Last Tuesday, before chemo I had my first appointment with the radiation oncologist. I really liked her. It was just a Zoom meeting, but that also meant Jeremy was sitting with me listening to what she had to say. At the end of the day, I am still going to do radiation. This cancer thing is all a game of statistics, and from the beginning I decided we were going to put everything we could into this. Aggressive with treatment, conservative with my body. That has been my mantra and it is working for me. I will not say that I was not a bit disappointed that she still recommended radiation, but going back through all the steps I have taken, I wouldn’t change my course of action. I plan to be around for a long time, and for me, a 10% increase in the chances that this cancer hasn’t killed me in the next 10 years is enough reason to move forward with radiation. I have spoken quite a bit about all the decisions you have to make on your own throughout this process. I will say this doctor did make it easy. Her recommendation and reasoning was clear. The research supports her, and we will move forward. I will do 5 weeks of radiation - 5x per week for a total of 25 treatments. There are closer locations, but I want her supervising my treatment, so I will go up to Stanford daily for treatment.
Upon learning this news, I reached back out to my reconstructive surgeon and his NP, who I adore and have been seeing almost every week for follow-ups since my first surgery. From the beginning, he told me he thought I was a good candidate to look at doing the reconstruction before radiation if it was needed, and we could make it fit in the timeline. Very quickly my radiation oncologist and reconstructive surgeon connected, and it looks like we are going to get the green light to thread the needle to fit in the surgery with a quick recovery before the radiation starts. I see my reconstructive surgeon next Thursday and look forward to moving forward and finding a surgery date. All things will be contingent on continuing to handle chemo well and good blood work numbers prior to the operation.
Side note - Wow, I have never known so much about my blood. The panel that is done prior to each chemo session is quite impressive. I thought I learned a lot about my blood during each pregnancy. I guess I was just naive.
One last thought about statistics and decisions. It is strange for me how many women look at all the various statistics and just decide they are going to fall on the right side of things statistically. Or make comments like a 10% change is not enough to deal with the inconvenience of additional therapy. I guess we all have different thoughts and approaches. Jeremy and I have tended to like the doctors that guide us towards the studies that support their opinions, that show us the research, and explain how they formulate their opinions. I have managed to stay off message boards this entire time. Jeremy reads lots and lots of peer-reviewed medical studies, journals, and more. (I have read a few.) I am definitely grateful to have a partner who can easily consume and interpret all of it. I can’t imagine making all of these decisions without this knowledge. I also know, in the end, I got A LOT of opinions before deciding on a team. It seems that many just go with whomever they see first. I do not regret my decision to make sure I was with a team I truly trusted. I know this created many more appointments and decisions than others may face, and I can see how much easier it would be to not take this approach, but we are all different. We all find comfort differently, and, for me, knowledge is power.