Jill Busbey Jill's Journey

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Hello All!  I decided to start this website to update you all at the same time!  So much has happened and I am finding I can't keep track of who I've told what to and sometimes am forgetting to update at all!  Hopefully this will be helpful to all of us!

As many of you know I found a lump on my left breast on September 13th, 2016, a Tuesday.  It felt hard and just like a BB.  I called the Dr. Right away and they got me in for an exam on the following Tuesday, September 20th.  During that exam the Dr. said she wanted me to go straight to get a mammogram done that same day.  So I went right over there and did that.  During the mammogram they discovered that my lymph node was also enlarged so they wanted to do an ultrasound (again, right away)..so I went straight from mammogram to ultrasound.   During the ultrasound, they discovered not only one lump, but two and that there was something going on in my lymph node as well.  I talked with the Radiologist and he explained it "Still could be nothing, but it could be a number of not nothings too."  Everything from Breast cancer, lymphoma, lupus were going through my head.  They said they definitely want to do a biopsy of all three spots.  So the following Friday, September 23rd, 2016 I went in for a biopsy.   I got a call from my nurse coordinator on Monday, September 26th at about 4 that all three biopsy sites tested positive for the same type of Breast Cancer.  Invasive ductal carcinoma grade 3 of 3 (which means the most aggressive kind on a scale of 1-3) and the biopsy confirmed it had spread to at least one lymph node in my armpit area.  WHAAT?????   Then on Tuesday September 27th I met with a surgeon to discuss options.  Since it's such an aggressive spreading tumor they were recommending starting chemo asap and then follow up with surgery and radiation and then possibly another round of chemo.  Blood work, a PET scan, MRI and a heart test were ordered and completed on the 30th of September, 4th of October, 5th of October and then I had a port installed on the 7th of  October.  We also met with the Oncologist on the 29th of September.   All tests came back good.  Which meant I didn't have any other tumors anywhere else in my body.  What the scans don't show is if there are any individual cancer cells floating around in my bloodstream anywhere.  (the next place it will go once it's beyond the lymph nodes.)   So on to chemo.  I had my first Chemo session on Friday, October 14th and will be doing smaller updates hopefully from here on out!  Whew that's a long story already!!!!!  Love all of you and thank you for being there for me!  I know I am loved and I appreciate it all!!!