A long time since I last wrote.
Going back to work has been hard work. I wanted to start the new academic year off, to be there to settle the new class in, to set things up how I would want them, rather than stay off work till all the treatments were done, and come back to take over 'someone else's' class.
As it has turned out, working mornings only is about as much as I can manage. I get very tired, and I'm not as clever and quick as I like to think I used to be. People at work have been very kind and it's working out all right at the moment. People at home see me go to work every day and assume I'm back to normal, and cut me no slack. I am having difficulty giving up my 'patient status'; I still want to deserve pampering and be offered help. Don't know if I really need it, it's just post chemo fatigue, nothing a good bit of stiff upper lip won't cure, eh!
Radiotherapy might make me even more tired and sore too, so I might need some time off work to recover from that as the weeks wear on.
The radiotherapy people needed chasing at the end of September and eventually I was given a planning session on 4th October and 15 days of sessions has started yesterday, 14th October.
I don't like the treatment so far. It is very perfunctory and mechanical, cold, clinical, impersonal, undignified and indelicate. I feel exposed and vulnerable lying arms above my head, naked to the waist, absolutely still, while technicians talk to each other in code, swapping numbers and bits of words, prod me bodily into a 'perfect pose' and then leave the room to zap me by remote control, return, reposition things, leave and zap me again. They tattoed permanent guide marks on me last week and daily they over-write these with marker pen, to make big enough marks to line up their machinery. I'm closing my eyes now, and pretending it's not happening to me. ("On a beach in Greece, on a beach in Greece" etc etc)
My breast care nurse, who hasn't been in touch with me to find out how I am since seroma clinic days, is leaving her post next week to work full time as a breast care nurse in the private sector. I requested a meeting with her to look through her file of photos and have a discussion about reconstructive surgery before she is gone for good. We met on Wednesday... I know I can't get started on reconstruction till at least 6 months after radiotherapy but I don't want to wait any longer than necessary, so I'm planning ahead.
It looks like the whole reconstruction plastic surgery will be a major major undertaking in itself. I will need 3 months off work minimum. I shan't be able to drive for 6 weeks after surgery. And there'll be quite a few more surgeries with recovery time in between before the whole thing is done.
The photos I saw were all taken quite soon after plastic surgery. It looks horrendous. I would have liked to have seen some of women 6 or 12 months afterwards - will scars actually fade? how long does that take?
Bottom line is - you don't get a pair of lovely boobs - it's not a boob job. It's a patchwork stuffed mound sewn in, to save you wearing a prosthesis in your bra. It's main advantage is that you look normal when wearing clothes - you get the symmetrical cleavage back, and can lean forward more confidently. None of the women in her photos looked normal or symmetrical in the buff. Once the reconstruction has settled you can have the other side lifted to match. Terrific. Why can't they make the new breast better match the one you already have? The whole nipple construction thing looks rather Heath Robinson to me. But what do I know? Plus, the whole breast will be pretty much sensation free - which is rubbish, like when your arm goes to sleep. My upper arm is still numb on the underside now.
I had foolishly wanted more. Can't believe how upset and bereaved I still feel about this 'amputation'. I sort of wanted reconstructive surgery to make it all better, back to okay again. It doesn't. But, it's what there is.
Going back to work has been hard work. I wanted to start the new academic year off, to be there to settle the new class in, to set things up how I would want them, rather than stay off work till all the treatments were done, and come back to take over 'someone else's' class.
As it has turned out, working mornings only is about as much as I can manage. I get very tired, and I'm not as clever and quick as I like to think I used to be. People at work have been very kind and it's working out all right at the moment. People at home see me go to work every day and assume I'm back to normal, and cut me no slack. I am having difficulty giving up my 'patient status'; I still want to deserve pampering and be offered help. Don't know if I really need it, it's just post chemo fatigue, nothing a good bit of stiff upper lip won't cure, eh!
Radiotherapy might make me even more tired and sore too, so I might need some time off work to recover from that as the weeks wear on.
The radiotherapy people needed chasing at the end of September and eventually I was given a planning session on 4th October and 15 days of sessions has started yesterday, 14th October.
I don't like the treatment so far. It is very perfunctory and mechanical, cold, clinical, impersonal, undignified and indelicate. I feel exposed and vulnerable lying arms above my head, naked to the waist, absolutely still, while technicians talk to each other in code, swapping numbers and bits of words, prod me bodily into a 'perfect pose' and then leave the room to zap me by remote control, return, reposition things, leave and zap me again. They tattoed permanent guide marks on me last week and daily they over-write these with marker pen, to make big enough marks to line up their machinery. I'm closing my eyes now, and pretending it's not happening to me. ("On a beach in Greece, on a beach in Greece" etc etc)
My breast care nurse, who hasn't been in touch with me to find out how I am since seroma clinic days, is leaving her post next week to work full time as a breast care nurse in the private sector. I requested a meeting with her to look through her file of photos and have a discussion about reconstructive surgery before she is gone for good. We met on Wednesday... I know I can't get started on reconstruction till at least 6 months after radiotherapy but I don't want to wait any longer than necessary, so I'm planning ahead.
It looks like the whole reconstruction plastic surgery will be a major major undertaking in itself. I will need 3 months off work minimum. I shan't be able to drive for 6 weeks after surgery. And there'll be quite a few more surgeries with recovery time in between before the whole thing is done.
The photos I saw were all taken quite soon after plastic surgery. It looks horrendous. I would have liked to have seen some of women 6 or 12 months afterwards - will scars actually fade? how long does that take?
Bottom line is - you don't get a pair of lovely boobs - it's not a boob job. It's a patchwork stuffed mound sewn in, to save you wearing a prosthesis in your bra. It's main advantage is that you look normal when wearing clothes - you get the symmetrical cleavage back, and can lean forward more confidently. None of the women in her photos looked normal or symmetrical in the buff. Once the reconstruction has settled you can have the other side lifted to match. Terrific. Why can't they make the new breast better match the one you already have? The whole nipple construction thing looks rather Heath Robinson to me. But what do I know? Plus, the whole breast will be pretty much sensation free - which is rubbish, like when your arm goes to sleep. My upper arm is still numb on the underside now.
I had foolishly wanted more. Can't believe how upset and bereaved I still feel about this 'amputation'. I sort of wanted reconstructive surgery to make it all better, back to okay again. It doesn't. But, it's what there is.
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