THE SURGEON

We met with the surgeon this morning. We liked her very much and we left feeling better informed and more at peace about things.

The surgeon gave us more information about the kind of breast cancer I have and what the surgery will be like. What came as a surprise is her telling us that even though my diagnosis is a cancer that is non-invasive, there’s a good chance I would have what they call, “micro-invasion,” meaning that the cancer may have started to spread.

Even though she said this is just a possibility and that it would be minimal, it still scares me. She also explained that there is always a concern for the lymph nodes and that they will be taking a sample during the surgery to test right then and there. If anything looks sketchy, they’ll take some of the lymph nodes as part of the surgery. They’ve looked at my lymph nodes two times already using ultra sound and they looked fine, so I’m not so worried about this.

We were concerned that I should have the surgery right away and that it would dash our vacation plans for the kid’s spring break, but she reassured us that there was no reason the surgery couldn’t wait until we got back. So, the surgery is scheduled for Friday, Good Friday, April 2nd. It will be an out-patient surgery unless they have to take any of the lymph nodes.

I’ve never had any kind of surgery before, so I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little scared.