First Person: A cancer patient in the throes of battle

Editor’s note: This is the fourth installment of a five-part Breast Cancer Awareness Month series taken from the journal of a breast cancer survivor (part one, part two, part three).

It’s Monday, a week before surgery

“Monday Monday, so good to me,

Monday Monday, it was all I hoped it would be

Oh Monday morning, Monday morning couldn’t guarantee

That Monday evening you would still be here with me.”

OK, so the lyrics to the Mamas and Papas song isn’t about cancer, but it’s my new theme song. Today I saw my internist; the one who ticked me off when it sounded like he was congratulating me. Of course I know he wasn’t, but I was in a rather poor state of mind that day.

I had my regular checkup and a pre-op check to be sure I was past the bronchitis, had enough blood left in me and would pass muster for the surgery. I guess I passed since surgery is still on for next Monday, Monday!

Wednesday — Surgeon pre-op visit

Well, the “girls” were checked out again and I was informed about all of the things to do/expect the morning of my surgery. My spouse came as well and I could tell he was incredibly nervous for me.

Following that somewhat stressful appointment, I went to pre-register at the hospital. At least this time I wasn’t probed nor did I have anything else done to me other than a blood pressure check. My blood pressure was oddly low, considering my agitated state. I have to show up at 7:30 a.m. on Monday, Monday to be squashed and probed and inserted with a blue dye and some sort of wire lead to assist the surgeon with locating the nodule growing inside me. Just the thought of another mammogram is hurting me and for some reason my left breast has been having sympathy pains. Following this I will then be whisked to the hospital for a 10:30 a.m. surgery. Tests will be done in the surgery room; others will have a two-day wait for results.

I wanted to throw up! Instead I went home and took another nap. I’m getting quite good a napping.

Sunday

Tomorrow it will be 55 days since I first had my mammogram; 47 days since my biopsy and bleed. What has that little nodule been doing in the days I’ve had to wait to have it removed?

Today is my husband’s birthday. We are going out to dinner. Tomorrow is Monday, Monday and I hope that Monday evening it (cancer) won’t still be here with me.

Day 57 — Monday

Yesterday was a blur. I can’t say that on my way there I didn’t have the urge to keep driving until I ran out of gas in Arizona or Nevada or someplace far, far away. My fight or flight impulses were seriously conflicted. But you can’t take flight when your enemy is within you.

I arrived nearly half an hour early for the markers to be placed. After that, I recall saying prayers, being wheeled down a hallway where my anesthesiologist met us and inserted something into my IV to “take away my nervousness.” All I remember after that is arriving in the operating room. That’s it, until I woke up in recovery. The nurse with me seemed to anticipate when I would need pain meds, which put me blissfully back to sleep.

During my drug-induced sleep my surgeon visited my waiting husband, daughters and granddaughter, telling them that tests performed in the operating room looked very good and that she didn’t anticipate any problems.

At 5:15 p.m. last night, on day 59, I received another phone call from my surgeon with results of the pathology tests. I had Stage 1 cancer, the surrounding tissue was clear and there was no lymph node involvement. Sure, I’ll need some follow-up treatment of some type, but things are looking up, and I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Crossing that Bridge

Cancer is an interesting disease. It keeps on giving; just when you think you have come to a road’s end there seems to be another path leading off into a deep, dark forest where there are no road signs.

Following surgery I learned my tumor had been one called “an aggressive little bugger.” It was hormone receptive negative. Now normally you think of the word “negative” to be a plus when discussing cancer, but not in this case. Had it been hormone receptive positive, then it could be dealt with more easily. This basically meant I should have chemotherapy and radiation treatments in case escaped cancer cells had made their way undetected into my brain, lungs, liver or other body parts. I just remember that while listening to this explanation I disconnected and had an out-of-body experience.

Poison Kills

Early on I decided I wouldn’t do chemotherapy. Why? Because I am allergic to pretty much every antibiotic and medicine known to modern medicine. I have had seizures, turned blue, puffed up like a blowfish, gotten rashes, hives, headaches and various assorted other reactions over the years. My list of safe drugs is pretty slim. I was certain chemotherapy would probably kill me. So, Door No. 1: die of cancer. Door No. 2: die sooner by drugs. However, family members are good with guilt. Apparently an IV filled with serious poison is the only option I should consider.

First Treatment

I have another doctor now. He is the one who decides what type of chemical cocktail will work best on killing those pesky cancer cells. I met with him and explained my fear of a) needles; b) having poison injected into my being; c) death from injecting what I will no doubt be allergic to, and d) needles, again, just in case he didn’t hear me the first time.

This guy’s so calm he scares me. “No worries,” he tells me. “You’re in the safest place you can be in case you have a reaction.”

Which I will have!

My first treatment, following blood tests to be sure my kidneys and liver could handle it, began almost four months to the day from my mammogram. Not that this is at all important, just a little trivia fact in my little life filled with trivia these days.

The “Infusion Center” is a room filled with about 20 recliner chairs, 10 in a row on opposite sides of a room. I chose the last chair on the left as far away from anything or anyone as I could. Nurses prepped my hand, inserted an IV and started a saline solution. It was 9:30 a.m. Later another bag was attached and then another. These were all premeds. When the chemo started I began to read. Within about 10 minutes, I began to feel odd. I felt a discomfort under my sternum and then pain across my lower body radiating from my back and across my abdomen. Then, a serious pain hit my upper legs and groin area. I doubled up and nurses came over and pinched off the line with the IV.

The doctor showed up right about then, and I remember looking at him and mouthing the words “I’m allergic.” He was nonplussed. The nurses attached a bag with Benadryl and started it. After that they filled me with more steroids and, when I probably wouldn’t have been allergic to a swarm of angry killer bees, they started dripping the chemo back into me again. I didn’t leave the center until 3:30 p.m. I felt like I had been run over by a truck and at that point probably would have felt better if I had. The best part of all of this was hearing my spouse tell my daughter that if I felt up to it later that night I might want to go to a Galaxy soccer game. I remember thinking, “I’m really in hell.”

This morning, two weeks after the first chemo treatment, I got up and went into the bathroom, where I happened to glance into the mirror and actually caught my breath. Staring back at me was someone I didn’t recognize at all. Just an old, tired looking, semi-bald woman.

Did you know that when your hair starts to fall out your head hurts as though there are thousands of little cactus needles trying to force their way out? Just another bit of trivia.

My hair was shaved off today.

Final installment, next week: Chemo continues and close on its heels, radiation. Once her many months of treatment pass, everything appears to be going well — and she hopes it stays that way.

ELAINE LA MARR is a 38-year La Cañada Flintridge resident and former Valley Sun staff writer.