(no subject)
Jun. 26th, 2015 01:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the_rckMy sister just called me to tell me that she has breast cancer. The kind she has has a 98% five year survival rate, but she's going to have to have a masectomy, possibly (depending on the MRI and the genetic test) a double masectomy. She's actually hoping for the double masectomy because the odds are very high that she'll have to have the other breast removed eventually. The cancer seems to be entirely contained in her milk ducts. They don't think she'll need chemo or radiation therapy.
I have emailed my doctor to find out if this changes what we should do about my lump. Also, if my sister has genetic markers for breast cancer, Cordelia and I will need to get tested, too. My mother is paying for the test largely because she wants Cordelia to know if it will be an issue.
We have no idea if there's a history of breast cancer in the more distant reaches of the family. Our mother's mother died of lung cancer, and her mother died of a heart attack in her 80s. Our father's mother just turned 90, and her younger sister is still healthy. Their mother lived into her 90s. Beyond that, we know nothing.
I'm surprisingly less worried about this than I expected to be. It helps that my sister isn't at all freaked out (though apparently our mother and step-father really got upset).
To my other sister, if you read this, please don't tell Papa or Grandma or anyone on that side of the family. Our sister doesn't want them worrying about this on top of everything else. That particularly means not mentioning it on Facebook because our aunt is likely to see it.
I have emailed my doctor to find out if this changes what we should do about my lump. Also, if my sister has genetic markers for breast cancer, Cordelia and I will need to get tested, too. My mother is paying for the test largely because she wants Cordelia to know if it will be an issue.
We have no idea if there's a history of breast cancer in the more distant reaches of the family. Our mother's mother died of lung cancer, and her mother died of a heart attack in her 80s. Our father's mother just turned 90, and her younger sister is still healthy. Their mother lived into her 90s. Beyond that, we know nothing.
I'm surprisingly less worried about this than I expected to be. It helps that my sister isn't at all freaked out (though apparently our mother and step-father really got upset).
To my other sister, if you read this, please don't tell Papa or Grandma or anyone on that side of the family. Our sister doesn't want them worrying about this on top of everything else. That particularly means not mentioning it on Facebook because our aunt is likely to see it.
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no subject
Date: 2015-06-26 06:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-06-26 07:11 pm (UTC)My sister is very calm and matter of fact about the whole thing. She's done her research and is confident in her doctors.
At least my arm trouble turns out to be nothing but tendinitis. We have no idea what could have caused it, but it's very definitely tendinitis.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-27 01:27 am (UTC)*hugs*
FWIW, I was diagnosed with breast cancer more than 7 years ago: Stage 1 carcinoma in situ, which means it hadn't spread anywhere else. I had a lumpectomy with a wide re-excision (they had to go in a second time and remove more tissue when stage 0 cells were found in the margins of the original chunk once they got it into the lab). I had radiation afterward and Tamoxifen, and was declared clear after 5 years ago: so far so good.
I wish your sister a similar outcome!
(If you want to know more, you should be able to read that narrative under the "cancer" tag on my blog ... it also includes my more recent and equally successful uterine cancer challenge.)
no subject
Date: 2015-06-27 03:11 pm (UTC)But my sister assures me that the type of cancer she has has a 98% five year survival rate, so...
Right now, I'm debating whether or not I should call my mother. My sister says she was very upset. I'm just worried that me talking to my mother will make her feel worse when I want to make her feel better.
The two weeks until we learn the results of the genetic test will be difficult because we won't know, before then, what I need to do about my situation. From what I gather, the fact that I'm older than my sister worries my doctor a bit, given the lump I've got. This may mean they'll change to recommending that I get it removed instead of waiting to see what happens (because it might be healthy tissue. The surgeon thought it probably was. She said she couldn't biopsy it reliably because it doesn't show on ultrasound).
no subject
Date: 2015-06-26 06:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-06-26 07:15 pm (UTC)I do think this decides me not to take on any fic exchanges this summer. I probably still could do one, but I'm likely to be distracted, especially if her surgery goes forward as quickly as she thinks it might.
She is very calm and not particularly worried at this point. Her eight year old knows she's going to have surgery but doesn't know why. His father and grandmother have had surgery in the last year, so he thinks of it as just one of those things that happens occasionally rather than as anything worrisome.
no subject
Date: 2015-06-27 02:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2015-06-27 03:03 pm (UTC)