Hi everyone...so sorry I've been so slack about my updates. Up until this point, I really didn't have anything to add to my journey. I guess I'll start with the beginning of the year. In March and April, I went through a series of MRI scans due to some pretty severe back pain that I was having. With my type of breast cancer, it usually comes back in the bones, lungs, or brain, so my oncologists ordered the MRI scans of my thoracic and lumbar spine. When doing the scans, the technician got just a little portion of my cervical spine and the report indicated that I should have a scan of the cervical spine since there were abnormalities present. Turns out...I'm just old and my cervical spine shows just that..I'm old. Lol. I ended up doing acupuncture for my back pain and the pain is gone so far. Keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't return! On September 13th, I started the breast reconstruction process. Since I waited 2 1/2 years before doing this, expanders had to be placed to make room for implants. These expanders are used to stretch the skin so that a pocket can be formed to hold the implants. This process, I feel really sure, is as close to medieval torture as you can get! It's been the hardest and most challenging part of this whole journey. On top of that, a week after my surgery, I came down with a terrible cold/flu that caused me to run fever for several days. I'm just now starting to feel almost normal again. I'm scheduled for surgery on December 20th and at that time the expanders will be removed and the implants placed. I was scheduled for a CT scan right before my surgery, but the day of my appointment, the Ct scan machine had problems, so my scan got cancelled. So...I called last Friday to reschedule it and it just so happened that they had time available to do it that day. I agreed to have this scan without even thinking that the surgery and this cold would cause problems with the way that my lymph nodes appeared on the scan. I've gotten the results of that scan and my oncologist is concerned because the lymph nodes at my armpits are not normal compared to my scan last year. Unfortunately, because I'm only 7 weeks from my reconstruction surgery and I've been fighting a cold for the last 2-3 weeks, it's hard to tell if the lymph nodes are abnormal due to my body fighting and recovering or if there is cancer present. My oncologist ordered a pet scan to rule out cancer, but my insurance will not approve it because the next step should really be a biopsy to rule out the cancer. After talking with my oncologist, he has decided that I will follow up with him in January, and at that time we will do another CT scan to compare if any changes have taken place. So please keep the prayers coming! Pray that my body is still recovering instead of it being cancer. I'm just going to give this to God and totally surrender. Thanks again for all your prayers throughout this whole journey! They are greatly appreciated. I love you all and will try do updates as soon as I know anything else.