's personable, direct, and patient.

He told me that there are 9 tumors in my right breast…
4 that I've told you about previously and 5 other areas that light up like a christmas tree with contrast…
meaning they are metabolically active areas…
since 3 of 3 biopsies were cancerous he expects all of them to be small cancers as well.
The first thing he said was, "Wow, you're MRI is really scary"…

We've decided to have a bilateral mastectomy with immediate reconstruction. I need to meet with the plastic surgeon to plan the reconstruction. He told me that I don't have enough extra fat to do a flap, so an implant will be the way to go. They will put a temporary tissue expander in at the time of surgery, add saline to it periodically until it is the size we want, and then they will replace it with a more permanent implant. That means another surgery in 4 - 6 months.

He was optimistic that surgery should cure this…
I hope he's right.
Chemo will be decided upon after the pathologists go over all of the breast tissue and lymph nodes. They inject a substance that moves into the lymph nodes the day before surgery and then remove the ones that drain first…those should theoretically be the ones with any metastasis in them.

All of this is so strange…
yesterday I told you that I had come to terms with this…
today I had a mild anxiety attack and have been near tears several times.
I guess it won't be processed until it is all over and then some.

I love you,
Maggie