It's been five weeks since the difficult news of my last scan results and the #1 thing I have been wanting to share is simply, "thank you"! I truly mean it. Thank you! Thank you for the overwhelming amount of love & support texts & phone calls blog comments & DM's thoughtful check in's at work heartfelt cards & care packages home cooked meals & porch deliveries offers to join me at chemo or help in any way we need. The consistent and unwavering support Mike and I have both received is truly remarkable. There is no way to fully convey our gratitude and appreciation and to let you know what a difference it makes. I know every single person has a lot on their plate these days and is busier than ever. For you to take time out of your life to think of us means so much. My port placement procedure went off without a hitch a little over three weeks ago. It has healed nicely since this picture was taken, but it's still sore and a bit uncomfortable. I'll get used to it over time. The first round of chemo went well too. It was a long day, followed by an incredibly busy weekend filled with love and get togethers from family and friends so the fatigue definitely hit me by the end of the weekend. Unfortunately, I also caught a really nasty head cold that lingered for two weeks and zapped my remaining energy. I get frustrated with fatigue and hate needing to slow down or scale back on things I want to do like exercise, cook healthy meals, and say "yes" to all the things. But other than that, I truly have no complaints about chemo so far. This time of year is always extra sentimental for me since my birthday and the anniversary of my diagnosis are only two days a part. Ever since I was a child, my mom has made a big deal of birthdays, and I've always loved that. And of course, nothing puts birthdays into perspective like a a stage IV cancer diagnosis can. Each birthday celebration is truly the greatest gift I could ever receive. Thank you to everyone who shared sweet birthday wishes! In addition to my birthday, this week is always met with the anniversary of the day I was diagnosed with cancer - March 23, 2011. This one moment in time has divided my life into what feels like two separate worlds...life before cancer, and life after. I guess it was a rebirth and forced me to become a new person in many ways.
One of my very best friends, Kyle, is the most thoughtful person on the planet and has been sending me a dozen, stunning, long stem roses each year on March 23rd...one pink rose for every year I have battled on against cancer. Each year, one additional pink rose, and one less white. We always talked about how amazing it would be to reach the day when the entire bouquet would be pink. What a milestone that would be! That day was today - I made it! Today, Kyle came to visit me during chemo with this gorgeous bouquet in her hand. A dozen pink roses. 12 years. It makes me emotional just thinking about it. Twelve years of cancer and so many hard times emotionally and physically...but twelve years of soooo... much good LIVING! While the road ahead continues to be uncertain, I am filled with love and gratitude this week. And with that...I'm signing off my long winded post to get back to that - living! We are gearing up for a little adventure to Austin and ready to explore a new city and make more memories. Chemo can't hold me down for long! xoxo, Meg
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The waiting game....It's never fun, but in the midst of a global pandemic, it has been taken up a notch. It has been longer than expected since I have shared an update and that is due to the fact that I was waiting for more information to actually update you on. Last week marked 6 weeks since I had been off treatment and over 5 weeks since the biopsy of my sacrum. Just as a little recap, that biopsy was completed in order to test whether my cancer has a particular mutation that would qualify me for a new promising drug, since we have come to another fork in the road regarding my treatment plan. I was told the biopsy results would take two weeks for the independent lab to complete, but I didn't hold my breath knowing full well that everything is delayed these days in the midst of COVID-19. While I awaited those results, I completed 10 radiation treatments, started to have pain relief, got off the meds that made me feel lousy, felt super grateful and relieved...and then the pain returned. It's been a bit of a rollercoaster, which seems to be par for the course when I'm in the midst of a recurrence. The good news is that after re-introducing the nerve pain medication, I am feeling better with minimal side effects...bonus! In all honesty, I have actually been surprised at how patient I have been while waiting for these results. (Patience is definitely not one of my virtues!) I have been able to let go of any stress or anxiety about it, knowing full well that it was entirely out of my control. But, come Week #4, I was hoping for some type of update. I called my nurse and was told that the lab had completed 3/5th's of the testing. Fast forward to Week #6, and I was starting to get a little antsy. I checked in once again to see if there were any updates, and that's when the rollercoaster ride continued. The first thing my nurse said was, "the biopsy is positive"...and I literally said, "yes!" out loud. However, my excitement and relief were quickly dampened when she said the lab did not have enough tissue to complete the testing. The "positive" aspect she was referring to was that the pathologist reported that indeed this tumor is metastatic breast cancer that has spread to my sacrum - which is what we already assumed. The fact that there wasn't enough tissue to complete the testing for the mutation was devastating. It has been very unsettling to be off treatment for 6 weeks; the longest I have ever gone in 9 years living with MBC. And now to top that off with feeling like that biopsy of my bone (which was not fun), and the subsequent 6 weeks of waiting...has all been a total waste. The plan now is as follows:
There are a few other important considerations that further complicate things. The one that weighs heavily on my mind is that no one knows if this tumor mutation survives in tissue that has been preserved for many years. There is a great chance that even if I have a positive mutation, the test will be negative because the tissue they are testing is 3 years old. On top of that, what if there still isn't enough tissue there to test? Do we have to wait until my tumors grow large enough to have a painful biopsy yet again in order to have a complete test? All of this scares me. To top it all off, communication with my treatment team has been poor and for the first time in 9 years, I have felt very in the dark and have been left with a lot of unanswered questions. For now, I am focusing on the hope that being back on some type of treatment contains my disease and hoping/wishing/praying/pleading that there is enough tissue in my ovaries to complete the testing and that the result is positive. I continue to practice letting go of what I cannot control and will continue to live, love, laugh and soak up every moment I can....despite remaining on this rollercoaster. xoxo, Meg Mike and I enjoyed a hike last weekend and coming upon this tree felt so poetic to me. Sometimes we are forced to bend so much that we think we might break. It's amazing what all living things can endure.
I had a week to think about this latest news, to read the MRI reports and luckily have an impromptu appointment with my radiation oncologist last Thursday when I ran into him at Karmanos while there for blood work and an injection; all before meeting with Dr. F on Thursday morning.
The MRI report and meeting with my radiation oncologist revealed cancerous activity at more than one place in my spine and also elaborated on some of the damage that has remained there for the last few years due to cancer, radiation and other side effects. The good news is that over the last two weeks, the pain in my back has subsided substantially. So while my radiation oncologist said we can definitely radiate this area (even though part of it has already been radiated once), he would suggest waiting to play that card until I absolutely have to. And I agreed. Radiation to the spine carries a great deal of side effects, not only potential damage to the spinal cord, but also damage to surrounding structures. The last bout of radiation I had to my spine left me feeling like I was swallowing glass and resulted in dropping too much weight in a few short days from my inability to eat or drink. My radiation oncologist, Dr. M, assured me I can call him any day, at any time, if my pain returns and I need to get in for radiation. He is simply the best and I am so grateful to have him on my team...and grateful I don't need his care again quite yet! Mom and I headed to my appointment Thursday morning, where we came with a handful of questions, but also a lot of faith in Dr. F and his opinion. Dr. F shared that there are plenty of arguments to support changing my treatment at this point, but just as many to support watching and waiting. These are some of the main points of our pretty long discussion together:
When the study was published in 2016 about the combination of drugs I am currently on, it was hailed as a huge success because the "progression-free survival" rate was 9.5 months. I have been on this treatment for 22 months now so I am extremely grateful for that! And if I can squeak out some more mileage on it, all the better! On another note, I will be meeting with the Phase 1 Clinical Trial doctor at Karmanos in a couple of weeks to see what trials they have. It is a scary thought for me because the phrase "clinical trial" has also felt like the words "palliative" or "hospice"....words you hear when things are extremely dire and there aren't many options left. But luckily, Dr. F explained it to us in a way that made a lot of sense and didn't feel nearly as terrifying. Aside from meeting with the clinical trial doc, Dr. F is going to watch me a little closer for now. I will still have blood work every couple of weeks, injections every 4 weeks, see him every 8 weeks and get scanned again in 3 months instead of 6. I feel in my gut this is the right plan for me at this particular time. I feel good about it - as does Mike, mom and my doctors. So we wait...and we watch...and pray that the pain doesn't return and that these rogue cells chill out and hibernate for a good long while. In the meantime, my blood counts have plummeted once again (never seems to be any rhyme or reason), so I wasn't able to restart my treatment on Thursday. It does explain some of the additional fatigue I have been feeling lately. I will have repeat labs done next Thursday and hopefully restart then. I think that about sums it up. Thanks for all the love and prayers! xoxo, Meg There is no doubt about the fact that cancer is one sneaky beast. Lurking in the darkness. Slowly creeping up through the shadows and rearing it's ugly head at any time. I have always known this. I have lived this while watching relatives and friends face the disease before I did. But it is another thing altogether when cancer sinks its fangs into you. I have been neglecting the blog so much over the last couple of years because truthfully, all has been relatively stable for me since my recurrence at the end of 2014. Life has been full and busy - just like I have always liked it. Work, photography, travel, family, pups, friends, cooking...fitting as much into each day as possible. This summer I was feeling the best I have in years. One of my bff's and I devoted ourselves to a morning bootcamp class before work and I faithfully attended for about 12 weeks. It felt so good to finally feel more like myself - energized, strong, and comfortable in my own skin. It never ceases to amaze me how quickly that can all change. On September 15th I awoke around 2am to excruciating back pain...the kind that is impossible to describe unless you have experienced bone pain from cancer. I have felt this before and know it all too well. I felt like my back was going to shatter in a million tiny pieces. I woke Mike up and asked him to please try to rub my back in the hopes of some relief. To make a long story short, after suffering through the work day and barely getting through it, I ended up in the ER that night. This started a cascade of events which have led to where we are today. At the risk of skipping some details, but saving some energy, here is the "highlight reel".... ;) -Completed bone scans, CT scans and spine MRI's the last week of September -Learned on Sept 29th that I had progression in my spine at multiple levels which also caused my T8 vertebrae to be fractured -Underwent high dose radiation treatments to my spine every day before work for two weeks which concluded on October 14th -After initially only feeling some fatigue and slight nausea, I encountered severe side effects the week after radiation ended. My esophagus was an innocent bystander caught in the crossfire of radiation and the damage was unexpected and extremely painful. It was not a sore throat due to the radiation burn that you would expect. It was more like trying to swallow glass through a tube that had narrowed down so tight that even water caused ridiculous pain and coughing. It become so bad that I avoided food and liquid altogether; resutling in a 8 pound weight loss over 4 days, along with severe exhaustion and overall feeling like crap.
-Could finally start eating towards the middle/end of last week and have been feeling MUCH better! So, that brings us to today. I went in this morning for a follow up with Dr. F, my oncologist. It is too exhausting to detail right now but basically, I thought he wanted to stay the course on my current treatment because it has been keeping the rest of my body free from disease and limiting the disease to my spine. I was taken by surprise this morning when he immediately stated he wants to switch my treatment plan completely to two targeted therapy drugs. I had been feeling in my heart that it was time to switch treatments but I guess I just didn't expect it today and I wasn't prepared. It unleashed a flood of emotions and uncertainties about the future.... What will these side effects be like? Will this change my quality of life? Will I be able to maintain my normal busy schedule? Will I feel nauseous? Fatigued? Lose/gain weight? Will this work and for how long? What if I have another progression soon and blow through yet another treatment option? What if it doesn't keep the disease limited to the bone? What will happen if this fails? I have been beyond blessed these last 5 1/2 years to maintain a pretty great quality of life despite all I have been through. I don't want to lose that. I don't want to start to head down that road of jumping from one treatment to the next because things have stopped working. I don't want to hear, "there is nothing else we can do for you". I learned tonight that another young friend with MBC was just told those exact words yesterday. She has entered hospice and it's just heartbreaking. The other tough part of today was making the decision to finally have my ovaries removed. My disease is fed by estrogen so my ovarian function has been medically suppresed since I was first diagnosed...first through chemo and immediately following through that lovely shot of Zoladex I receive every single month. Dr. F has always said that there is no real difference between the Zoladex and having my ovaries surgically removed. I told him to tell me point blank if it would better my chances for survival to have them removed and he said the research can't prove that. So, we decided to stay on Zoladex and not rock the boat by having surgery. Well, today he finally said, "If it was me, I would have them out." That's all I needed to hear. I know it will be a pretty straightforward laproscopic procedure, and I am not worried about the surgery itself at all. But it just feels like another huge punch in the gut. Another glaring reminder of all that cancer has robbed from me. I feel like I have been dismantled piece by piece of all that makes me a woman - the loss of my hair, my eyelashes, my breasts, my ovaries, my ability to bear children. It is a pain that runs so very deep and having my ovaries removed opens that wound up...a wound I have tried so desperately to close up and allow to heal. My new treatment plan will consist of two new drugs I will write more about later. They are extremely expensive so I have to wait to start them until I receive insurance authorization and I don't know when that will be. I will take an oral pill daily for 3 weeks and then have 1 week off, then repeat. The other drug is an intramuscular injection that I will receive in the good ole' tush. I will receive it every 2 weeks for the first 3 rounds and then every 4 weeks after that. There are side effects of these new drugs that are highly likely, including a significant decline in my blood counts which will place me at high risk for infections as well as cause fatigue. There are many other possibilities but these are the most likely. I will have blood work completed every 2 weeks to make sure my counts stay in a range that is safe enough to receive the treatment. So this is where we are, friends. This is the plan until this disease starts crawling back up from the darkness and threatening to rock our world once again. But, with each attack it wages, I will beat it back down and chase it right back into the shadows...running it out of the sunshine where I choose to live my life. Please keep me in your prayers. I am feeling a bit overwhelmed and down right now, which is not a place I like to be. Please keep Mike and my family in your prayers. Spefically, please pray for wisdom for our medical team to help us to make the right choices for my care; for strength to endure whatever may come our way; and for faith and perserverance while remembering that we are in God's hands and are loved and cared for every step of the way. I promise to write more soon and keep you all updated. Thank you for always being the most incredible support system anyone could every ask for. It is appreciated more than you will ever know! xoxo, Meg Have you ever had one of those out of body moments where you feel like you are floating above your physical self and somehow watching what is unfolding rather than truly experiencing it? That's how I felt on New Year's Eve during my first radiation treatment. It was almost exactly three years ago that I first laid on that radiation table. I have said this before but it's true in this circumstance as well...some days it seems like yesterday that I was diagnosed and first went through radiation, and other days it feels like a lifetime ago. As I laid on my back in that lovely hospital gown and looked up into the bright flourescent lights, reality struck me and I almost couldn't believe I was there. It hasn't necessarily been smooth sailing, but all in all, I have been doing amazingly well throughout the past three years since I last had radiation. And although I had a sneaking suspicion that something was wrong, it still takes me by surprise sometimes that I am in the thick of things again..waging a full out battle against this disease. Once again, I have nothing but the best things to say about the amazing Karmanos Cancer Institute where I am treated. My radiation oncologist, Dr. M has made me feel very confident in this process and I am grateful for that. Originally Dr. M stated that he really wanted to do a special targeted high dose radiation called Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy - also known as Cyberknife or Gamma Knife treatment. You can read more about it here but basically it would be a higer dose radiation that only requires 3 treatments and has less side effects. We did the entire simulation for this which required a custom molded cast of sorts of my body which would ensure I wouldn't move during radiation, as well as a bar across my abdomen so that I couldn't take a deep breath which would cause too much internal movement. I had the tattooing done as well so I could be lined up perfectly on the radiation table. During the simulation they also do a few CT scans to determine exactly what the radiation field will be that will receive treatment. Unfortunately, the night before I started radiation, Dr. M called me to say that once he completed the planning after the simulation, he realized that too much of my spinal cord would be within the radiation field. The spinal cord is able to take some radiation, but not at the intensity that the Cyberknife would be. So I have been receiving more tradiational radiation treatment like I did to my chest 3 years ago but thankfully, I only need 10 treatments. I head to radiation each morning before work or on my way home from work and truthfully, it's a super easy and straightforward treatment. It's pretty similiar to what I wrote in my previous post 3 years ago about radiation so if you want to read more details about the entire process, check that out here. I have completed 7 treatments so far and I am so happy to report that I am definitely feeling relief. My hip is feeling much better and although I am not painfree, the difference is truly noticeable and has restored my ability to sleep and relax comfortably while sitting. I am barely taking any medicine for pain and my overall quality of life is significantly improved. So cheers to that!!! Thank you for the continued support. The calls, texts, flowers, blog comments...it all means so much to me. Hope 2015 brings continued happiness and good health for us all! xoxo, Meghan A glimpse at my Groundhog Day routine at radiation.... Here I am! Did you think I forgot about you? A little sneak peek of our adventure in Maui.... A new addition to our family! Meet Gracie! On Tuesday I had my radiation simulation, including another awesome tattoo...
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