This is my story-Starting Jan 2009
When i first moved to Wichita, Kansas in November 2008.. the plane was long and made me really jet lagged.after a very long ride and home where i belong. i took a shower after a very nice dinner with a close friend. that was when i found the first lump.i admit i wasnt one to check or ever worry about breast lumps.or assume that wouldnt ever happen to me.. just to some one else.. boy was i wrong
:: the_journey ::
pre op surgery 46dd
this is the start of the beginning of the roller coaster of things left to come.
22-JAN-2009
Biopsy
after the first set of biospys i had little brusing.. days later i felt as if i was loseing me.. a part of my inner soul.
i KNOW breasts DOnt make a person.. nor do they do any function after children... but loseing that inner self..
just really gets a person to relaze just how daily life is taken for granted.
each day looks differnt..
each day is one you will cherish more after you learn you have breast cancer.
each day... is a gift!
18-FEB-2009
New bra with holding drain tubes
first day home... this is the new bra that holds all the drain tubes..
18-FEB-2009
bandages
bra open .. i was checking on the drainage and i needed to rearrange it all so i could lay down on my side for a while
18-FEB-2009
first day home checking bandages
as you can see after i got home i needed to check... you can see barely the gapping holes left for me to see after next bandage change
19-FEB-2009
first shower
this is right after my first shower... also the drain tube on the right side fell out... so i will have to really pay attention to the drainage for this so no infection sets in before next week. the real emotions that came with this view cant ever be explaned.. but lets just say i cryed for hours...not due to the loss of my breasts but how i now looked.. how much i still have to go through. and the point that the surgery is just the real beginning....
20-FEB-2009
pink ribbon scarf
While my friend and i went to dinner tonight.. ( i needed out of the apt for a while) we went to McDonald's for dinner before i needed to grocery shop.
there was a lady behind us waiting in line.. a very beautiful lady.. nice black long coat with this pink scarf... i got out of line and asked her where she got it.. i wanted one just like it.. telling her i just went thru a radical mastectomy and got out yesterday and it seemly now pink is my fav color... her husband had mentioned they had gotten it a few years back and really not sure where but probably walmart ...
she was so very kind and just gave it to me...
later on she came over to out table and gave me her business card.. lets just say.. her worries of how the scarf looked were nothing compared what she had just given me... ( the old saying you can tell a person by his taking the shirt off her back thing..) well she had done just that... not knowing how much that pink scarf really now meant to me...
it still lingers of her perfume and will.. its a sweet smelling one that is wonderful...
this lady is one who had a friend who has breast cancer and went thru recovery as well... thus why she had given it to me i think... she had mentioned when she gave me her card they used to come to the same McDonald's and talk while her friend was going thru it alll....
little did she know this scarf is a past it forward thing for me... lets hope i am around long enough to be able to do the same thing...
she is a gods angel...
21-FEB-2009
drain tubing
this is the tubing that drains out my left breast tissue... as far as looks concerned no one really sees it.. its hidden behind a bunch of gauze ...the home health nurse changes it daily.. behind it is a hole.. no just behind my skin.. but it doesn't show.. the gurgles that you feel as it drains.. the phantom pain that is under neither... the emotional drain that where it is used to be...
its all covered.. like a book behind a book cover.. with in lies a soul.. heart and body.. real depth... a real person who may smile to avoid things on the out side.. but the info is with in the pages... of yet to come forth
18-MAR-2009
the month after
its been a month after surgery as of march Th
a few bouts of depression.. roller coasters of emotional things run across my mind....wanting to feel like every one else on the street
i even put on a old bra i got before i had surgery.. and stuffed it with batting so i can go out looking like the old me...
the redness on the right side is due to still healing after a second set of drains where put in and then taken out recently...
i go in for surgery to place my port in next week
i still feel pain.. am really sore and tired pretty often.. am still not back to where i was .. but am forcing my self to do more every day...
chemo starts soon...
25-MAR-2009
port-March 24th 2009
they put my port in... it already iches as i took off the bandages... i feel it there but to most they dont see it....
this is where the chemo will go into... so i dont blow up my veins again
April 1, 2009
chemo room
when i walked in the room this is what i saw a full room of chairs... in the back along the walls were really nice ones...