So much to update and so many things to deal with

Well here we are again, again somewhere I never thought I would be.  We had a great walk and overall our team of 8 AMAZING ladies raised over $17,500.  The weekend overall raised over $4.2 million just in Santa Barbara alone.  I am again so thankful for the amazing support I have had through this entire  process.  It is so hard to look back on such an amazing weekend of strength, love, support, emotion and bonding from where we are looking now.  This process is such a roller coster with many ups and downs as well as unknowns but NOTHING can take away that weekend and what we accomplished.

When I returned from the walk I had some swelling on my left ankle and it was painful to walk so I made an appointment with my doctor thinking maybe the chemo was slowing my recovery or something. I also was having some headaches so she ordered a head scan just in case, the headaches would come and go and get so bad at times I would have to stop what I was doing and just sit.  Triple negative breast cancer has a tendency to reoccur in the brain, so I went to the scan the week of Halloween and had a follow up with my Oncologist on Halloween.  Around this same time I felt a "lump" in my left armpit that didn't feel right so I added that to my list of things I needed to have looked at.

Why is it that when you look back at things they all become so clear.  It's like I want to stand on the mountain top 6 weeks ago and smack myself right in the face and tell everyone I came in contact with that something was WRONG and I knew it.  I just didn't feel right and knew something was going on but didn't know how to express it or how to say it.  It all just seamed like a bunch of small things that didn't really add up to anything but I had a gut feeling that something was stirring.

The scans confirmed a few things and here is the list.  The cancer has spread to my brain and I now have a tumor about the size of the quarter on the front left side.  I also have 3 enlarged lymph nodes on my left side that need to be biopsied.  I have a few spots they want to follow up on, one on my lungs and some abnormalities showing on my left femur as well.  But more on all of that later, we have to take it all one step at a time and right now we are starting with the brain.  I was admitted to the hospital on Halloween and stayed for 4 days. They have started me on a high does of steroids as well as pain meds to help contain the tumor and manage the swelling which is causing much of the pain.  Some of the other things I am dealing with is balance I get very dizzy very quickly, lack of appetite, confusion and speech, such as not really being able to say what I want to say.  I know the words but can't get them from my brain to my mouth, it's like I lose them on the way.  So please don't judge me that my "writing" is the way it is.

So here is the plan, I spent the day at the doctor today having meetings with the treatment team, neurosurgeon, radiologist and nurse coordinator.  I will be going in for brain surgery on Monday (really brain surgery) something I never thought I would be saying, let alone doing.  I will be in the hospital for 3-4 days for them to remove the tumor and manage the swelling.  After I have recovered a bit from the surgery I will have brain mapping done for the next steps that involves one large dose of targeted radiation on the area of my brain that the tumor existed.

As always the hardest part of all of this is talking to the kids about it, not knowing how much to say but trying to keep them as informed as we thought they should be.  We know they are worried and they are getting older and understand more. We want to be the ones to tell them and not have it be a subject they can't talk about or worse, they do their own research online.  If you know my kids or not I just ask that you keep them in your prayers or if you see them just give them a smile.  I am not afraid, I am not scared but I won't say I am not nervous, they are cutting into my head.  I do feel thankful that I have been through this process before, we don't have all the answers and yet need to make decisions on the answers we do have.  Please bare with us at this time as we deal with it all in our own time. I will blog as much as I can to keep you updated on my progress but will be doing my best to stay off of my phone and Facebook. I only hope my journey can help one person!

Love to you all!