One year. Done.

Today, 21st September 2010,  is the first anniversary of my mastectomy.   Some might expect me to be sad about that, but I am not.  What's done is done, and I can live with it quite easily.  No psychological damage, my fella still fancies me, I've adapted my clothes to fit.   Doesn't mean to say I won't have a reconstruction when I can, but it isn't causing me any day to day issues.

If anything, I want to celebrate that I have made it to the first anniversary and I feel absolutely great.  I have withstood the treatment reasonably well, my hair is coming back thick and fast (literally) and so far (keeping everything crossed here) the cancer has been beaten.  

I have an appointment for my now annual mammogram check on 5th October, followed by a meeting with the surgeon (to discuss results, I guess) on 4th November. Not brilliant that those dates are a month apart, but I am confident that if there is anything worrying to see on the scan that I would get to see him a bit sooner!

The other reason to celebrate today, is that I saw Dr Iqbal for the results of my latest heart scan, which I had yesterday.   Initially, the result was not available on the screen when he looked for it.  They had promised me that an appointment the day before the clinic would be OK, but obviously they hadn't quite got around to updating the system yet...  My appointment with Dr Iqbal was at 5pm, so he rang and rang (then got his registrar to ring) and there was no answer to be able to get the "unvalidated" result.  Then, Magical Michelle rang - and of course, someone answered, and they gave the result.   I now have an ejection fraction of 53%! Yay!  So this means Herceptin treatment can recommence.

I had 6 treatments out of 18 before it got stopped, so now have another 12 to have.  The bad news is that I have to have two loading doses again, which mean a day at Velindre Hospital each time to check there is no allergic reaction.  The good, nay, BRILLIANT news is that they are now able to offer the remaining treatments from home!  Yes, indeed.  Bupa have been subcontracted to deliver treatment from your own home.  So I guess they will rock up with a drip, the medication and a nurse and hook you up in your living room!  Apparently, this is saving the hospital a lot of space and time, as there is less of a crush in the waiting and treatment rooms. For me, what I am hoping it means - and Greg shakes his head in despair at me - is that I can get a more convenient appointment time and still do a full day at work on treatment days.  Seeing as it doesn't cause any ill side effects (apart from giving you a dodgy heart, for which I had no symptoms), I don't see this as a problem.

12 more treatments at 3 weekly intervals will take me another 9 months. So if they start in October, they'll be finished in June 2011. So, still a long way to go.

The other sad news, is that Dr Iqbal is definitely leaving, so this may have been the last time that I will see him.  I thanked him for everything he has done for me.  I also quizzed him on what his plan for us trying again for a baby would have been.  The detail of the plan is this:
- 9 more months of herceptin (until June 2011)
- then 6 more months on zoladex (December 2011)
- then come off the zoladex and wait for my periods to come back (sometime early 2012)
- then come off tamoxifen and try and get preggers (2012...)

Lets hope we get that far without any more hiccups.  I'll be 39 by then.... eek!!

But I am happy.


p.s. Photo courtesy of Jenny Grodzicka - sorry, I should have asked permission before I stole it! xx

I've had a haircut!

Actually, I had it cut last Tuesday but haven't had time to update here since then.

It actually looks as though it is meant to be this short now, rather than all fluffy around the edges!!   And it has made it look a bit less grey, which can't be bad.

Yay!

Busy busy bee

So, just to explain why I have been far too busy to update the blog in the past month:

- Walked the Walk

- A week in Mallorca and some nice sunshine

- Visit to my brother and family to wish Ella a happy 10th birthday

- Attended a conference at Bicton College in Devon

- Camping with a big group of friends

- Seeing The Automatic at Monmouth Festival (free gigs!!)

- Being Jane Austen for a day (Leanne's Hen do)

- Mesmerised by the Monmouth Balloon Glow

- Decorating Greg's house ready for sale

- Securing a job. Yes, I have a job, but it will be all change soon. I needed to get a new role - the right role - in our senior restructuring. I did it. Phew. 

Have a heart

You may recall that my Herceptin treatment has been suspended because my MUGA heart scan result was not what it should be.  Well, I have been on the perindopril tablets since then and my blood pressure is down - the last reading I had, it was at 115/79 which is nice and normal.     However, I had another scan and my %  (of blood being pumped through the left ventricle) is not quite back where it needs to be.   Normal is 50-70%, my first 'bad' reading was 44% and my latest reading is 48%. So its going in the right direction, but it isn't quite there yet.

Dr Iqbal mentioned that I ought to increase my perindopril dose between now and the next heart scan, but although I saw my GP on the same day, Dr Iqbal hadn't given specific instructions to we decided to wait until the GP recieved a letter.   This arrived today, so they have phoned and told me to double my dose up to 8mg a day, and if I suffer any low blood pressure symptoms (dizziness, excessive tiredness), to toddle in and have a BP check.   So tomorrow, we start on the higher dose....

The next heart scan is in the middle of September, followed by another appointment with Dr Iqbal.  It will be my last one with him, however, as he is apparently leaving.  I didn't get the chance to ask where he was going, but I will miss him.   He has been a champion for my fertility issues, so I will make sure I will ask him what his longer term plan would have been for me, so that I can make sure it happens.  I will miss him and his funny ways!!

We Walked the Walk

Most remiss of me, not to update on here about the fantastic walk that my friends and I did on 3rd July.


"Team Flora" consisted of me, Greg, Hannah, Charlotte, Gail and Yvonne - and don't we all just look fine in our bras?   

We had great fun decorating them - quite a few of us (me included) specially designed them to cover our wobbly tummies! 

We walked 13 miles across Bristol - from Ashton Court to the harbour and back again, via busy Park Street and White Ladies Road, and escorted by policemen who helped us cross roads safely and a volunteer attendant at every mile.  Every single one of them - without fail - gave Greg a compliment as we marched past with his windmills spinning gaily!

Greg decided that he wanted to march on at speed, so we lost the other 4 quite quickly (sorry girls) and trudged on apace.  We made a strategic decision not to stop at the first loo block, wisely deciding that those that were stopping would give us a bit of extra space if we pressed onwards, which it did.  We had a comfort break at the next marker, mile 7, and grabbed more water to keep us hydrated in the warm sun.  At mile 10, Greg felt his thighs go numb, and the last couple of miles were fairly steeply downhill which came as a shock to our legs as it felt as though the rest of the course had all been uphill!   Greg was a broken man at the end, but was pleased that we had made it in under 4 hours (3hours 45mins to be precise), and was back to normal after a couple of days rest! 

I was most impressed that everyone kept starting sentences with "when we do this next year..." - so anyone else want to join us?

Added up, we managed to raise over £1500 for Walk the Walk, an outstanding achievement.  Thank you so much to my amazing friends, and to everyone who donated. We couldn't have done it without you.

I was just unlucky!

Yes, you guessed it - I got the results of the genetic testing that I had done in March (see March 17th blog) and I have none of the so-far discovered gene mutations known to cause breast cancer. So I was just unlucky, I guess.

Or I have a gene mutation that hasn't yet been discovered. Mum and I have both given our blood samples to another clinical trial which is continuing to scour the human genome for any other faulty genes, so there is always a possibility there is something there.

For now, though, what this means is that I will not be proffering my left boob to go under the knife, and I won't be worrying overly about ovarian cancer or opting for an oophorectomy (I love that word!!!). My neices (and nephew) don't have to be any more worried than anyone else when they get older. Phew.

Its a relief, I can tell you.

Whoops! It's been a while since my last update....

Hi folks
Sorry for not updating for some time - life has been just far too busy, in all good ways.

I shall now post about a few different items, so watch out, here they come....

SCAR project

Came across this on another blog. The images are amazing. Although it makes me think that a nipple reconstruction across a scar line is not worth the effort...

£597 and rising

If you haven't already, now would be a great time to donate for our half marathon walk. Just over a week to go, and we're hoping the weather is going to stay nice.

Go here to donate: http://www.walkthewalkfundraising.org/teamflora

A HUGE thanks to everyone who has already donated. The team is nearly up to £600 raised so far, which is a fantastic amount! I am very impressed and very pleased.

We'll take photos of the team to post here afterwards.

BP is DOWN!

Hurrah! GP check yesterday, and my blood pressure is down again! It is now 124/86 which is much more normal for me. Normally, they increase the dose of Perindopril from the 2mg a day that I am on at the moment, to 16mg for it to do what it needs to do. But doc has left me on 2mg until next Friday's check as he doesn't want my BP to go too low - it's almost as bad as it being too high as I'd feel tired all the time.

Was a bit annoyed at the surgery as I had an 8.30am appointment and expected to be straight in and out and then Greg and I could get to work. Even going at that time would make us late at work. However, some bossy mother had brought her teenage daughter in and wheedled the receptionist to allow her to have "a quick chat" with the doctor ahead of the drop in clinic starting. This quick chat turned into the doctor doing a procedure on the daughter (don't ask me what!!) and using the nurses treatment room, which I was supposed to be in for my appointment! So the whole thing to 30 minutes longer than it should have done and G and I were both really later for work. Grrrr. Its not as if I haven't already missed enough of work in the last 9 months, is it? I know, I know, I have the best excuse possible, but that doesn't mean I don't feel guilty about not pulling my weight at work.