To the Happiest place on earth

Its done!!!! - we leave sunny Melbourne at 9am on Monday 5th September 2016 and leave all of our trouble behind.

Im finally going to get myself some Mickey Mouse ears or a Minnie Mouse stuffed toy that I was so envious that my friend Nicki Pearson had and I was always in awe.

60 something sleeps to go. :)

More crazy itchy fun

There we were enjoying a lovely dinner with some girlfriends, eating from several small plates, a nice glass of bubbly and some wine.

The night was great fun and we had some giggles over some crazy sweet/sour dessert which stopped conversation dead in its tracks, not to mention the cat-bum looks on our faces. I joked that they have hidden cameras and are all out the back wetting themselves with laughter watching their guests eat this complimentary after dinner treats!

Anyway as we are walking to the car I begin scratching and itching all over! Here we go again. This time it was all over my legs, arms and stomach. I came up in hives and couldn't stop scratching. Luckily I had some antihistamine in the car from my last episode and took one without water in desperation.

It eventually stopped itching but the hives stayed with me for the night but were all gone by morning. Definitely no more Zolidex for me!! I have a suspicion it has raised my immune system to the point of a new sensitivity. It could be peanuts, but I have to test it.....with my antihistamine safely nearby. Oh what fun....maybe on a weekend when I have nothing better to do.

I went and saw an oncology gynocologist. She was lovely and what a difference talking with someone who knows her stuff. She said she could say 99% that she would not need to operate abdominally and that it would be keyhole surgery with a 1% chance it could change at the last minute. She also told me the side effects of ovary removal and their important function as we age. She has recommended that I go for menopause counselling before making a decision at the menopause clinic at the royal women's. She also told me to go on my holiday and don't make a decision until after that. To take the tamoxifen for 6 months and then decide. She asked why they were pushing the aromatas inhibitor. She was very reassuring, warm and supportive. Overall a good experience. You wouldn't want to be a prude in her office though. She has very large pictures of the female anatomy all over her office. Sometimes I just didn't know where to look :/

My motivational wall.

finally finished coloring one surgery with just outline of the remaining surgery to go. Each coloured represents a part of my 'journey' (we hate that word).

15th June - super kids

Sitting next to my baby boy listening to his soft snores makes me feel like the luckiest mum in the world. Being able to be here next to him and breathe in his baby smell and his warmth is one of the best things about being a Mum. I know he's not a baby but he is our 'baby' of the family.





The last post I put on Facebook I got some comments about needing a superwoman cloak, but I think that my three kids deserve little superhero kid capes for going through what they did to see their mum sick and wonder if I'll get through when we couldn't make them any promises. They toughed it out as did John, my family and friends. I know many were being brave for me.

So what's been happening! I took myself off to my gyno - he was finding it difficult to understand why I needed to take my ovaries out. I tried to explain it all to him. Anyway he's worried it's an unnecessary operation, but oncology want my body to stop producing estrogen. Anyway what I thought might be day surgery, and key hole surgery and at worst an overnight stay and a few days off work - he warns me that it may not be that simple! After 3 c-sections and an abdominal repair he doesn't know until he gets in there whether he'll have clear access to them. It could be abdominal surgery with up to 6 weeks off work. Damn - is nothing simple or straightforward?

Some good news is my seroma may be gone. No fluid to drain for the first time in 11 weeks!!! I high fived my plastic surgeon. He's such a glory dog. My physio taped up the seroma area trying to encourage the fluid to drain to major lymph nodes, my ps saw it and suggested that she was trying to take the credit for the fluid draining. The main thing is that it has resolved for now anyway. 1 appointment off my list each week.

So now I'm booked in to see an oncology gyno who can perhaps advise me a little better, no more Zoladex implants for me since the allergic reaction, so might delay surgery and use the lesser hormone blocker, tamoxifen for 6 months then get ovaries out in the new year and have the aromatase inhibitor then. We'll see. I have an appointment to see oncology tomorrow, not sure how happy they'll be with my news about Zoladex.

Oncology appt at St Vincents

16th June

Today I saw the oncologist at St Vincents Cancer Centre.

I told her about my zoladex experience and that I didn't want to take it anymore. She said that the side effect was unusual (of course).... And asked if I had reacted to anything else....the only thing that was different in my life was that bloody injection 24 hours before! They take a lot of convincing oncologists.

So then we got down and dirty. I finally asked why the urgency, why do I need to take this super drug and consequently have non-functioning ovaries? What is it about me that we are trying to make me post menopause for this drug in particular? I get that they are finding better results and they only have enough data for post menopausal treatment to compare it, but what in particular about me that they are doing this for?

She told me that my full pathological response is uncommon. Especially with the type of cancer I had and with it gone so far as the lymph nodes. My cancer was considered high risk with the largest tumours being almost 2 mm. Okay - now that's what I meant. She said that they could only expect a good prognosis based on my result - As in no recurrence. (Oncologist won't declare cancer free just because they've removed it all until 5 years post). It now puts me on a completely different level of risk to my initial diagnosis however, where I was stage 3 cancer she is happy to say that I am now stage 0.

Having this all summarized for me made me very happy, scared, happy, relieved - i wanted to hug someone. I knew I had the full pathological response but what did that mean to them? My classification and my treatment and follow up plan?

So I'm off to see an oncology gyno next week for a second opinion on access to my ovaries and I have in my hand a script for Tamoxifen, daily dosage for the next 5 years at least, it's the lesser hormone drug. The oncologist confirmed that in my case, because of the good result - the differences in the drugs may not matter to me as much as it would have with a worst result.

So depending on what the oncology gyno says, I'll work out a plan. But I'm 80% sure I'll use this one for 6 months, check the side effects then decide on ovary removal in the new year after my other surgery.

The oncologist did try and talk me out of prophylactic mastectomy all the same......Friday 14th October 2016 - it's all set.

1 Year Anniversary of "you have cancer"

Well yesterday passed uneventfully - the 5th June 2015. Do you know where you were that day?

We spent yesterday driving through the misty rainforest of the Dandenongs. Devonshire Tea at Olinda Cafe and wandering through the villages of Olinda and Sassafras. I picked up some beautiful hand cream handmade up there for myself as a treat and the kids were spoilt at the Biggest Lollyshop. We had left behind a bottle of Verve when we stayed up there 2 weeks prior, so we went back to pick it up and show the kids around. We did mean to take them to William Rickett gardens, but it was raining and would be too wet and slippery.



It was 1 year ago that we sat in that Breastscreen waiting room after being called back and having further tests 2 days prior. Its a day that is very difficult to forget and is vivid in my brain. I remember what I was wearing, noticing that we were being kept for last. There was a lot of activity and a lot of apologies to us for keeping us waiting. I could sense the extra empathy and attention we were being paid by the nurse. Turns out she was waiting for the complete pathology results as there were some pages missing which dictated the type of cancer I had. She also knew my result and what was to come.

As we were ushered into the little room, I remember that I sat down and John was just closing the door when my now, breast surgeon opened my file and said the words "you have cancer"......just like that. John sat down very slowly and put his head in his hands. My breast surgeon continued to go through the results, while I stared at her stockings. They were patterned and I was thinking that she shouldnt wear patterned stockings with the patterned dress she had on - it was a big clash.......anything to take my mind of what she was saying. I did want to know, but I didnt. Much like a car crash on a freeway as you pass. You dont want to look, but you want to know what's going on.

She started again, I was thinking about the kids being motherless and then back to what she was saying. John asked a couple of questions, but otherwise we were crying, as was the very apologetic nurse. The nurse and I had spent quite some time together, with my boob out on the table while the radiographer was taking biopsies and more and more images. I knew they were looking for something with those images. I just didnt understand the extent of what they were seeing. Calcification was the only word mentioned when lying there with the nurse and radiographer.

Back to my breast surgeon, I managed to pull myself together, after consoling John.....and the nurse, and asked what now? what has to happen, when and how. She did keep expressing that this is a good cancer, being hormone receptive so they can treat it easily, and hey have been treating if for over 20 years now with the same regime. She explained we dont know how I will respond to treatment, we just have to start. Right upfront they knew that I had to have chemo, radiotherapy and mastectomy to overcome it. There was no negotiations.

They made an appointment for me at my GP that afternoon, so we could start in the clinic on the Tuesday to get things moving. The St Vincents Cancer Centre and Chemotherapy was next stop on this journey.

I wish I could say that this is over, and I guess the Cancer part is, but the ongoing therapies and surgeries are still in my sights. Perhaps by January 2017 it will all be over - I certainly hope so.

Crazy itchy fun

26 May

I'm sitting in the office, minding my own business when all of a sudden I am in a severe itchy state. My hands and feet are bright red and blotchy and the itching is getting worse and I'm going crazy - much to the amusement of my work colleagues. I've got my hands in the freezer, which I'd only just got my head out of after a prickly, hot flush! I start to feel a little bit overwhelmed and call my GP. She suggested getting my hands on some antihistamine as soon as I can and call back if things don't settle down. Luckily for John's (my boss) hay fever/sinus he has some zirtec in the office. After taking that, within 20 minutes things are feeling calmer and the itchiness has reduced to a dull buzzing. So this happens exactly 24 hours since my zoladex implant.

Man, I also have bad headaches from this implant which settles down after a week or so - coffee seems to sort it out :) this has got me thinking it's not the 'normal' I was hoping to return to after cancer. With the psychological stuff still hanging around I don't want any more 'treatment' and my body never seems to agree with drugs. I'd be a bad druggie!!! Ha, ha. Whenever I seem to take something and I read the side effects, I feel like my name is printed in the 'acute' side effects section. And the doctors deny what I'm experiencing because it's not common., just common with Kym.

I've been on the forums Reclaim your Curves and having dinner with the Boob Club girls. It's funny how they make this cancer thing feel very 'normal' because there are sooooo many of them. While the diagnosis was the scariest thing I've had to experience you eventually realise, as your specific diagnosis and the gradual success results of the treatment show you that it's not a death sentence. There's just that little thought in the back of your head whether they got it all, and fear of recurrence which raises its ugly head from time to time, but mostly you don't think about it.

Back to the forums, I realise that every person is so different and it's in the differences that are really important. A person who says they aren't allowed to have a reconstruction after radio for at least a year, whereas I had a reconstruction 5 weeks post radiation. The difference is that I had chemo and radio first, not mastectomy. If you have a mastectomy first, you are left flat chested with a horizontal scar and little skin left. Then they need to stretch the skin using expanders that they fill every day with saline until your skin is stretched to the size you want. Whereas mine was skin sparing, meaning they kept the pouch after removing the contents and made it fit my transplanted arteries and muscle. But maybe I couldn't have had that if I had immflamatory breast cancer where it effects the skin - there are so many different scenarios it's difficult to compare one persons situation to another.

So in light of my itchy party, I have an appointment with my gyno to book in my oophalectomy - ? Something like that - ovaries and tubes removed so NO MORE ZOLADEX IMPLANT. this should happen in the next few weeks.