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Feb 1, 2011 01:12 PM sakura73 wrote:
Hi Lisa
These issues are so difficult. May I ask, are you still on Zoladex too? I assume you will need to come off that as well if you are going to conceive.
My story started a lot like yours; diagnosed in Jan 2009 at 36, had chemo together with Zoladex for six months, then radiation. My period came back 6 months after the last Zoladex shot (that was just a year ago now). I had surgery to preserve ovarian tissue before chemo started; it is still in the freezer. Since my period came back I have had one pregnancy which miscarried at 3 months, and am keeping my fingers crossed in relation to a second. So it seems things are kinda working again.
But our stories are different too; I'm not a girl who came off Tamoxifen early, because I decided after a LOT of soul searching not to take it at all. I felt there WERE statistics which showed that after chemo, Tamoxifen's additional protection was quite limited and, for me, not enough to justify a 5 year deferral of child bearing. I also saw recent evidence that in some ways pregnancy can be protective rather than a new risk. So after long debate with my oncologist I refused the Tamoxifen and decided that I would live with a slightly higher risk of recurrence than I would have had if on Tamoxifen (bearing in mind that Tamoxifen doesn't always work anyway). He disagreed with me but he accepted my decision. That was 15 months ago, and so far, so good.
The available evidence suggests that women who conceive after cancer don't have higher recurrence rates. The numbers of such women are very few, which makes statistics of limited value. And yes, there is no data on 5 years vs 2 years on Tamoxifen. You have to decide which risk you can live with; a perhaps higher risk of recurrence, vs a MUCH higher risk that you won't be a parent. And no one, in the end, can make that choice but you.
The cancer you had sounds larger and more aggressive than the one I had. It may be for you the protection offered by Tamoxifen is more substantial. But keeping our bodies safe from cancer is only part of the issue, isn't it? We want to be healthy because there are things we want to do with our lives, like have children. Being healthy is not merely an end in itself, it is a means to an end.I decided that the chance of being a mother was too important to give up, and so I decided to take the increased recurrence risk.
So, for what it is worth, knowing the very little about you that your opening post reveals, if I were you I would stop the Tamoxifen and go hell for leather at having that baby I so want.
But that's me; it may not be you. These things are hideously hard. You're in my thoughts as you make your decision.
Rachel
Diagnosis: 1/22/2009, ILC, 2cm, Grade 2, 2/17 nodes, ER+/PR+, HER2-