Love Story

In the mix of being forced to make some of the hardest decisions of my life, one of the best things in my life happened. I think it’s time to bring some joy to my blog. April 8, is probably one of the best days of this entire year, and in fact it will be one of the best days of my entire life, no questions asked. In honor of Veteran’s Day, and in chronological order of my hectic life, was the post-deployment ball. Matthew tells the story so much better than I do, but, I will try my best.

Matt has been one of my best friends and biggest supporters since we first were connected three years ago. You see, it all started with a simple Facebook message while he was stationed in Germany; wishing him a Merry Christmas and thanking him for his service. Throughout the following year we messaged randomly catching each other up on our lives. I actually tried to send him a letter during the summer of 2014 to which he claims the mailman never delivered. It wasn’t until a year after my first message to him was when we would first officially meet at the Elmira-Corning Regional Airport. He hadn’t slept in days, hadn’t had a solid meal since he left Germany, all those things would have made me miserable, not him though. He was instantly cracking jokes and a smile never left his face. I enjoyed dinner with him and his family at Applebees, I drove home that night with sore cheekbones from all the laughter, and in that moment I realized how important of a person Matt was going to be in my life.   A week came and went and I found myself back at the airport afraid I had missed his flight, afraid that I didn’t get to say goodbye, and afraid of when I was going to see him again. I ran around the airport tears in my eyes, searching for the man in the camo hat, and when I finally found him a huge relief came across me, I got to wish him off to Germany. We continued to message and skype, and because of the time difference I was staying up well into the night to get to know him better.

However, it wouldn’t be until late October of 2015 when I would see him again. I got to spend two days with Matthew before he would deploy to Afghanistan. Deployment was challenging. I went days without hearing from him, a man I was so accustomed to talking to every single day, all day. I prayed so hard for his safe return, and in those prayers I came to realization that I couldn’t just be friends with Matt anymore, for I had fallen completely and head over heels in love with him. It wasn’t until the tail end of his deployment during another choppy skype call that he asked me to go on a date with him upon his return. Matt was one of the first people I told about my cancer diagnosis, it was only days after his return home, and I think he was in as much shock as I was; however, he assured me that everything was going to be okay.

Fast forward a few weeks to where he asked me to be his date to the post-deployment ball. I have never been more honored to be attached to someone’s hip than Matthews. In fact I have never been more proud of a person than I am him, his work ethic, his dedication, his drive, his sense of humor, the sacrifices he’s made, all of which are qualities that I admired about him.  In a conversation over dinner, he asked me to be his girlfriend, and of course, I couldn’t turn that awesome offer down.

You may be asking what the point of telling our ‘love story’ has to do with my cancer journey. Matthew had every reason to run away and turn his back on me but instead he pursued me and wanted to be by my side through it all. He was committed, he was all in.  *Cue tears now* I was going to become really sick, and no one knew the extent of how sick I was going to be. He knew that I was facing a monster that was set out to destroy me; that I was going to lose my hair, gain weight, get sick, receive scars, have possible infertility issues, and change my physique permanently. If that isn’t unconditional love, I don’t know what is. We built the foundation of our relationship, we built something on what tears other couples apart (3% divorce rate for active duty members in 2014, and 21% divorce rate for woman with a serious illness). He assured me that this was only going to be a hiccup in the grand scheme of things. I’m blessed and so grateful to have such an amazing support team and so many people loving me through this journey.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYNOXRifXKQ

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/02/25/military-divorce-rate-hits-lowest-level-in-10-years.html

http://www.cnn.com/2011/LIVING/07/21/sick.couples.o/

 

A Series Of Events- Part 2

The next month and a half was full of several trips to the hospital for appointments; here are a few of the major ones:

March 30, 2016

This is the first time I met with my oncologist Dr. Thakar. I walked in to the department to register and when I looked around; all I saw were people with white hair. I certainly felt like an odd ball, that I didn't belong here. He answered all of the questions we had regarding chemotherapy. He gave us his opinion on what chemotherapy treatment plan he recommended. The plan to being cancer free was to undergo chemotherapy until October or November, complete surgery a month later, and do radiation after if needed, and complete ten years of hormonal therapy.  We discussed how fast I should start treatment, and if I was interested in freezing my eggs. I left this appointment with more questions than I went in with. I was being forced to make decisions about my life that was never in a million years even crossed my mind. I found out that until a plan was set in stone my life was chaotic and frustrating. Not knowing what your next year and half consists of is one of the worst things about cancer, the unknown- your life basically turns into a mess, a mess that you really have no control over.

March 31, 2016

One side effect that chemotherapy has is hair loss. After doing some research I found out that most breast cancer patients lose their hair within the first two weeks of starting chemotherapy. As I have always had relatively long hair I was nervous to see myself in the mirror being bald. As cancer takes all your control of your life away, I wanted to have control over losing my hair. Even getting trims at the hairdresser in the past was traumatic for me. Heck, there was a time in my life where I only would get one hair cut a year, however, I had nothing left to lose. So, on this day, I just walked into a salon at the mall and had them give me a pixie cut- and I LOVED it!

April 4, 2016

Another potential side effect of chemotherapy is that it can affect your heart. Dr. Thakar ordered for me to get an echocardiogram to get a baseline of my heart before starting chemo. An echocardiogram is a test of the action of the heart using ultrasound waves to produce a visual display. This appointment was pretty neat because you get to see and hear your heart. As always, Mom was at this appointment and she teared up stating, “The last time I heard your heartbeat, was when you were inside of me.” She’s been amazing throughout this entire process, and I am so grateful for everything she has done for me.

Read Morea about Echos Here: http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/echocardiogram          

April 6, 2016

Today was the day we (Mom, Dad and I) would venture into New York City to receive a second opinion at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). MSKCC was amazing, their staff was so friendly and accommodating I was able to meet with several key players that help treat this disease without having appointments for many of them. I realized while I was there, sitting in the waiting room that there are several young woman under the age of 40 that have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Breast cancer isn’t as taboo in young people as many would think; and in a sense, that was comforting. Dr. Comen, gave us her recommended chemotherapy treatment plan, as did Dr. Kristein about surgery. It was a long day, and now I had to make decisions. The worst part about this is making decisions, I rarely can decide what to have for dinner let alone make life changing decisions about my health. However, I had no choice.

 

A Series Of Events-Part 1

The next month and a half was full of several trips to the hospital for appointments; here are a few of the major ones:

March 24, 2016

A little under a week later I found myself with my dad, stepdad and mom in the office of general surgery. The girl that never broke a bone, never has been really sick, the only surgery she had was a tonsillectomy, was meeting with a breast surgeon. A surgeon that specialized in getting rid of breast cancer—what was going on?! I sat there with my pages upon pages of questions I had for this entire process I was about to begin. It hit me, right there in that office, I had cancer and my life will never be the same, ever.  I’m usually good at holding back tears, but something about this topic made me cry, an inconsolable cry, and it has taken a while to know that it is okay to cry. I met my nurse navigator, who would be the middle man during this entire process. She explained the type of cancer I had, and answered all the questions that she could answer. Then we met with Dr. Gillott, the breast surgeon. He stated that I was the youngest patient he ever had as he examined me. I have come in first several times from various things in my life, and I have wanted to be first at the many things I have pursued, but I never imagined nor did I want to be first at this. His recommendation was a bilateral mastectomy (a surgery to remove both breasts), although I learned that, that is not the only option when it comes to surgery. I really liked Dr. Gillott, and I felt like we clicked, so imagine my emotions when he told me he would be retiring in June and they hadn’t found his replacement yet.  This added a lot of stress, panic, and additional questions that I was not expecting during this process.

March 25, 2016

My cancer is fueled by hormones, which means that my birth control (which controls my hormones) had to go. To remove the Nexplanon in my arm; they give a numbing shot, and cut the skin where the Nexplanon is placed to get it out. What would have been a five minute procedure turned into a half hour procedure, as there was an issue upon removal. Scar number 1 of who knows how many.

March 25, 2016

This was one of the more challenging appointments I had. An MRI is a test that uses magnetic field and pulses of radio wave energy to take pictures of organs and structures inside the body. A breast MRI is more invasive than mammography because a contrast agent is given through an IV before the procedure. You lie face down with your breasts almost in how I can describe them as bottomless squares. The procedure itself is painless once you get your IV put in, but it is extremely loud- it almost sounds like a jackhammer. They give you headphones and let you chose whatever music you want to listen to from Sirius XM Radio you want. They give you a call button that you hold in your hands, you have to lay completely still for the entire process. They take a series of pictures and midway through the procedure they inject the dye (contrast agent) to enhance and improve the pictures.  Overall, the entire process is probably an 45 minutes to an hour.

Almost one hour of lying there in your own thoughts, in a machine that is as big as a car, that sounds as loud as a spaceship taking off- okay that’s doable. They got me all hooked up and they pushed me into the machine. When the machine first started the sound scared the living daylights out of me, something that I just was not expecting. The kind staff at Guthrie- Sayre, allow you to choose what station you want to listen to. I chose to listen to Hits 1 (today’s hits), out of all the hits that could be played during that seemingly short amount of time was Charlie Pouth’s ‘One Call Away’. One week from being diagnosed, one day from being told I was going to lose both my breasts that my appearance as a whole was going to change completely, was this a joke? Was this song really playing during this procedure? I felt my eyes start to water, and I knew that I was on the verge of ugly crying. I laid there in complete silence as the tears poured out of my eyes. I was crying so hard, my breathing became erratic, my nose started to run, and here I had to lie completely still. I couldn’t sit up, I couldn’t wipe my nose, so I laid there; I was determined to not hit the call button, I wanted to get this appointment over with. It took the next few songs for me to collect my composure. However, I was embarrassed when they pulled me out of the machine, for looking like such a mess.

Read Morea bout MRI’s here: http://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/magnetic-resonance-imaging-mri#1

Charlie Pouth’s One Call Away: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxuY9FET9Y4