When Dr. Nathan put in the expander, he filled it up about 40%. I went in yesterday and got my first "fill."
I was a little nervous going in, especially after seeing Annie walk in with two huge vials of saline. Dr. Nathan immediately put me at ease and reminded me that we could do this reconstruction as fast or as slow as I wanted. I'm opting for the faster route, but not too fast!
At the top of the expander, there is a port. Different from my "chemo" port as it doesn't stick out. You find it be placing a small tool with a magnet on my breast and marking it. I didn't want to see the size of the needle and opted not to watch.
To my complete amazement, it didn't hurt at all. He finished with one vial and asked if I wanted to go ahead and put in the other, noting that it would be tight and be very uncomfortable later that night. I felt brave and let him add the other vial.
To quote my new friend, Stacy, "it is like filling a water balloon and you know when you know it is full but you think just a little more...and you are hoping it doesn't break? Yea..thats me right now."
I only took a few Aleve yesterday afternoon because I had to drive home from work, but once home, I dug into the pain meds. It doesn't so much hurt, it's just very uncomfortable and I had a hard time sleeping.
Two or three more and I should be filled to the brim. Then a six-week wait until surgery. I planning for sometime in early January. Hope it works out!
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Sue Sassmann's fight against breast cancer.
About Me
- Sue Sassmann
- A day after my 38th birthday, I was diagnosed with invasive ductal carcinoma. As a wife and mother of three beautiful daughters, I never imaged my life would take this path.
Behind the Scenes
Background for what's going on now...I was diagnosed on Friday, March 28, 2008 with breast cancer—infiltrating ductal carcinoma (also called invasive ductal carcinoma). Atypical cells–cells that, for an unknown reason, mutated as they grew–have collected in the ducts in the breast. At some point, these atypical cells broke through the duct wall, and started moving into the surrounding tissue. This is when the cancer crossed the line from DCIS–ductal carcinoma in situ–to invasive (infiltrating) ductal carcinoma–IDC. It’s the most common type of breast cancer.
I am ER (estrogen receptor) and PR (progesterone receptor) positive and HER2 negative. All that basically means is that my prognosis is good and I’ll respond well to treatment. Blood work and chest x-ray are clear!
After the MRI, it was determined that the right side is clear, but they found another spot on the left closer to the breast bone. Because I’m opting for the mastectomy on the left, they don’t have to test it, they’ll just remove it.
Surgery was April 28 and the results of the surgery weren't as good as we had hoped. The surgery and the mastectomy went alright, however they found cancer cells in the lymph gland nearest the cancer. Dr. Radford took out the remaining lymph glands on the left side. We are looking at aggressive chemo in hopes of killing any remaining cancer cells and reconstruction looks like it'll be in three months or so.
I am ER (estrogen receptor) and PR (progesterone receptor) positive and HER2 negative. All that basically means is that my prognosis is good and I’ll respond well to treatment. Blood work and chest x-ray are clear!
After the MRI, it was determined that the right side is clear, but they found another spot on the left closer to the breast bone. Because I’m opting for the mastectomy on the left, they don’t have to test it, they’ll just remove it.
Surgery was April 28 and the results of the surgery weren't as good as we had hoped. The surgery and the mastectomy went alright, however they found cancer cells in the lymph gland nearest the cancer. Dr. Radford took out the remaining lymph glands on the left side. We are looking at aggressive chemo in hopes of killing any remaining cancer cells and reconstruction looks like it'll be in three months or so.
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