My cancer story has been more of a linking of miracles than a sad story. On the morning of Sunday, March 4th, 2007, I was dressing when my hand ran over something on the side of my right breast. A chill ran over me as I felt for a closer inspection. Indeed, there was a very obvious pea-sized lump on the far side of my breast. We had house guests at the time, and I didnít mention it to my husband until bedtime. When I wanted to show it to him, I wasnít able to locate it. I had to feel very deep into the breast to locate it. Odd after it had presented itself so obviously that morning. Miracle # 1.
I saw my family doctor on Tuesday, who recommended me to a fantastic local cancer surgeon. On Friday, she did the lumpectomy, followed later in the month by many scans and finally lymph node surgery. By the end of the month, we knew that we had been extremely lucky. The lymph nodes came back clean, and the lump was a stage one, which is very early detection.
Now we were faced with long term treatment. My oncologist recommended radiation and chemotherapy. He also mentioned a possible breast reduction. The larger the breast, the more places for cancer to recur. We really wanted to avoid the drastic treatments of radiation and chemo if possible, so after much discussion with my husband, we elected to have bilateral mastectomy, followed by reconstruction. These are all hard choices, but we opted for as long a life as possible without too much worry.
On May 4th, I underwent double mastectomy and came through the surgery beautifully. Early the next morning, the nurse helped me to the restroom. As soon as she closed the door, I realized I was in trouble. I remember reaching for the nurses call chain, and nothing more. When I awoke, I had a ventilator down my throat, and was informed that I had a blood clot that had been hiding in my right leg. It chose that morning to move, and it had traveled straight to my heart and stopped it. If I had been at home that morning, or even still flat in the bed, I could have very quietly died. Instead, I was able to grab the chain and call the nurses. Miracle #2.
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The rest of the story, I missed, but I know it by my family telling me. My husband was awakened from his cot in my room with crash carts banging into the door and nurses from all over the floor converging on us. They moved me to a hard board, and immediately began CPR on me. It was about 7 A.M. on a Saturday morning, and no cardiologists on duty in the hospital at that hour. My cancer surgeon, who only lived a few blocks from the hospital, was called, and arrived in short order. While she was running through the parking lot, she came upon a cardiologist who was there to visit another patient, a man who went to our church. Miracle #3.
She grabbed him by the arm and ran, dragging him with her, to my room. By that time, the nurses had been performing CPR for 25-30 minutes. The cardiologist very quickly performed a procedure to break up the blood clot on my heart, and got it started beating again. The cardiologist, combined with the precious nurses at Covenant Lakeside who worked so hard doing CPR for so long to keep me alive are my Miracle #4.
The days from the Saturday of the pulmonary occlusion to the next Saturday were very difficult, but I never doubted for a minute that I would recover and go home. I found out later that many of the hospital personnel were not so sure, but I knew that a God that would bring me safely through what I had been through was not going to quit on me now. Today, I am fine. No brain damage. (Well, sometimes I blame old-age forgetfulness on my CPR time.) My breast reconstruction is completed, and I am cancer free. I am once again enjoying my life, my husband, my family, and my businesses, and cancer is something I think of very seldom. I sometimes even think that my cancer saved my life by having me at the right place at the right time. Thank you, God. My Miracle #5.
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