So I saw the plastic surgeon today.  He’s got  a great sense of humor.  He said  I was a perfect candidate for implants.  He said he causes the pain and the other surgeon causes the scars.  They take pictures of before and after and promised they wouldn’t show up on Facebook.   I told him I wanted to be a little bigger than I am now, about the size  his receptionist is (funny how everyone else’s boobies have become important to me) and he made a joke about not knowing what they looked like, that he’s married.  LOL  He also told me I have to quit smoking.  2 weeks before the implants go in and for 6 weeks after or the implants probably won’t work.  The nicotine messes with the blood flow and will cause the skin flaps to fail and the implants will ‘fall out’.  His words.  I’m not sure how I’m going to do that.  The patch has nicotine in it.  Maybe I can do those now before the implants.  Also, the boob with the cancer will get a new nipple built and tattooed.  My mom hates tattoos but hell, this one I need 🙂

Then I went and saw the surgeon who will be removing the cancer.   Because the plastic surgeon is going on holidays for 5 weeks, and leaves this Friday, I’m going to end up needing 3 surgeries. She did say I could wait till he got back and then only have 1 (implants going in at the same time as my boobs come off) or find a different surgeon who could do the implants at the same time but I like her, and him and I trust her.  I couldn’t see wasting more time looking for someone else I like and it doesn’t make sense knowing the tumor is growing.  She did indicate that this needs to come out sooner rather than later.   So I’m having 3 surgeries.  And chemo.  And radiation.  I asked her for sure on those and she said yes.   The 2nd surgery is to put an expander in to replace the missing boob and stretch the skin making room for the implant and the 3rd is to do the implants.   Her office will call me when they’ve made an appointment for me to see a surgical nurse and to do all the blood tests they need.  I’m going to be out of commission for probably 4-6 weeks for this surgery.

The sentinel node thingy, they inject me with a radioactive dye, will be done the morning of the surgery and in New West.  This determines the first node of my lymph nodes that the breast lymph ducts drain to.  They can remove this one node at the time of the cancer surgery to be tested to see if the cancer has spread. Then back to Maple Ridge to have the cancer surgery.

I’m hoping that chemo and I play nice together because it’s going to be for 6 months.  I am already losing my boobs, I don’t want to lose my hair too.  Or get really sick, or bloat up.  Or not survive the whole thing.

It finally hit me today how serious this really is.  I have cancer.  I’m having surgery on the 28th of this month to get rid of it.  I didn’t ask for it, don’t want it and can’t control it.  I should be saying cancer has me.  And today I’m afraid.