Come celebrate and join our team!

2011 Making Strides Against Breast Cancer of Greater Cincinnati Making Strides

Mom's last treatment

Lots more news lately! As Dad has continued to prepare himself for another round of therapy, as just mentioned, Mom has her last Herceptin treatment this week. She will continue to go in periodically to get her port maintained for the next year before they feel like they can take it out. I think I have been misinforming people that she was done- because I didn't even realize! So, she is getting her last hormone treatment and will also continue to take a pill.

Also- if in your mind you could share and redouble some prayers to another family fighting this fight in much need of the extra prayer time! It's been a year now since Mom's rediagnosis, and just over two since Dad's. We've been blessed with some effective treatments, and feel lucky to spread the love to other's in our community who need the support as well.

Jim finishes the 5k Prostrate Cancer Run

On Saturday, Jim ran the Cincinnati 5K Prostate Cancer run in about 25 minutes. He continues to run 4 miles or so 3-5 times a week building up his bones and heart for the hormone therapy being used to treat his prostate cancer. He has a checkup this week to see if it's time for another hormone shot or if they think he can wait another 3-4 months.

ACS's Making Strides Against Breast Cancer

Hello again all! On October 8th, the American Cancer Society is hosting it's annual Making Strides Against Breast Cancer event in Cincinnati, OH. It's taking place at Yeatman's Cove, and having volunteered at the event several years running, it really is a great event. In light of this year's setbacks and successes, my mom has put together a team to start to raise money for the event. Her goal is $1000, and is already on her way there. If you are able to help in anyway, or would just like to come on down to the event for a nice morning stroll to celebrate everything that we have accomplished this year! A link my mom's team is listed below.

http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR/MakingStridesAgainstBreastCancer/MSABCFY12EastCentral?px=22776632&pg=personal&fr_id=35969

Jenny

New Hairdo

I've been meaning to post a picture of my new hairdo, but since Jenny mentioned it, and I got a hair cut today, here it is!

No News Is Good News

Hello everyone! It's been awhile since we've made a post, but I'm happily reporting that is because there hasn't been much to report. Dad has been doing well with his workouts to keep his heart nice and strong for future hormone treatments. He has a PSA test tomorrow, so please keep him in your thoughts and prayers for the next week so that we get good results for low numbers! Mom is mostly done with recovery and very happily growing her hair back (much curlier than before she lost it!). Still waiting for things to fully heal before the decision of reconstruction is made, so for now, she is doing well and back into the swing of things! Other than that, the family is back and at 'em, so we are very happy to have both Mom and Dad available to drive since soccer and basketball season are in full effect!

Thank you again for all your support,

Jenny

Complete Radiation - Check! Now what?

As Julie wrote, I finished radiation in early June - yeah!!! What I wasn't as ready for was how bad the burn got AFTER I finished treatment. It was really bad a couple weeks after my last session, and I actually took more pain medicine than I had after the surgery. I had to watch what I wore to work, and pretty quickly revert to just a plain droopy Tshirt once I got out of work. I have to say, though, that once it stopped getting worse, it really healed very quickly, so that at my 3 week checkup, everything was pretty much healed. I could go back to wearing normal clothes, and just before we left for the beach on vacation, I finally got my long term prosthesis, which matches pretty darn well, and is so comfortable I go all day without remembering that its even there. That means I'm as back to normal as I'm going to be for quite a while, and it's a pretty good normal.

So what's next?
1) Drugs. I keep taking the hormone treatment at the chemo suite every 3 weeks until October. Besides knocking out one more of the reproductive possibilities for this cancer, it gives me a chance to say hi to the same chemo staff, and they tell me I look great, and that makes me feel good. I like to think maybe someone who has gotten through chemo and is recovering provides some hope to those in the middle of their treatments, since I know it helped me when I saw healthy looking people come in. I also started the "5 year drug" that shuts down some of the estrogen that feeds the cancer, another of the possible reproductive possibilities, and though one of the possible side effects is extreme achiness, it hasn't been too bad so far.
2) Consultations about what to do in the future - I'm working on two different consultations about where I go from here - do I have reconstruction done again, or does that help mask any future reoccurrence? if reconstruction is OK, how long do I wait? or do I go the other direction and have the remaining breast removed, just to be sure? As Julie said, I'm going to the James Center at OSU later this month, and P&G also provides a "Best Doctors" service that I'm using to ask the same questions.
3) Get back to normal - We're on vacation at the beach this week, which is really nice to have all the kids together having fun. When I get back to work next week, I'm going back with a short haircut and no wig. And now that my energy is returning, I need to keep loosing weight, since excess weight also causes extra estrogen to form, not good for the breast cancer situation, and not good for the family history of heart and diabetes problems either!

One thing struck me recently about getting back to normal - its a normal that no longer includes my mom. We might have "fixed" everything else, but that loss doesn't go away. I just have to think she's up there helping me through the rest of this crap though!

Love,
Teri