Deal or No Deal Seriously

Met with the Surgeon today.  He helped calm me down with a few key questions and statistics.  I asked how soon after I get my mastectomy can I get my reconstruction done.  He said, "What is your goal?"  I said, "To Live."  Well then, if your goal is to live and if you were my daughter I would suggest not waiting for the whole process of getting reconstructive surgery, (its a whole process, unlike fake boobs) and start with your treatment.  I am wanting to give myself the best odds, and that is to kill this cancer as soon as I can.  He said because I am thin, reconstructive surgery is going to be a bit of a challenge.  I will have to cross that bridge when I come to that.  

He told me that Since I am so Young and Since its a Triple Negative I have (D and I again remember different numbers here, funny what stress does to our brains, we need to remember to bring a tape recorder) a 10-30% chance of me developing breast cancer a second time if I do a Lumpectomy.  I quoted the first surgeon's statement, "There is 30 years of research showing there is no difference in survival rates if I get a lumpectomy vs. a mastectomy."  He said that he disagrees with that as it really boils down to A Quality Of Life issue.  If I want to have the lumpectomy and risk getting it back and fighting this thing again I gave you my chances above. If I get a mastectomy I have a 1 % chance of getting cancer again.  

This is a no brainer, I am taking the deal of Mastectomy.  If my cancer was one of the other 3 that feed on things that they know about and if they could give me whatever drug to decrease my chances of getting it again, I would take that Lumpectomy.  But I am not going to risk this again.  If two months ago, someone said, "If you go down this road you have a 10-30% chance of getting it, heck even a 10% chance of getting breast cancer, and if you go down this road you have a 1% chance."  What road would you choose?  I choose to stick to the road that is going to insure my life for the next 55 years.  I am so young, and there is so much ahead of me that I have a larger amount of time that this could come back vs. a woman getting this in her 50's.  

Hard questions that I can only answer.  I am the one who will have quality of life issues, dealing with the pain of tighter tissue and restricted movement due to this surgery.  And if I go under, and they do find more and the tumor is bigger and more nodes are involved than expected, I would be getting the mastectomy anyways.  My Oncologist is going to call me tonight and talk with me about all of this.  I am interested to hear what he thinks.  Can you believe I am getting to deal with this?  Amazing.  The Why's are all around and I am ignoring them.    

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Okay I just spoke with my Surgeon.  It is a 10 % recurrence rate for the lumpectomy without the gene bit.  Those numbers are high, much higher and I could be freaking out over nothing and warping my brain about things that will not matter.  But I need to weigh this all, and need to decide before surgery.  If I do the lumpectomy or the mastectomy either way I am going to be watched like a hawk for the next 5 years or so.  If a second cancer does appear they will catch it very early and then off with that boob!  What my surgeon did say is that he is concerned that I am under the age of 35 and that it is a Triple Negative.  

I have a question for my Oncologist now since he works closely with young woman with Triple Negative.  What I need to know is from that 10% (guys I got a D in Alegbra 2 with a tutor) you get the four sub-groups, the feeders on Progesterone, Estrogene, Her2Nu, and my lucky devil Triple Negative.  What are the rates of recurrence with women UNDER 35 and that have the Triple Negative?  Are we 75% of that 10%?  Phew...Right now I am leaning towards the lumpectomy.

If I get the lumpectomy and during surgery if they find more nodes than one that is cancerous the Surgeon said it does not changed my recurrence rate.  It isn't higher.  This is why I do Chemo and radiation.  The lumpectomy will allow me to be a better athlete, a massage therapist, and allow me to be closer to the person I am now.  I love to go snowboarding, ect.. Although I am not sure if I will be able to do that, if I fall will it cause me to have lifetime lymphadema?  I asked the Surgeon how will he know if he got all the cancerous nodes out, he said that he wouldn't know for sure, and this is again why I do chemo and radiation.  Another interesting thing he said is choosing a mastectomy gives me control with what I can have control with.  It is bringing my recurrence rate down to 1%.