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One woman's fight with breast cancer
Topic Started: Oct 25 2013, 06:14 PM (181 Views)
jon-nyc
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Cheers
Wow


http://www.viralnova.com/wifes-cancer/
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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brenda
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..............
True love there.
“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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bachophile
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HOLY CARP!!!
as u know, i deal with breast cancer all the time.

here are just two stories of patients in last month.

1- 41 year woman, no previous pregnancies, who after years of trying, got pregnant via fertility rx with IVF. she is diagnosed with breast cancer at week 20 of pregnancy.

breast cancer with pregnancy is quite a complicated affair, if in the first trimester the best bet is to do an abortion and then treat as early as possible (chemo in the first trimester is very teratogenic) in the last trimester, best to give birth as soon as child is safely viable, and then begin treatment. its the middle trimester which is always the big problem. the hormones of pregnancy especially estrogen are very dangerous for breast cancer as some cancers are "fed" by hormones and it becomes a big stimulus for growth besides the cancer stimulus for unchecked cell growth.

no question of abortion here, although 20 weeks it still can be done but in this particular case, after years of trying and IVF, the option is not on the table at all.
and so...the mass is large, we can shrink it with chemo, assuming that after the first trimester the teratogenic effects are much less as all organs are already formed in the fetus. (P.S.-please dont let this evolve into an abortion thread, im not taking any stand here, just laying out the facts and if it turns into anything else but a breast cancer thread i will delete this ) and then get away with only lumpectomy, and then radiate after pregnancy, (no rads allowed during pregnancy at all)

the other option is a mastectomy now, wait until week 36 or so, and do C/S and the begin here adjuvant chemo and radiation which delays her adjuvant treatment by about 3 months, during which if she still some cancer cells in her system they continue to be fed by estrogen.

still deciding but personally i lean towards the mastectomy now option.

story 2-
50 years old woman, has had breast cancer 13 years ago at age 37, operated and got adjuvant radiation and tamoxifen.
after waiting the requisite years to be considered cancer free, she got pregnant and had a healthy girl. but....the girl, at age 5 or so developed a rare pediatric malignancy which has required years of chemotherapy to keep in check and is still undergoing treatment. and now, the mom, has a recurrent breast cancer, is going to require a mastectomy and adjuvant chemotherapy. so in effect, both the mother and her child will be undergoing chemo together, with the husband, who of course works full time to support the family, has to juggle job with nursing both his spouse and child thru chemo.

this is just two anecdotes of what i deal with on a regular basis. what amazes me is how sometimes, the knocks that life (God, the cosmos, chance, whatever your outlook) are not just simple knocks, not just, ok, im sick, lets do what i have to do and get on with it, but knocks that i simply dont know how people have the ability to manage. the amount of pain and fear and stress is just beyond the ability to comprehend.

another day on the cancer wards...

"I don't know much about classical music. For years I thought the Goldberg Variations were something Mr. and Mrs. Goldberg did on their wedding night." Woody Allen
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AndyD
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Senior Carp
For me, the photo fourth from last is telling.
All the love in the world, all the help is wonderful, doing things together.
Then, briefly, very much alone.

Every morning the soul is once again as good as new, and again one offers it to one's brothers & sisters in life.

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Red Rice
HOLY CARP!!!
These kind of montages always get me. So sad.
Civilisation, I vaguely realized then - and subsequent observation has confirmed the view - could not progress that way. It must have a greater guiding principle to survive. To treat it as a carcase off which each man tears as much as he can for himself, is to stand convicted a brute, fit for nothing better than a jungle existence, which is a death-struggle, leading nowhither. I did not believe that was the human destiny, for Man individually was sane and reasonable, only collectively a fool.

I hope the gunner of that Hun two-seater shot him clean, bullet to heart, and that his plane, on fire, fell like a meteor through the sky he loved. Since he had to end, I hope he ended so. But, oh, the waste! The loss!

- Cecil Lewis
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brenda
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..............
Bach, it must be a roller coaster job for you with such emotional cases you face every day. God bless you for undertaking the work you do.
“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
~A.A. Milne
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Mikhailoh
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If you want trouble, find yourself a redhead
bach, that's a great illustration of the choices facing physicians and patients - which is the least bad.
Once in his life, every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous redhead - Lucille Ball
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Horace
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HOLY CARP!!!
oops wrong thread
As a good person, I implore you to do as I, a good person, do. Be good. Do NOT be bad. If you see bad, end bad. End it in yourself, and end it in others. By any means necessary, the good must conquer the bad. Good people know this. Do you know this? Are you good?
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