The Winning Side

Today was my appointment with the breast surgeon. I was looking forward to seeing her and having her remove the bandages.  

She was very pleased with how it came out. The one incision is about the length of my middle finger. She put some tape over it. The other incision under my arm is still very tender and swollen. I need to keep icing it and taking anti-inflammatory medicine. This incision is where she removed 3 lymph nodes from my armpit area. I will need to be conscientious going forward not to have my blood pressure taken on this arm, and do my best to prevent infections or I could run the risk of lymphedema. 

All that being said, the good news of this visit was the pathology report. Everything the surgeon removed was sent for testing and everything came back clear with no evidence of cancer! I had what is known as a pathological complete response (pCR), where there is no residual cancer left due to the effectiveness of the neoadjuvant treatment, or chemo before surgery.  This makes everything that I had to go through totally worth it! 

Am I shouting from the rooftops? Well, not quite. I’m still cautiously rejoicing…partially because cancer snuck up on me the first time, it’s left me a little scarred, and also I’m still in a holding pattern on this mysterious mass in my chest. But will I take this as a win? Yes I will. It’s nice to be on the winning side of life again.