MIDDLE-AGED WOMEN 40-60ish
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Happy New Year to all my middie friends! Wishing you all good health, much love and happiness for 2015.
DH and I actually went out last night - took DS and his girlfriend for dinner. We were home and in jammies by 6:30 but we actually did something! Caught a nap between 10:00 and 11:30 and was awake for the countdown at midnight. Ahhh the life of a tired old gal
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Happy New Year to everyone. I'm 51 and recently diagnosed. Horrible time for this to come upon me. Kid 3 is graduating high school in June, kid 1 is graduating college in May, kid 2 is dissatisfied with his college choice so is doing the admissions/transfer process all over again. They have been a great support here in these early days. I am most concerned about kid4, my bonus baby, who is 10. I have not told him anything yet as I am still waiting for final pathology and mri report. I hate hate hate that he is going to have to deal with this. We are very close and he is very sensitive. I know in the end we will all just have to deal with this the best we can. I've been so worried about all the possible outcomes I might hear about me at my next drs appt and today it just kinda hit me in the face about how much my dx will affect those around me.
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Jeeper 4, I had a H.S. senior (also college-age son) the year of my Dx. They were not too panicked (they said) because my Dx had a fairly good prognosis. Their school years went on normally and I was thankful for that. Hope your BC is early stage and you can banish it with surgery/treatment. No tips for going thru' it with a 10 year old...probably just keep the info. basic and unalarming, and answer his questions honestly as they come up. Good Luck!
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Best of Happiness & Health to All...0 -
Hi Jeeper. So sorry you have to join this club. I know it is so hard in the beginning. Everything coming at you at once. You will make it. Just hold on.I am 42 and was diagnosed in July. I had a daughter who just graduated high school and a 12 year old son. I was very concerned for my son as he too is very sensitive. To my surprise, he has flourished in school this year and been OK in general. I've told him all of it and he has seen me go through my best and worst days of chemo. I say all this to say that maybe your son will surprise you. Praying that all goes well for you. Hugs Amy
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Hi Jeeper, Welcome to this group. Everyone here is so helpful and supportive.
I was diagnosed at 49, am married and have sons aged 17, 15 and 12. I think this entire thing has been hardest on me... since we women are the care takers of the family. We put everyone's needs first... and with cancer we have to take care of ourselves. My just turned 12 year old has handled everything fine. At his age, he doesn't have a lot of knowledge of or information about the scary side of cancer. I've been straight forward and honest with my kids, while trying to keep their lives as normal as possible. Keep it simple, but don't lie to them. They need to be confident that you are telling the truth, or they will worry and wonder what is really going on. You want them to trust you.
That's my advice. I've been through surgery, chemo and the recoveries that go along with that. I started radiation this week. My kids have surprised me. I thought my looking sick, losing my hair and so on would really effect them. Not so much. My oldest, a high school senior, had to apply for colleges with his dad's help instead of mine. Science projects were done with out me (I am a scientist). I couldn't chaperone and volunteer for all the school events, such as my middle son's marching band. All of these things were harder on me than on my kids.
Let me know if I can help you in any way. Please update us on what your learn! If you make your diagnosis and treatments "public", we here on the boards can better address your situation.
Poppy
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Jeeper, so sorry 2015 is starting this way for you. My daughter was a freshman in HS when I got my diagnosis. On the whole, she did just fine. As others have said, keep it simple & honest with your bonus baby. Let us know what you find out about your diagnosis so we can help if possible.
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Welcome Jeeper - sorry that you are here. You will surely find the support and encouragement you need here. Lots of women who have "been there, done that" and always here for each other no matter what. Keep us posted on how you are doing both mentally and physically. If you have a question, ask it. If you have any news to share (good or bad), share it. If you need to cry, there is always a shoulder (or two or twenty) to lean on. If you need to vent, we are all ears! No judgement - only understanding.
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Hello Jeeper,
So sorry to hear your lousy news. To echo others, this is a very safe place. When you have your diagnosis more precisely defined, you may want to re-post. There are threads throughout BCO that have groups of women that will have the same diagnosis as you and are facing the same treatments simultaneously. For example, someone may have begun a calling all Rads in January 2015, or Waiting for a mastectomy in February 2015. This 40- 60 ish thread is very welcoming and the ladies share numerous things beyond breast cancer as well. They have terrific senses of humor that we middies appreciate. We're here for you any time.
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I just received this in an email....
Breast cancer can remain dormant in non-breast tissues for decades before returning as stage IV disease. Perhaps surprisingly, the most aggressive forms of breast cancer (triple negative, inflammatory, HER2+) are less likely to recur than hormone receptor positive (ER+/PR+) disease after the first five years. The switch from a dormant to a proliferative state is not well understood. Now Princeton researchers have devised a computational model that appears to explain tumor dormancy. Their model assumes a natural contest between tumor promoting and tumor suppressing factors in the cancer cell or microtumor microenvironment. This competition results in a stalemate for a time in which the cancer either eventually wins or is eradicated. The model also predicts that if the number of actively dividing cells within the proliferative edge of a microtumor reaches a critical (but still relatively low) level, the dormant tumor has a high likelihood of resuming rapid growth. The implication is that cancer-promoting diet, lifestyle, and environmental exposures can play a role in triggering the switch that leads to metastasis and vice versa.
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well, hell~ scare us.
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Yes, definitely scary info but it does kind of motivate me to continue on the path of trying to make lifestyle changes that will be more healthy for me, so I suppose that is a good thing. Any more information on the specific studies that came to that conclusion? I'd like to learn more about it. Thanks!
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Loral, We have heard that for a while now, how ER+ can linger and then rear its ugly metastatic head years later. Incredibly scary! It is good that they are trying to understand the mechanisms of cancer better; however, it begs the question why the cleanest living, most health conscious still get BC right along with the rest of us average Josephines. At this point, there are a lot of pieces of the cancer puzzle missing and I have a feeling that it will take many more future studies to really figure out How, Why, and Who.
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Check out the new study that shows most cancers are due to luck. 22 due to luck & 9 due to life style choices or genetics. Unfortunately they didn't include breast cancer or prostate cancer since the results weren't definitive.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-ne...
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Me too, Mel. I love science- not that I understand it well..... I kinda want to hear how the particulars of the lifestyle factors wake the dormancy.
In the Dec. 2014 science magazine, Discover, there's a terrific article about numerous high risk cancers triggered by a KRAS gene mutation. [Dr. Joanne] "Weidhaas' research showed the KRAS-variant is present in 61 percent of women with hereditary breast and ovarian cancer who don't have either BRCA mutation". An aside in the article is that Weidhaas turned down millions from venture capitalists because she wants the cost for the test to be low not thousands of dollars. She co-started a non-profit called "Mirakind" to further the research. Per the Discover article by Linda Marsa, "Few practicing oncologists know the KRAS-variant test exists". This biomarker, called KRAS-variant is linked to more cancers than any other known inherited genetic mutation. It is present in 1 out of every 4 people with cancer, and in more than half of people who develop multiple cancers. KRAS-variant carriers tend to get highly aggressive and recurrent breast, ovarian, head and neck, lung and pancreatic cancers." Triple Negative women are mentioned in the article as well.
Weidhaas was a radiation oncology resident at Sloan-Kettering.
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Loral, thanks for posting that, but the bolded implication at the end is from the writer of the email, I think. I managed to find the actual study: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0109934 and I do not see anything about diet etc in there, nor do I think the study supports any implications about lifestyle. We would need loads more research in order to make any such assumptions.
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Exactly my point, too, Momine. And I was also wondering about the clean~living exercising vegetarians like my friend Lois, who had a very aggressive form of this disease too, like elimar said.
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Tomboy, agree. There is evidence suggesting that exercise may have a protective effect, both against getting the stupid thing to begin with and against recurrence. We probably all know exercise freaks who got BC anyway, but that doesn't mean that exercise isn't helpful, statistically speaking. However, this study doesn't even begin to get into any of that.
Lately I have seen some stats about how much exercise BC patients/"survivors" get on average, and it is pretty bad. Most of the reports I have seen say that the majority didn't get much exercise before diagnosis, and post-DX they get even less. So I do think the medical establishment could do much more to get patients moving, for example, since we do have evidence for the benefit of this. But I am rambling now. Simply to say that I do believe we have evidence for some lifestyle factors, but, again, this study doesn't touch on that aspect.
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I believe that... I got so much exercise before dx, I just loved to walk, and I worked as a housepainter and worked at a museum building wall and furniture, climbing ladders and scaffolding, I was thin and naturally strong. I am still just no where near that active, but I am trying harder now and got a fitbit too. But femara and lymphedema are really wearing on me. Are you up late like me, or is it morning where you are?
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Tomboy, morning. I am in Greece, so 7 hours ahead of the East Coast and 10 hours ahead of the "Coast Coast"
Femara does do a number on my joints, although the degree of it waxes and wanes. I had mild LE in the beginning, and it still flares up here and there, but I really do find that exercise helps both problems. I wear a sleeve and gauntlet when lifting weights, and I do not lift anything big with my arms, but I always feel better after. Yoga is also helpful for the lymph flow, as far as I can tell from my limited experience. I only do 5-6 positions, none of which puts stress on the arms.
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Loral, Thanks for sharing that, and don't feel like we are jumping on you, for anything in the post. Cancer is SO complilcated that, at even at best, the studies have been piecemeal so far. I wonder if there ever will come a "unifying theory." In my non-scientific way, I came up with my "Body Balance Sheet Theory. (I'd have to do a search of this thread, using accounting keywords, to tell you when that discussion took place.)
Anyway, the info. in your post does mention a "natural contest" between tumor promotion and tumor suppression, and that does fall into line with my thinking. If ANYTHING tips the body's balance, in a microbiological kind of way, cancer (or any other opportuning disease) can get a foothold, so to speak. Now, by anything, I mean it could be any factor (and the factors are not necessarily equal--so hard to tally up on the "balance sheet") from poor diet, inactivity, poor sleep, genetic factors, exposure to toxins, physical or emotional stress; or any combination of factors.
In my case, looking back, both my cancers could easily date back to around the time I lost a parent. Big emotional upheaval, where my eating and sleeping and brain waves were all out of whack. If there was a "natural contest" going on inside me, this surely would have been cancer's big chance to make a move. IF what I am saying actually happened, it partly answers my own question why extremely healthy individuals get cancer too. None of us can avoid the stress of LIFE. I don't care how much mindful meditation someone does, you cannot escape emotional trauma at the sickness or death of a loved one. We cannot measure (but here is a STRESS CHART that does try to) how severe a major life change might be. Of course, there are a million smaller stressors that life throws at us as well.
So why doesn't everyone get cancer? That is THE question. Maybe if we lived longer, we all would get it; or maybe some of us somehow manage to stay in that plus column on the Body Balance Sheet. More studies needed to get to the bottom of the cancer mystery.
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No problem ladies..Just another article from a different breast cancer site. With my high Onco Dx score I already am 33% likely to have metastasized cancer somewhere within 10 years, so I was thinking this study had something to do with the guidelines of that genetic test. Who knows!!!
I just checked my stress score and it was 676...wow!!!
Oh and I'm also home with the Flu today, fun fun!!!
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Loral, that seems like a very dire prognosis, given your stats. I hope it is wrong somehow.
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I am very leary of putting too much stock in studies because there are always variables that make the results less than objective ( and therefore useless). You can find studies to contradict any other study and if not...just wait a year. I think it wise to live as healthy as you can, but I don't think you can predict who will or will not get cancer or have a reoccurance of it. I personally do not want to live in fear of a reoccurrence of cancer because, if I do, cancer wins and I lose the moments I have been given. I think this study is interesting but I will take the good and ignore the rest.
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If we all got what we deserved from our life style choices, I would be dead all ready a long time ago. Since my poor choices youth I have cleaned up my act and then got cancer. So I am not so sure what "causes" BC. And I am not going to waste too much time thinking about it. I'll leave that to the scientist types. I do volunteer for studies and have been followed by the sister study for more than 10 years. They did a lot of environmental testing. They were wondering why one sister would get BC and not the other, then I had to get it too, but much later than my late sister.
Side note, since I have lost lots of weight (trying to be healthier) I look a lot like my sister. My hair is short now too, like hers was. I was at a BC support group right before Christmas, a woman kept staring at me. Finally she approached me and asked if I had a sister. I said yes I did but she was not with us anymore. She said thank god, I thought you were her and you scared me. Way to make me feel special!
So I had another visit to the dentist today. Why are my teeth all of a sudden falling apart? I had to have the crown that was put on in September taken off and a root canal done plus a cavity filled in the same tooth. The darn thing was hot. Meaning the nerve wouldn't go numb. Good thing there was no one else in the office I was making some noise. The stupid nerve wouldn't even go numb when he injected the novacaine right into the canal. Hopefully, I won't have to have any more dentistry anytime soon. I've had enough! I know, I know be gratefull I have my own teeth. grumble grumble!
now, I've forgotten whom I was going to welcome.
So when I saw my Gyn in December she quoted me the line about how exercise reduces the chance of recurrence by 50%. I said that is great if I had any energy I would get right on it. I said I do yoga, which I don't think of as exercise. I think of exercise as running 5 miles or riding a bike 12 miles or a jazzersize class. But that is all beyond me at this moment, so I do what I can do and keep moving as best I can. I have had to change my perspective on what I can do, what I need to do and what I can let go of, without beating myself up for where I am at. And you know what, the world has not ended even if I couldn't "do it all" anymore.
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yikes! a hot tooth! glad its done, mac. love how you told your gyn if you had any energy you would do it!
loral, i guess it freaked me out cause my level of activity has dropped about 79% of what i did before dx, and in about 6 hours i am getting an mri, after having had a mammo and ultrasound a few days before christmas. and my chief complaint about chemo was the absolutely NO energy part. And the metabolism disruption. like by alot. so it was hitting close to home and freaked me up a little when i read it.
this lumpy bump i have under/in scar, has been concerning me for a year at least, and they poo poo'ed me. now all of a sudden, they are concerned..
ok. according to elis' stress thingy, illness can cause cancer. does this mean then that cancer causes cancer? love and night
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Macatacmv--chemo would have decreased my risk of recurrence by 50% to, from 5% to 2.5%Big woop.That's why I passed on chemo.Most people don't understand the difference between absolute and relative statistics, and relative are more often quoted as they are bigger and more impressive.So, Macatacmy--ask your GYN how that 50% relative stat changes your absolute stats and watch her squirm!
I have come to the conclusion that cancer causes cancer, worrying about cancer causes cancer, not knowing about cancer causes cancer, birth causes cancer, breathing causes cancer, eating causes cancer, and I'm beginning to think that death causes cancer.Time will tell, right?
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I think it is all those henrietta lacks (HeLa) cells, vaporized. That first immortal cell, they were finding it everywhere, polluting specimens in labs where it was never brought in. It may have become part of our DNA.
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NativeMaine - right on!! My chuckle moment for the year. You only forgot exercising causes cancer & sleeping causes cancer & ...
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