Its OCTOBER, that means Halloween and Breast Cancer Awareness in our home. When I thought about what I wanted to say to people, I really put thought into it. I took my time thinking about what to say, how to say it and then I realized people need hope. No matter what someone is facing in life today, HOPE gets us through it. For me October is all about sharing my journey with metastatic breast cancer and how having hope has changed everything for me.
On January 13, 2021, I felt like I had no hope. My husband and and I sat in an exam room waiting for the doctor to give me my diagnosis. To this point we know it’s breast cancer, we believe we have caught it early and we are about to hear the treatment plan. We sat in the room for an hour, no exaggeration. Finally the surgeon walked in, introduced herself and delivered to me what felt like a death sentence. We did not catch it early Mrs. Mattingly. It appears to be in your sternum. We are looking at stage 3 potentially stage 4 breast cancer. I listened carefully, or so I think I tried to listen as I slumped forward in my chair and gasped for air. How is this happening? How did I get here? How do I get through this? Can I get through this? How will Toby cope with all of this? What about my daughters, how will they take the news? What will Toby’s girls think? How will they react? How do I protect all of them from this diagnosis? Will I live to see our first anniversary? Will I see our grandkids be born? Will we get to travel? How does a blended family deal with this diagnosis? How do I tell my mom? How do we tell Toby’s parents? Yes all of those thoughts went through my head in the immediate moments after hearing its stage 3 possibly stage 4.
The next step was to have a PETSCAN done. A petscan is a full body scan, where they inject radioactive sugar into your body. Cancer loves sugar. The science is that areas of cancer will light up on the scan. This is another diagnostic tool used to help diagnose metastatic cancer or multiple areas of cancer.
On January 20, 2021 Toby and I met my medical oncologist for the first time. She had the results from the petscan. To say it was overwhelming to hear all the areas in my body that lit up like a Christmas tree would be an understatement. I had what appeared to be large tumors in my spine, spots on my kidney, liver, lung and just about every bone from my neck to my knees. I looked at her and asked if I could beat this? She looked back at me and said, “first we need to know how many cancers we are dealing with, then we come up with a treatment plan.” Wait, what? This could be more than one cancer? How is this happening? How the hell do I get through this moment? My oncologist advised that it is very rare for breast cancer to metastasize to the kidney. It only happens about 3% time. Biopsies are needed on my kidney and my lung. Then we proceed with a treatment plan.
On January 27, 2021 I under went biopsies for my kidney and my lung. What a roller coaster of emotions I felt on this day. I will share about this experience in another post. On January 29, 2021 Toby and I were back at my oncologists office to hear the results from the biopsies. As my doctor entered the room she appeared energetic and happy, I hoped that meant we were gonna finally get some “good news”. As she began to read the results I could see that the results from the biopsies were consistent with the original breast cancer diagnosis. There was more medical jargon than I could comprehend in the moment. As she concluded the results she said, “this is one cancer, your treatment is to shut down hormone positive, her 2 negative breast cancer.” With tears in my eyes I asked, Is this a win? She confirmed this is a huge win. Lung and renal cancers are typically much more aggressive cancers and have different treatment plans than your metastatic breast cancer. Hearing that, I was ready. Lets attack this aggressively and give me every opportunity to live as long as possible with the best quality of life. As we got back to the truck, Toby asked me how I felt? Honestly, I felt like I got my life back. A metastatic breast cancer diagnosis and I felt like I got my life back, WOW!!! I left MD Anderson that day with HOPE.