Margo Brandt

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It's surprising how life can be going along so smoothly and all of a sudden it can take such a sudden turn.  In the beginning of July I needed to make my appointment for my yearly physical so when I made that appointment I also called and scheduled my mammogram.  I knew it was overdue but did not realize that it had been 2 1/2 years since my last one.  I had even been reminded of it at a doctor's appointment in January but just kept putting it off because I didn't think it had been that long.  I had  it on a Friday morning and on Tuesday I received a letter stating that I needed to schedule an ultrasound.  This didn't even bother me as I had to do this one other time.  Called on Wednesday and got it scheduled for the next day.  Right after I made the appointment my doctor left me a message to make sure I got this scheduled and that I more than likely would have to have a biopsy also.  I went in Thursday morning for this and yes something showed up so they wanted to do a biopsy which they were able to do right away.  Even after this I wasn't real concerned as others told me they had to have these and it was always just fibers and nothing major.  On Friday afternoon, July 15 (my brother's birthday) my doctor called me with the news that I had moderate differentiated carcinoma or breast cancer.  Wow, cancer happens to other people, not me.  I got a call from the surgeon's office yet that afternoon and was scheduled for the following Wednesday. 
When my doctor called me I thought she had said it was 3 cm but when Bob and I met with the surgeon he said it was 1 cm or about the size of his pinky fingernail.  He recommended surgery and radiation therapy.  We met with the Radiation Oncologist  (Dr. Petereit) the next Wednesday and he too was in agreement with surgery and radiation therapy.  ( I had worked for this doctor a long time ago and have complete confidence in him.)  After these 2 appointments  I was scheduled for surgery on August 2. 
On Tuesday, August 2 I had surgery at Same Day Surgery Center and was confident that all would be fine.  When I came to that afternoon Bob was there and had to tell me that it was bigger than they originally thought and that the sentinel lymph node was positive and they had to take the lymph nodes and this meant that I would have to have chemo.  Think telling me this was the hardest thing he ever had to do.  A week and a half later we met with the medical oncologist  (Dr. Schroeder) and he explained the whole process to us.  I would need 8 treatments 2 weeks apart and then would have to have 6 weeks of radiation therapy.  His only concern was that the margins weren't real clean after the surgery and he wanted to check with the radiation oncologist on whether he wanted those cleaned up.  I was scheduled to have my port put in on Tuesday, August 16, just 2 weeks after the original surgery so during this they went in and cleaned up the margins and these came back negative so I good to go with chemo.  Dr. S had said that most working women try to have chemo on Fridays so they  have the weekend to recover.  My first treatment is scheduled for Friday morning, September 2 and I hope to schedule the rest of the treatments on Friday afternoons so won't need to miss much work. 
One of the bad things is that grandson Cole starts kindergarten now and I won't be able to attend any of his activities.  His mom and dad will have to record everything for me. 
I am still thinking positive that things will go smoothly and uneventful and that there won't need to be many updates to this other than that I had another treatment and am doing fine.