Thanksgiving Day Everyday 11/28/19

 

Fall semester of 2019 came like a storm.  Our building was going through renovation over the summer and all of us had to be completely moved out.  I was doing shoulder rehab after finding there is a bone spur and started to notice chest pain.  Luckily I was able to move back in time to start the semester while observing colleagues still missing items.  The pain persisted and orthopedic doctor finally sent me to ER.  My plastic surgeon sent a team for breast biopsy; the diagnosis followed.  My cancer came back and spread outside of the area.  It is Stage IV: metastatic breast cancer (MBC).   My oncologist’s nurse said they are going to treat more like diabetes this time and I need to be on Herceptin, the miracle drug that helped in 2015 needs to be administered rest of my life.  I am on chemotherapy.  I have #4 just before the final exam then two more to go. 

Chemotherapy feels easier than last round and now that the pain is under control, I started to digest what this all means.  Cancer spread to skin and spine, so I started bone-strengthening medicine, Zometa.  This is for two years.  In retrospect, Herceptin every three weeks and Zometa once a month doesn’t sound too bad.  But it didn’t come to me that my medical team is not trying to cure me this time.  My cancer is not curable.  I didn’t beat cancer.  Cancer BEAT ME!  I cried in front of my husband, Tony, one day.  He was all in, supporting 100% in 2015.  He made sure I am not all by myself in the infusion room and accompanied many surgeries required.  At this point, we informed only immediate family and my department chair and students, and my online Spinervals teammates.  I didn’t want to advertise asking for attention like first time.  I felt like when I re-married.  I didn’t want to look like I am asking for people’s attention.

First person to give me numbers was, Dr. Hughes, my breast surgeon and overall breast cancer in charge.  She told me that 5-year survival rate of MBC is 25%.

I didn’t feel like I am going to die anytime soon and luckily what we have seen is all improvements.  However low key approach of treatment, not like first time, made me feel like I needed more comprehensive medical attention.  We maneuver so many doctors specialized in one area and feel like Tony and I have to be overall coordinating managers.  Tony had known the statistics, but didn’t have guts to tell me, he confessed. 

Thanksgiving remains my favorite U.S. holiday despite the fact it is too close to the end of the semester and my body makes a mistake and thinks it is already done.   I often get sick as this year.  In this holiday, we are all explicitly encouraged to count blessings.  First of all, I have ever-supportive husband and family behind me.  My students were getting good at turning in special assignments on chemo days.   I have a full-time job that I have control of my day and supportive department chair, who knows me from having her office across the hall.  This job gives me great health coverage that I desperately need.  Our dog, Sakura, has been a healthy and well behaved.  She gives me companionship and makes Tony less worried while he is on the road. 

Chemotherapy drug must have improved since 2015.  Compared to the first round, I am feeling fewer side effects and have been riding inside with 20% reduction of FTP.  I haven’t run and lifted weights, but I am hopeful I can resume after chemo #6 is behind me in January.  I still believe in what I wrote in 2015 about being a healthy cancer patient. However this time around, I am refraining from fight or flight mode.  My mother is trying to come to peace that the natural order of coming out to this world may not be always what is followed when going out.  I am not in panic to change anything I do for now.  I feel like if anybody can be in 25%, I should be.  Slowly I realize my life going forward is Thanksgiving Day everyday.