The oncologist appointment

Well firstly the good news, the second lot of cells they took at last operation were all clear, woohoo, so he said you are cancer free at the moment, so that was great news that they got it all out

Was a huge appointment re what i have to decide with future treatments etc

Firstly the trial i mentioned was talked about, it is a worldwide thing and is based in sweden, so today i signed a consent for them to send my pathology over to germany to be tested, firstly to check if i am triple negative for sure and also to put me in a computer, the computer will then decide if i am selected to take part in the trial or not, the results will be back within a week, pretty damn fast!

Anyhow if i am selected to participate i have to decide whether i want to or not, if i do then it means i will be given another drug which is already used to treat other cancers, but it would also mean i would have to have treatment with this drug for 12mths, which is like having chemo for 12mths, a lot to take on, and it could make it worse or better, there are no garantee's as its a trial. I have a lot to read up on with the info they gave me on how it all works anyhow

The chemo will start very soon, probably within a few weeks, i will have it once a fortnight for 14 weeks, they decided due to my age that they want to dose me high and that often, they mentioned the port thing, i was dreading that, its a thing they put in your blood vessel or something and it sticks out a bit in your neck and chest i think, but means when you go for chemo they just do it through a port, they said i would be under general to get it put in, i said well i wont have it if i am not! she mentioned a local to get it out later but i will be fighting tooth and nail on that one later down the track to get a general, why suffer if you dont have too!
He also said that my age is a good thing and that younger people seem to respond a lot better to the chemo treatments

He printed me out a graph to show me having chemo vs not having chemo and the odds do increase a bit, although not as greatly for me due to the type i have, but still better than no odds i guess

i will lose all my hair he said and they tried to tell me some people look great bald, i said i dont think so!! wasnt willing to agree on that one, then i asked about my nails and he said they would go brittle, i said but i have really nice nails!! had to add my whinging in there somewhere lol

so anyhow now i have to organise a wig within next 4 weeks as he said about 2 weeks after first treatment my scalp will get itchy my hair will go, but i kinda knew that anyhow so wasnt shocked about it

on a completely different topic, i bought up vitiman D and cancer as i had seen a lot of them together while reading online, he said that there have been so many studies done and they have found that using anything over 15 plus sunscreen is actually worse for you in the long term re melanoma, he said he would never use over 15 plus, he said people cover up way too much and its not good for your skin either, thought that was interesting and worth mentioning

so anyhow the team i met today seems great, they are all so understanding and ask about my family and kids etc, they are just very caring people and thats exactly what you need when dealing with all this

and finally he bought up me getting testing for the BRCA1 (breast cancer gene) as i am really the first in my direct family to have cancer, he said i could have the gene and just be the first to have it, i thought because i had no daughters it wouldnt come into play, but he said even my sons could be affected, re they could be more subseptable to colon cancer and other types of cancers later in life, the dilemma of me being tested is that it could affect them in other ways later in life, he said if i did test positive to it then they could have a lot of trouble ever getting life insurance and other things due to them maybe having more risk of cancer than normal, so a hell of a lot to think about really. I need to research what it means to me if i did test positive though, i wonder re the recent story regarding christina applegate if a radical approach is something i would want to do if i did have it

anyhow sorry to give so much info in one sitting but this is more so that i can look back later and read up on things i forget or want to clarify, so feel free to skim :)

oh and i will definately have the radiotherapy after the chemo