Day 26: I'm Nuclear

Surgery scheduled for tomorrow (and other good news)

Despite my horrible news from Friday (testing positive for the BRCA 1 mutation) -- I still have to carry on, right?

So, my surgery is still on for tomorrow.  Just to remove the area around the cancer.    I am not sure how quickly I'll be able to recover.  I hope it's pretty quick because I still have Christmas shopping to do!

Yesterday morning, I had a chest X-ray done as per pre-op protocol.  Later yesterday afternoon,  my nurse called to tell me that the x-ray came back "completely normal" - which means there was no evidence of any cancerous areas in the lungs or on the ribs.  Nothing is 100%, but that seemed like incrementally pretty good news to me.

Also, this afternoon, I went into the hospital for another pre-op procedure called sentinel node mapping, which is basically a fancy phrase that means they figure out which lymph node to dissect during surgery to look to see if the cancer has spread.

In order to get this mapping done, I had to report to the Nuclear Science Department (which sounds like something out of the Cold War era), and get injected with a radioactive pharmaceutical that then spreads all throughout my lymph nodes.  The technicians photograph the movement of the fluid to determine which lymph node is the sentinel one that needs to be dissected.  Then, tomorrow my surgeon, Dr. Nora Hansen, will make sure to grab that lymph node during the surgery.   They will dissect it and won't have the results until my post-op meeting with Dr. Hansen, which is scheduled for the 21st.  That is the date I will learn my "survival statistics" (gulp).   I'm hopeful that things will turn out well.

The most important thing about this surgery is that the CANCER WILL BE OUT!  I can't wait for this mass to be out of my body. I sort of want them to save it for me in a jar so I can look it in the eyes and tell it that I'm not going to let that gross grey mass beat me. 

In other news, I bid on a couple of awesome paintings in the Leslie Hindman fine art auction on Sunday and won them!  Check out my favorite piece (it's huge!).

Finally, Joe & I started looking at some diamonds in the upcoming LH jewelry auction.  Here's a picture of us diamond shopping.  I felt so glamorous!

So, it's nice to have somthing to look forward to at the end of all of this.

Joe and I just got back from a wonderful pre-surgery dinner at "Ruxbin" - a very hip neighborhood restaurant.  I had the superfood quinoa to get my strength up for a super recovery.

I came home to a beautiful bouquet of flowers with a note that read, "Bonnie, We would like you to know that you are in our thoughts during this difficult time.  You have our support and we wish you a speedy recovery. All the best, Your Research Team" 

Aww....that was sweet of the people at my office to do that.

Okay, all. Please, please please, put me in your thoughts and prayers tomorrow.   I hope all goes well and that I'll get good news from the miraculous Dr. Hansen on the 21st.

Peace and love and joy and health.
Bonnie