Topic: Can we have a forum for "older" people with bc?

Jul 16, 2009 09:39 AM, edited Jul 16, 2009 09:40 AM by gillyone

Everyone is different. My tumor was 3.5cm with lymph nodes involved too. I had a lumpectomy, but the tumor was almost under my arm. Didn't feel like it was in the breast. The mammo lady had to work hard to get the flesh squeezed up to be in the mammo. Got my port yesterday and I am finishing up scans tomorrow then back to the oncologist next week when hopefully we will have a treatment plan. But as a TN I expect aggressive chemo with rads to follow.

Jul 16, 2009 12:38 PM ritajean wrote:

Our Golf 4 the Cure raised $5,500 for the Susan G. Komen Foundation!  It is all being earmarked for research in the hope that it might help somebody find that cure that we need!  The golfing event was fun and the golfers were very generous with their donations!  Today I'm just "chilling out" on my deck, writing questions and enjoying my lovely back yard.

Lisa, you are in a lovely area of our country.  I visited San Diego about 10 years ago for a National Science Teacher's Convention.  I loved your city.  We rented a car and also drove up the coast one day and found a wonderful little cove in which to have lunch.  I'd love to come back out that way!

More later..

Jul 16, 2009 02:53 PM Cheyanne wrote:

Yes, IllinoisLady, I do have a positive attitude.  Last week, I was visiting with a friend.  Although I have only known her a couple of years so far, she is a good friend and she has been with me through the past few months.  She told me she has never seen anybody in my circumstances with such a positive attitude.  Well, I didn't know what to say except, well, there are a lot of things that are worse to have than what I have had.  Also, I think my recovery time from surgery, which was short, is colored by the other procedures I have had that were so much worse.  Hysterectomy, total hip replacement, two ankle pinnings (for one ankle fracture), to name a few. 

Jul 16, 2009 06:50 PM IllinoisLady wrote:

Golly Pam --- good to see you here again.  You have had a tough time and I would imagine you did "get ideas" during your "shock" session.  I know it must be very un-pleasant to go through....guess the only decent part is that it is all very quick.  I hope you don't have anything close to that happen again.  I'll be praying you don't. 

Just reading much of what all of you said.  We are thankful that this place is here and we can come...there is something about this disease that brings out such good parts of others. Consistently.

Cheyanne, Carole, Gilly, Leslie,Maga ( I like that just as much as grandmother or Marie )Pam, Lisa,......and Jo as well as everyone that comes here.....we come because we have a need and because this is the WAY we learn how to do cancer.  Even the Oncologists and many of the oncology nurses have never HAD this experience personally.  Many of them are very good and I'm thankful they are there but I think it really does take one to know one.......to really, really know. 

Hope you all have a really wonderful evening.

Jackie

Jul 17, 2009 05:34 AM IllinoisLady wrote:

Here is something I left on the thread Rita started....I don't think they will mind if I share as I think it is so applicable to and for several of the latest blog entries:

When we long for a life with no difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds, and diamonds are made under pressure. -Peter Marshall

If we are alive in this world we are going to have challenges...un-asked for and un-wanted and we just have to pray for the strength and wisdom it will take to move through them. 

Hugs

Jul 17, 2009 06:55 AM SoCalLisa wrote:

Jackie, well said...I dated Peter Marshall's son and played bridge with Catherine Marshall..

she was a stong woman..

Jul 17, 2009 12:46 PM gillyone wrote:

Hi ladies - just a little update. Got my port on Wednesday, and doing ok with it. But it makes my chest feel a bit heavy!! Had the last scan today - MUGA. Nothing now till we see the oncologist on Tuesday. I have decided there is no point worrying about the scan results. Whatever is there is there and worrying will not change anything. Hopefully I can get started with treatment next week.

RitaJean - my husband's sister lives in Bloomington and hubby is a boilermaker!

Jul 17, 2009 02:00 PM mzmiller99 wrote:

Pam - Hi!  I've been away as well...probably playing My Farm on Face Book!!

Susan

Jul 17, 2009 04:08 PM dkhancock1948 wrote:

wwjd:  I love your attitude!  Wow!  You still don't sound like you consider yourself old.  I think "old" is a lot in your mind.  I am a young 60.  Curves 3 x wk - I should take lessons from you!!!

Have a great weekend.

Jul 17, 2009 07:26 PM smallworld123 wrote:

I want to grow up to be an old lady. Just turned 67years old. Thanks for this thread.

Jul 17, 2009 07:50 PM patoo wrote:

WWJD, sorry, I don't think you are "old" enough for this thread.  Please don't post again - you put the rest of us to shame!  (curves-3x/wk; treadmill-2x/wk - show-off!!!) 

Okay, just kidding - welcome to all you wonderful ladies who have found us.

Jul 17, 2009 09:14 PM, edited Jul 17, 2009 09:18 PM by smallworld123

I want to live to be an old lady. I'm 67 years young, just got bc this year, had a mast. and want to go on to the next stage in my life. Put cancer behind me, and pray for us all for no recurrance. I did not do everything that the doctor said, but feel good in going the natural way. Its a personal decision we all have to make. I cannot beleive all the young women who have breast cancer now. Why? I asked myself, its not fair to them, or to us older ladies, but what do we all have in common with the young girls? If we could figure that out, we would know how to stop bc. blessings to all my sisters.

Jul 18, 2009 02:35 PM amE2 wrote:

Hi Ladies,

Back again.  WWJD   Yes, OR? NO I have not had surgery. I am on Arimidex as they said I was highly Estrogen+ and Progesterone + but I am HER2 - so they are doing their first CTC (Circulating Tumor Cells) blood test on July 28th but I won't know the results until after I come back from the OBX on Aug 17th.  I would still opt for no surgery as the Arimidex is doing a wonderful job.  A horribly inflamed breast with a two-three inch lesion has gone down to a regular breast with what now looks like a scar.  But I have lost a lot of breast tissue.  Sooo, LOL this is soooo silly, one side is large and the other is about half that size.  LOL  I can only laugh, what else can I do.  I am not big on prosthesis type stuff.  I am sort of a natural lady so I make everyone else put up with it.  LOL  Sometimes, they stare but only if they know.  ;-)

I have to comment about Catherine Marshall as 36 years ago when my life was at the lowest ebb it would ever be I read several of her books.  God bless her, she saved my sanity many, many, times. 

 AS TO AGE, no, don't really want to talk about it.  (64 but whose counting) LOL  I have been asked, --- out and out asked, what is the prognosis?  I want to say "And that is your business because?????"   I can't see ONE good reason for anyone to have that information other then my family and even then, --- frankly my onco  hasn't given me a prognosis.  The only one I got was that I was a long way from going up to Moffit, our premier cancer center up in Tampa.  I am happy with that.  I don't need to be projecting my own death.  ;-)

So, I have that and Robert (my husband, who has decided there is absolutely "nothing" wrong with me and acts accordingly.  Sigh.  Yes, well, dependent husbands and all that----.  

Ok, I am off to feed my 4 cats and pick Robert up from work.

Talk to you all later.  

Happy to see so many positive posts.

Hugs, Pam

Jul 18, 2009 05:12 PM youlooklikeyouneedabeergirl wrote:

Is there anyone here dealing with caring for an elderly parent or handicapped adult child as well as cancer? I need all the ideas I can get.

Jul 18, 2009 11:03 PM pegat13 wrote:

Here I stand shivering on the edge of the high board, squeze my eyes shut, pinch my nose and...JUMP.  After 13 years of actively not wanting to know, I recently stumbled on this site and am now considerably more knowledgeble about my case and ready to REVEAL ALL (and hopefully receive revelations from others). May 26, 1996, enjoying a liesurely shower before dressing in beige befitting the mother of the groom,I discovered the lump. A BIG lump - 8cm.  One week later I was enrolled in protocol seeking to discover if taxotere in combination with the gold standard chemo mix could shrink the tumor to the point that a lumpectomy would be  as effective as a radical mastectomy. In my case the answer was a dramatic yes. Everything went along swimmingly: surgery, radiation, Tamoxifen and at last, the 5 year victory bell.  I was cured!  Not only that,but unlike many of my friends of a certain age I had no health problems. No high blood pressure or cholesterol, not overweight, no arthrihtis so no joint replacements, no heart problems, not even cataracts.  I was now 60, ready to retire and ready to roll out and do something new and useful to save the world and have fun doing it.  But wait- what is that nagging pain in my hip?  You say thats not the hip?  Its called the sacrum? And it contains the most worrisome of 3 bone metastases?  OOPS!  Crank up the broad beam radiation, Arrimidex, Zometa, 5 different Cyberknife sessions. More trouble, switch to xeloda.  A lymph node pops up and up -  zap it with radiation.  But suddenly last month I can barely walk.  I have lost much sensation in my legs and feet over the years caused by nerve damage from the sacral tumor.  This is nothing new.  Pain, dropped foot, a cold and wasted leg, not to mention (I usually don't) bowel and bladder problems, have all originated under the auspices of the sacral tumor and have been slowly debilitating me for the past 5 years. But now I can barely balance on my own 2 feet without toopling over and can only lurch very slowly and very carefully from pillar to post.  Sometimes even that doesn't work and I have 2 black eyes to prove it. I also have a new doctor on the team- a neuro oncologist.  New doctor = new words to learn: lumbo- sacral plexopathy, radiculopathy, cord compression.  All scary because they arrive accompanied by the term "nerve infiltration."  No longer am I a no brainer, paint by the numbers case with a few simple bone mets. Now I have 3 docs, my oncologist, the radiologist and the neuro-oncologist.  I hear they were kicking my case around trying to decide what happens next. Most likely another round of Xeloda from what I can glean.I was never present at these conferences but I get the feeling that the neuro oncologist sees bad things coming down the track for me. In a few weeks I'll be 68, definitely old enough for this ole biddy thread, doncha think?  So I ask: Is anyone out there still awake at 1:43 EDT?  Ever been down a long and dusty road that looked like thisone? Do you know where this story goes next? I'd love to hear from you!