Shell Shock

How did we even get here? 

January 15, I found a breast lump. I didn't think much of it, because I'd just stopped nursing Luke the month before. But I made an appointment with my OB, who also thought it must be nursing-related. She referred me to a breast center for a mammogram and an ultrasound. 

That appointment was March 9. The radiologist there was looking at all the images and said, "I'm very concerned about this. There's a mass (which is what I had felt, that measures 3.8 x 3.3 x 1.6 cm.  In addition to that, there are calcifications (which look like sprinkles across the images) that measure 7x6x4 cm. We're going to bring you back in a week or so for a biopsy of the mass and also this one lymph node that looks suspicious. Here's how biopsies go, blah blah, do you have any questions?" 

I said, "When you say 'very concerned,' what do you mean by that?"

"Oh, I'm very concerned that this is a breast cancer mass. Now, did you have any questions about the biopsy?"

Um no, no questions at all, thankyouverymuch. 

So fast forward to March 19, when I went to MD Anderson for my biopsy. They also redid the imaging, because they like to have all their own tests. Before I even got the results, the diagnosing doctor said she's confident that it is breast cancer, and she'd call in a couple of days with the results.

The short story: the lymph node biopsy came back negative, but the core biopsy of the mass came back as Ductal Carcinoma in Situ (DCIS). This is essentially stage 0 breast cancer, meaning it had not spread out of the ducts. She even said that it's not technically cancer, but precancer. 

What does all that even mean?! Here's an explanation of how I understand things: you've got normal cells in your body. They're going along, dividing and making new cells like they're supposed to. One day, something messes up in the reproduction process and a change occurs. Now, you've got an abnormal cell. It's dividing a little faster than normal, and being weird, maybe looking a bit strange, but it's not cancer. As these new abnormal cells continue to reproduce, another change happens, and they become DCIS cells. Now, they're cancerous in that they divide much faster than normal cells and crowd out the healthy ones by stealing all the nutrients, but they lack the ability to go anywhere else in the body. Hence the "in situ" part of the name - they have to stay in their original place, the ducts. As these cells grow and reproduce, another change happens and they become invasive cancer cells - they now have the ability to spread. 

So, that's my diagnosis and a little lesson for you. And from here on out, I'm not typing out 'breast cancer' and 'cancer' all the time. Frankly, I just don't want to give it that much attention. So, you'll see bc and c showing up a lot, and you can just know what they mean.