Well, it's been a year....

Well, I've made it. It's been exactly one year since I sat in front of the consultant and she pointed to the mammogram on her screen and said 'this bit here - this is what they think is cancer.' I can remember my response quite clearly:

'Fuck'.

When I went to the hospital that morning I honestly did not believe that I would receive a cancer diagnosis. That's something that happens to other people, right? I trotted in to the breast clinic relatively carefree. Well, with the words of two GPs who I had seen previously echoing in my head - 'your age and lack of family history mean it's nothing to worry about'. I learnt the hard way that sadly this really is not the case.

The 22nd of July 2014 was when I was given my 'unofficial' cancer diagnosis. That is - it was very plain to see (at the least to the radiographers and consultant) that my boob was trying to kill me, but a biopsy was taken just to make sure. I left the clinic and the hospital that day with my life irreversibly altered forever. I left behind a piece of myself that day, which I have had to rebuild over the past year. My mother bundled me out of the hospital, back to my flat and then to her house. I regressed back to childhood over the next couple of days - all I wanted to do was cling to my mum and beg her to make it all go away.

I told very few people about my diagnosis before the official biopsy results were given two days later on the 24th of July. I think a very small part of me still held on to the hope that they were wrong, that the mass on the scan was just something simple and benign. Telling other people would have made it too real, too final. All my hope was dashed on my return to hospital on the 24th, when I was told that yes I did indeed have an invasive tumour in my right breast. This year on the 24th of July I intend to be on a train to Brighton to spend the weekend with some of my closest friends courtesy of the Willow Foundation - preferably half pissed.

The 24th of July 2014 saw the beginning of the complete whirlwind that is a cancer diagnosis and treatment. Since that day there has been:

3 biopsies 
4 mammograms
4 ultrasounds 
16 blood tests
2 radioactive injections
2 general anesthetics
2 lots of surgery
5 nights in hospital
2 head shaves
Multiple wig fittings
1 bone scan
6 toxic infusions 
12 oncologist appointments 
7 surgeon appointments
1 genetic testing appointment
3 late night visits to A and E
11 cannulas 
8 lots of test / scan results
1 chest x-ray
3 MRSA swabs
1 arm ultrasound
6 lots of steroids and anti sickness treatments
21 lots of self-injections
A truck load of other meds
1 flu jab
Several sore and collapsed veins
3 physio appointments
4 Zoladex injections
15 radiotherapy sessions

(Not an exhaustive list!)

There has been sleepless nights, bad dreams and tears. I've cried, I've sobbed, I've been utterly terrified. I've felt angry, frustrated and incredibly lonely. I've mourned the end of my life as I knew it. I've lost my hair, my eyebrows, my eyelashes and my identity. I've gained over a stone in weight. I've said goodbye to two close friends whose support and love helped me through the last year and who I still miss terribly. 

But I've also laughed more than I thought possible. There has been times when I have surprisingly felt happier than I have for years. I have felt loved and cared for. I have met some amazing people and made some of my closest friends. I have reevaluated my life and learnt more about my own strength and character and what I am actually capable of than I ever have before.

So I've done it. I've reached the one year mark. I've joined that statistic of the 96% of women who survive one year after their diagnosis. 

So how do I feel?  

Physically and mentally, I get tired very easily. I have learnt that my ability to nap is unparallelled. The medication I take to try and prevent the cancer returning brings with it tough menopausal side effects including hot flushes, weight gain and insomnia. I still suffer with total mind fuzz, otherwise known as chemo brain, which again isn't helped by my medication. I get frustrated because I find it difficult to find the right words to describe something or I lose my train of thought half way through a sentence. I quite often feel like I am thinking through custard. I have to write everything down otherwise I will forget important details and dates. I keep three diaries - not because I have the social life of the Duchess of Cambridge, but because without noting down every meeting and arrangement as soon as I make it I will inevitably forget it. I also find it very difficult to concentrate and have a terrible habit of zoning out during meetings or conversations. I have the concentration span of a flea on speed.....

Of course, my body doesn't look like it once did. It is fatter and softer with the addition of several scars and one fake body part. My risk reducing mastectomy has been agreed, which means at least two additional surgeries, the first probably being at the beginning of next year.

Emotionally, it's very difficult to describe the maelstrom of feelings I am experiencing right now. I feel cheated and angry that this happened to me, but lucky I have made it this far. I feel guilty that I am here and that other beautiful, vibrant young women have been taken from their families and friends far too early. I feel blessed to have met some incredible people over the last year, and devastated to have lost some of them too. I feel grateful to have been given another chance, but confused as to how to use it to make a difference. 

I look back at the events of the last year and it seems difficult to believe that it actually happened to me. But I also I feel completely overwhelmed with the reality of the situation. If let myself dwell on it for too long, it almost feels just too hard to face. For all the scares and scans that turn out fine, there is the chance that one day, it might not. There is the very real possibility that I could fall in to the statistic of those women who don't make it to their 5th or their 10th year. And there is no way of knowing whether this is going to be the case. It's the complete uncertainty that I find incredibly hard to deal with. Walking around feeling like you have a ticking time bomb inside of you that may implode any minute does not for a peaceful mind make. It is, quite frankly, utterly terrifying. Yes, none of us know how long we've got. But when you have started your own mortality directly in the face this takes on a whole new meaning.

But I can't let the fear control me. I have to take control of it. I have to grab it by the neck and shove it back to the back of my mind where it belongs. I need to honour those women who have been taken by this disease by seizing my second chance and making the most of it whilst I am able to. By enjoying life and squeezing out every last drop. A day spent worrying about your future, is a day you have lost from your present. As my wonderful friend, the late, great JoJo Gingerhead said:

Concentrate on the present

Don’t dwell on the past

Don’t worry about the future

Live for the now

Live for the now 

Radio GaGa

Last week I had an appointment with an oncologist to discuss radiotherapy. It was one of three hospital appointments in one day - I'll go in to those in more detail a bit later....

All the way through my treatment I was told that I would need radiotherapy. However, when the results from my surgery came back I was told that it may not be necessary and that a discussion was needed as to whether it would be beneficial. To cut a long story short, the oncologist said there was definite benefit and that we should go ahead. He also assured me that the pain in my bum cheek was more than likely due to degenerative damage from chemotherapy and hormone treatment, rather than cancer and wouldn't send me for a bone scan dammit. Anyway....

After the decision to go ahead with radiotherapy was made last week, I found myself at a different hospital yesterday for a CT scan and marking up for the start of the treatment. It was my first time having a CT scan and I can only describe it as being inside a washing machine. Half naked. With your arms above your head. The scan is to find out where your heart and lungs are so that when they direct the radiotherapy waves at you they don't fry your insides. You kind of need those bits.

After that I received three 'tattoos' which were remarkably reminiscent of the kind of self marking that some of the kids did at school e.g. dipping their compass in ink and scratching their current amour's name in to their skin. These tattoos are only very tiny dots placed under the skin, but they were done in much the same manner - with a thick needle dipped in ink.

Radiotherapy is due to start on the 28th of April for three weeks. I'm hoping its going to give me super powers but as it is it will probably be more like fatigue, sore skin and a shriveled implant. 

Back to my day of hospital appointments. Spending the entire morning at hospital is not the most riveting of experiences. There's only so much swiping left on Tinder a girl can do.... Anyway, after I saw the oncologist I went to see my plastic surgeon. She agreed that we didn't need to fill the monster boob any more and the expansion was now finished. I asked about when the expander would be replaced by an implant that looked more like a boob than a football and also when they were could take away the other potentially deadly breast. I was told that it would be six months after radiotherapy at the minimum, preferably twelve months. The only time she would operate any sooner would be if she was forced to e.g. if radiotherapy started to make my scar split and the implant to come out. Delightful.

After my appointment with the plastic surgeon I was sent to have more photos of my boobs taken. My before and after surgery boob photos will be coming to a medical student text book near you sometime in the near future. Without my face luckily. However, somewhere between taking my bra off and putting it back on again I managed to lose the cleavage enhancing whatsit I use in the 'normal' side of my bra to fill it out as the monster boob is bigger and a lot more pert that my natural one and makes me look decidedly lopsided. No idea how I managed to do that but some lucky member of hospital staff will probably have come across what looks like an overgrown garden slug at some point over the last few days.

After the photos came an appointment with the physio about my dud arm. The node clearance means that I have nerve damage, numbness and considerable cording under my arm. Cording is basically when the lymph vessels become dry, scarred and shriveled and feel rather like guitar strings. After showing me some exercises to try and revive the nerves in my arm, he gave me an armpit massage. Yes, you read right. He massaged the cording under my arm, something that I have to do myself at home as well. It's comes to something when you need your armpit massaging instead of your back right?

So, an appointment with an oncologist, examination of the monster boob, tit photos, an armpit massage, CT scan and dodgy prison-like ink tattoos. Just an average week in the life of a young breast cancer patient!

A bit of a shite year

As it's New Year's Eve eve, I thought i would reflect a bit on the past year. I've just got out of bed. I've spent the majority of the Christmas break in bed, suffering from tax aches and pains but mostly from awful fatigue. I don't seem to have to do much at all to need to have two hour naps to recover. I'm quite useless and not good at much at the moment, but my ability to sleep is unparallelled. I've put on a stone in weight since my treatment began, partly due to steroids and other drugs, but mostly because I've not been able to exercise anywhere near as much as I was before my treatment started. I tried to run as much as I could during FEC, but once Docetaxel started it walloped me. Now I can only manage one to two mile runs, which then leave me needed to sleep for two hours and aching like I've been inside a washing machine.

Anyway, as the title of this post suggests, this year has been a bit of an arse. I split up with my long term boyfriend, my grandmother died and then I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Triple arse. It's hard to believe that my diagnosis was over five months ago. It seems such a long time ago, but at the same time only yesterday. I've almost forgotten what life was like BC (Before Cancer). I've been picked up and swept along on the cancer tsunami and have now been deposited on the beach picking over the remnants of my life. But although a large part of my treatment is over, there is still a long way to go. I've just been allowed a little respite before the second wave comes to give me a bashing. 

So much has happened in the last five months, it's difficult to quantify it all. But I will try. Here it is:

3 biopsies
3 mammograms
4 ultrasounds 
15 blood tests
1 clip fitting
2 radioactive injections
1 general anaesthetic
1 surgery
2 head shaves
Multiple wig fittings
1 bone scan
6 toxic infusions
7 oncologist appointments
3 surgeon appointments
1 genetic testing appointment
3 late night visits to A and E
1 overnight stay in hospital
8 cannulas
7 lots of test / scan results
1 chest x-ray
3 MRSA swabs
1 arm ultrasound
6 lots of steroids and anti sickness treatments
21 lots of injecting myself
A truck load of other meds
1 flu jab
Several sore and collapsed veins
1 large seroma
1 lot of painful under arm cording 

Plus lots of sleepless nights, bad dreams and tears. There's no wonder I'm knackered all the time! But I don't want to finish this post leaving you thinking its been all bad, because it hasn't. Amongst the tears and bad dreams, there has surprisingly been a lot of laughter too. I've reconnected with old friends and made some brilliant new ones through the Younger Breast Cancer Network. In fact, I'm spending tomorrow night with some of them and I can't think of a more fitting end to this year. I know we'll all be putting a massive two fingers up to the back of 2014!