Connie Delaney

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We had gone down to Peurto Morelos, Mexico for a Dance Retreat that was being put on by Bernie Heideman and Sky Roshay i. We had been to this camp before and had a wonderful time. Although this trip we were plagued by sickness with Connie getting sick for several days the first part of the trip and Wayne getting sick for several days toward the back end of the trip. We had returned home by the second week of February

On the way down to camp Connie had noticed a redness around her left breast and a small lump under her left arm. As soon as we got back home this led to her to an initial visit to the doctors office for a mammogram during the 3rd week in February. This was the beginning of this long trip that we are on. 

After a month of mis-diagnosis, we finally learned the worse: Inflammatory Breast Cancer. Which is a very fast moving and rare cancer that needs to be diagnosed and treated fast. Of course, you know us, and we started doing a lot of research online, and discovered that this really wasn't a good situation. Fortunately Wayne has great insurance, and we are a very pro-active phone-calling team, so we managed to get me into MD Anderson Center in Houston Texas within a week. We managed to get me seen, and treated, before (probably just before) the cancer had metasticized. 

Diagnosis is Stage IIIC HER2+ Inflammatory Breast Cancer, for anyone who wants to look it up. 

The treatment is going to be two kinds of Chemo, followed by Mascectomy, followed by Radiation, and then a last ten months of chemo. According to what we've been told, each of these things will be progressively easier... so you can imagine how tough my first "dose-dense" chemo months will be. So you know where I am in the process it will be about like this. 

1st Chemo round: April - May. 2nd Chemo round: June, July, August. Operation sometime in September. 4-5 weeks of radiation in October and November. And then the happy ten months of just one chemo drug to top off the wonderful experience. 

We'll get through it and see you all on the other side. I'm going to have  a year where I don't do anything extra.