laurie's Journey:

The breast center where I am receiving treatment has been wonderful so far. They have a tumor board that meets every week and they invited me to go and have a team of doctors review my case. The doctors were all very nice and everything went just like they told me it would. They examined me and then the board discussed my case for about a half hour. My husband and I waited in another conference room with a lady that was assigned to help me through the whole thing. I learned that the doctors volunteer their time to come to the tumor board which I thought was pretty amazing. My surgeon came in and said they wanted to do everything they can to save my breast but the board agreed that the one area that they didn't get a good sample from is concerning. If they do a lumpectomy on the two spots they have biopsied, then it turns out the third spot is cancer they would all recommend a mastectomy. Since my cancer is not evasive they would be able to keep all my skin and nipple. If I already had a lumpectomy first the skin would not be in good shape to save the skin and nipple if I have a mastectomy if it comes down to that. So I will have the biopsy next Friday. They will put a wire in first before I got to surgery so the surgeon will know exactly where the area is. The results will take a few days. If it is cancer I will go ahead and have the mastectomy. If it isn't they will do the lumpectomy and radiation. The doctor gave me my choices and this made the most sense. I hate having two surgeries but there just didn't seem to be anyway to get around it.

I will be having a mastectomy on 12/21 followed by immediate reconstruction of the tram flap. Feeling sad about all this.

I had a mastectomy followed by tram flap reconstruction a little over a week ago. The pain and swelling are much worse than I expected. I figured I was healthy and in fairly good shape and the surgery wouldn't be that bad but I was wrong! I have spent the last week sleeping the better part of the day. My dear husband has been helping me with everything. I hope to get the drains out next week!

I have my surgery scheduled for April 17 to get my new nipple! The surgeon will also do some liposuction to contour my abdomen and reshape the new breast! While he has that liposuction machine going I am going to have him get rid of my saddlebags while he is at it! I am so excited to look normal again!

I had surgery to re-do the nipple on my tram flap breast and then they did a matching procedure to reduce my good breast a little bit to even things out. Everything looks good so far. Can't believe I have had 4 surgeries in the last 10 months.