When do most recurrences for HER2 happen
Comments
-
Hi ladies,
My abdominal/pelvic CT is this Monday. Unfortunately, breast cancer can metastasize to the ovaries and that is what my doctor is checking for. The sudden weight gain and bloating is a classic sign of ovarian cancer.
It's also a classic sign of middle aged spread.
(I have no idea why the next paragraph is formatting funny - trying to fix it and i can't. Maybe this sentence will help.)
I am at the 2 year mark now - dix'd August 09, so am entering the danger zone for relapse. I've been in menopause since December 09, and been on Tamoxifen since March '10, so it seems strange that this would happen all at once but I'm also dealing with this excruciatingly painful frozen shoulder and not moving much at all. Or sleepng. The stress from all this pain could be causing a hormonal imbalance too, and that is the most likely thing, in my mind.
There are a few women on here who have had ovarian mets. It's less common than the others though. Bloating is a symptom of acites fluid, which can be caused by liver or ovarian cancers.
So, there is your recurrance lesson for the day! :
I should know by Friday - my onc said "no news is good news" so he'll call if they find something and won't if they don't. My insurance is on EMR so they get the results of tests within two days.
I see my orthopedist on Wednesdy and am going to BEG for him to shoot me up with numbing stuff. The pain of this frozen shoulder is the worst thing I've ever had. It's like post-surgical pain, only all day, all the time and you can't sleep. Nothing helps.
MLK, you should be able to do your flight. I did TCH, switching to Taxol halfway through. Although I was very tired at the end, I was still able to travel. Chaperoned a group of middle schoolers to San Francisco the day after my 4th chemo so you should be good to go after your first. That's about when your hair will start coming out though. I think mine started on the 3rd week.
0 -
coolbreeze - you are in my thoughts and prayers for Monday
0 -
Ann -- you have my thoughts and prayers as well.
And Iago -- an excellent point! If the biopsied sample was small, there might be need of a larger tissue sample. My original biopsy (which was a sterotactic core needle biopsy and which, therefore, yields a very small sample) did not show HER2+ at all... nor did it show anything more than DCIS. When I had a lumpectomy the much larger tissue sample the results showed invasive and HER2+ cancer. I missed that entirely (that it was based only on a biopsy).
0 -
Coolbreeze, you are in my prayers. Hope it turns out to be some hormonal imbalance.
0 -
Coolbreeze - there are so many things it could be without being cancer. Thoughts and prayers to you today - please let us know how it goes.
0 -
One of the nurses who does chemo @ my docs office is the piano player @ my church and she said the Epirubicin is red and also a red devil, but the andrimyicin is the original - oh joy!!! Thanks all for the info - my meeting is 16 days after 1st chemo so we'll see where my hair is (or isn't) at that point....I got a good wig standing by.
Coolbreeze: you are in my prayers; hopefully it is nothing serious!
0 -
Coolbreeze- Sending thoughts and prayers your way today!!!
0 -
Thanks all. Mos of the time I'm pretty sure it's nothing. Every once in a while I get that flash of "OMG, it's back." That's the way this disease goes.
0 -
CoolBreeze - praying for you today and sending you lots of calming, positive vibes!
0 -
Ann -- how did it go? When will you get info about what (if anything other than middle age spread) is happening?
0 -
I got the call today. They found a spot on my liver. I see the doctor on Wednesday. I have no idea what they'll do from here.....
0 -
Ann - (((((((((HUGS))))))))
0 -
(((Ann))) that is so scary. I hope hope hope it is nothing or, if something, then I pray it is treatable.
0 -
Thank you ladies. Yeah, I'm a bit freaked out but I can manage. I'm very aware it can be a false positive and might be nothing. I don't really think it's a cyst though, because I don't think my doctor would have had me come in - he'd have told me over the phone, I think. I don't really know what the CT scan report says yet.
I don't want to lose my hair again!
0 -
CoolBreeze I really hope it's a cyst. I too have "stable tiny lesions in your liver" in my initial scan. They scanned me again after chemo. Still the same. Will be scanning again in a year.
They find this benign stuff all the time. My fingers are crossed for you just another false alarm. When do you find out.
(BTW I had that CT scan on my birthday… my 50th birthday. What on earth was I thinking?. Maybe still buzzed from chemo.)
0 -
(((ANN)))
0 -
(((Ann))) I will be praying for you... I hope it is just a false positive. I will be thinking about you, and please let us know what he thinkswhen you meet with him. (((More hugs)))!!
0 -
Ann - will be thinking of you and hoping for a cyst or false positive.
0 -
Best of luck CoolBreeze. Sending postive thoughts your way.
0 -
Ann, this breaks my heart..... that you are dealing with this. IT WILL BE NOTHING! It has to be nothing... you do not deserve to go through anymore. If you ever want to talk... PM me ok. ANYTIME.....
GOD BLESS YOU ! Hang in there....
(((((((((((((((((((((( ANN ))))))))))))))))))))))
0 -
Thanks ladies. You know, mostly when you go through these scan times, you think it'll be nothing. Then when you get a pain you think it's something. The seesaw is crazy! I'm okay now but the only thing that concerns me is I had an abdominal CT in December that showed nothing, and now they see something. I have no clue if that means there was a mistake, or something grew...I don't know if cysts can grow that fast, or if maybe I have a fatty liver and it grew that fast or what.
Not knowing is always the worst.
I have had a bad backache since November too, but it's on the LEFT side. Liver doesn't hurt on the left, to my knowledge. So weird this disease.
0 -
Ann - I was just thinking about you when I was taking a bath.
Actually, I was thinking about how all our lives have changed.
While some women shop for a new swim suit this year, as I once did, and feel like they can't find one to hide all their flaws, some of us are now shopping for a suit that we can wear minus a boob or two.
How so many people tonight are watching American Idol anxiously wondering what the outcome is going to be while many of us wait with fear for test results that tell us if our cancer has progressed or if we have caught it early enough.
My husband was rubbing my frozen shoulder tonight before I took a bath. I was telling him how my chest was so tight since I lost my implant due to radiation damange. The divot, that was once my breast, goes under my arm slightly. I said, "I used to have a boob there." He said, "Yes, and you also used to have Cancer there". Sobering!
Oh damn the new normal some times!
Ann, from one HER2 ER+/PR+ Stage III girl ... I so hope you get good news!
0 -
Well, it appears to be liver mets. I have two lesions, one 2 cm one 3 cm, that were not there five months ago. He won't say for sure it's cancer until I have a biopsy and he sees those cells on a slide, but he said we have to assume it is. He said if all there is are the two lesions, than I'm "salvagable." What a word! After the biopsy, he'll schedule a PET scan to see if it's anywhere else.
To answer the original question, I guess for me recurrence happened just a little under two years since diagnosis, and only five months past my last herceptin.
0 -
I'm so sorry Ann. I'm really a loss for words. This sucks. I know they can manage this stuff but it still sucks.
"WTF does salvagable mean." would have been my first question. Crappy choice of words.
0 -
Crap. I am so sorry to hear this news. ((((((HUGS))))))
0 -
crap, crap and double crap!!!!! I am sorry Ann!
0 -
Ann - I did not want to read that news. I am sorry.0
-
Ann, I am so sorry to hear this. You have been on my mind these last few months; I check in on the blog and here occasionally. I didn't want to read this.
And, your doc sounds charm-free.
Warmest and with prayers,
Cathy
0 -
Ann I am so sorry. I hope he is wrong and a biopsy shows it is something else.
0 -
Thanks all. My doc is actually great. He is a no BS guy and I like his style. He's actually quite warm too. But, that is an odd-sounding comment.
There is always the chance that it's something else, but I am not going to hold my breath for that. The pathological impression says, "Interval development of two ill-defined hepatic lesions measuring 2.4 and 2.0 cm. Although non-specific, these lesions are concerning for metastatic foci." The fact that nothing was there at my last CT scan is the tip-off.
And, we still don't know what is causing my lower left back pain, which has been going on for six months. After the biopsy we'll do a PET.
I can hardly believe this is happening and yet, I believe it all too well. I'm less nervous than when I was first dx'd and concentrated at work just fine.
0
