Recalculating.....Recalculating

Oh my God, what a day. I did some more research on the trans flap surgery so I knew what was going to happen, and how I should prepare. I had done some before seeing the dr. last week, but not extensively. I had decided before seeing him that it was just too much surgery and recovery, and that having a mascectomy was enough to do at one time. But when I saw the dr. he assured me that the recovery wasn't that bad at all, and that the end result was much better. Mostly, it would be better if I did radiation. Well today I read story after story of women who took 8 - 12 weeks to get back to work - of being in a great deal of pain for weeks, even hunched over, and some who had pain for years afterward. It was pretty scary, and irreversable. So I sent an email to the dr. with a whole list of questions. When he called, he admitted that his first choice is usually implants, but because of the recommendation for radiation, he made that plan b for me. I told him I did not plan on doing radiation, and would only consider it if I had node involvement, and then, probably only on the nodes. He did say that while his patients, and he has done hundreds, have very rarely complained about the extreme recovery and issues I spoke of, that this was major surgery, and he understood my concerns. After our conversation, he thought that doing the implant would be the best choice, and if I was unhappy with the implant, then I could do the tram at a later date.


Soooooooooo, I'll still have surgery on the 25th, but I'll only be in the hospital for 2 nights. I'm not thrilled about having a silicone implant - but the tradeoff of such major surgery that is irreversable, just didn't seem to make sense. I do feel better about this. I can't imagine going through all that recovery - while I'm doing chemo.  So hopefully, I've made the right decision. That has been the hardest part of this whole journey - just being sure I made the right decision for me. Everyone has such strong perspectives about cancer. But I'm not everyone. I have to make them for me.