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How I'm doing: Post-surgery update

I'm so happy to have completed Step 1 in my road to recovery and healing! OK, so my left boob is longer than my right boob for now and I'm pretty sore. And I've finally finished peeing neon blue, which was fascinating! But it's all worth it, I say. 

What's next:  

  1. Begin daily physical therapy to prevent lymphedema + long-distance walking (short-term after surgery, until I am cleared for moderate exercise). 

  2. Doctor appointments on the 20th to learn biopsy results and 21st to confirm treatment plan. 

    The biopsy results of both the tumor and its surrounding area + the lymph nodes that were removed by my right armpit will tell us if there's any microscopic evidence of cancer (that is, did it spread). 

    Under the tentative treatment plan, my next step would chemotherapy (weekly, 13 weeks), probably early-mid-December. We'll see. 

  3. Continue to do my cancer homework

  4. Continue to thank everyone who has offered to help! (I'm slowly getting in touch!) 
Huge thank you to my longtime friend Laurie (who was my maid of honor when I was married!) for posting updates yesterday. If Laurie were in-person, she also probably would have filmed the whole thing for posterity, so in a sense, y'all lucked out. 😂  

Travel


I'm not going to be able to travel for a year unless it's local and limited (and I'm feeling up to it.)  The risk will be getting an infection with a severely compromised immune system. 

I love travel. This was going to be a big year for me -- I had to back out of a 3-week trip to the Cook Islands, Cambodia, and Vietnam. I'll just go in 2025. Still. Kinda broke my heart. 

But, I'm going to try to squeeze in a limited-risk trip before chemo. I met my friend in Sedona a few weeks back, right after getting my diagnosis and learning that I'd have a year treatment -- not something quicker, as I thought might be the case. Sedona's energy was so calm, so "flat," and it's so quiet there, I'm just craving it. I can't explain it. So I might get an AirBnb and just go quietly be for a bit. 

It's something to look forward to right now. I'm going to try to find these things along the way. 




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