The Circumcision

Unspeakable speaks......
I have been talking about the bilateral mastectomy that took place on Tuesday. Well I decided to take this opportunity to educate those that are not familiar with what a mastectomy looks like. So I have attached a diagram for those of you that are visual. Please review the picture to the left.
The spots indicated by the green are your lymph nodes, and obviously, the pink portion is the breast. This is a simple mastectomy, if you conduct this procedure on the other breast, it would accurately illustrate the procedure that I will underwent earlier this week. I want to make this next point, absolutely clear. "Every breast cancer case is different." If you have friends or family that have breast cancer, based on their situation, they may or may not have to undergo a procedure of this magnitude. But for me it was absolutely necessary.
Because I was diagnosed with stage three (3) breast cancer, which means that the cancer had spread to my lymph nodes, and I was able to physically feel the cancer in my body. It was necessary to do a surgery to remove the lymph nodes that had been previously infected, to eliminate the risk of the cancer spreading to other areas of my body. My decision to remove my breasts was based on several reasons. The first being that it has been discovered that I was born with the "cancer gene"or also known as a BRCA gene (we will get into this more in another post). The second reason, is that based on the fact that I have the "cancer gene," I would be at risk for secondary and third cancers in my breast, ovaries, and uterus, all which will have to be removed within the next year. Thirdly, I don't want to have to revisit this experience ever again.....I know that I said it has been a good experience, in that I have matured through it. But the reality is that this is not an easy experience, and once this is over, I want it to be over!

After my bilateral mastectomy, I will take a few weeks to heal. Next week, I will meet with my surgeon (who is absolutely phenomenal) to get the okay to move forward with radiation. Once I receive the "go ahead" from my surgeon, I will begin radiation for 5-6 weeks to kill off any "deadly cells" that they may have missed in the mastectomy. This will complete the oncology "protocol" that I was given in an effort to heal me from breast cancer.