Update from a long day

Today was a long day, but a good day. Much information was passed along!

At the tumor board this morning, everyone agreed that whatever is happening in my lymph nodes in my body are unrelated to my breast cancer. So, we are looking at them as two separate problems.

The news about my breast cancer is quite encouraging. The oncologist (Dr. Merin, who I liked very much) has staged me as a Stage I breast cancer, and the "grade "of my cancer is a 1, or the lowest, in regards to growth and aggression. This bumps me into the most positive of prognosis! If I proceed with appropriate chemotherapy, radiation, and an artomatase inhibitor (tamoxifen-- to stop my body from producing the hormones that feed my cancer), my prognosis for survival and lack of recurrence is about 98%! Please join me in praising God for this excellent prognosis!

I am beginning tamoxifen tonight. My tumor has been sent off for genetic testing (called oncotyping) which will help us determine the appropriate chemotherapy (if any) to use, and chemo will be followed by radiation. I will see the oncologist on June 2 to get those results and lay our plan.

On the lymph node front, the tumor board did not think we needed to biopsy any nodes at this time. The problem there could be anything from basically nothing to another type of cancer. The oncologist has ordered a battery of blood work to begin trying to figure out what is going on there. I should get those results on June 2 also.

So here are some prayer request specifics:

• Please pray for excellent feedback from the oncotyping and for an excellent plan for treatment to be made on June 2.
• Please pray now for good success from the treatment and good toleration of the treatments with little side effect.
• Please pray for little or no side effects from the tamoxifen.
• Please pray that those pesky lymph nodes will be a non-issue.
  
• Please pray as we lay plans to attend DIII track nationals next week, and for Tim as he runs tomorrow night, hoping to qualify in the 5K. He is now 15th on the 10K list, and they take 16 competitors. Pray he will stay qualified!
• Please pray for my mama's heart as I need to cancel the plan to visit Ben and Elsa after Nationals. It is perhaps a little thing, but the plan had always been to include our first visit to their home, and now that needs to be postponed, and I am sad!

And so many praises-- Just praise God for the good news and prognosis, and the way He keeps carrying me!