Dis Breast Cancer Survivors Part II -GAGWTA!

[snappy]

Oh yes, we were all concerned.

What a scary experience. Glad it is over and you can start the treatment of your thyroid cancer.

So you have to resume that diet?

Did your DH manage to connect with the Onc?

 

[snappy]

Alice, I loved your post.

Watch out, pop daddy will accuse you of being sexy.

I have to admit much of it sailed right over my head. My brother lives in Manhattan now, but were were all born and bred in the south. He was the only one who moved north during grammer school.

I need to send it to Tom.

Maureen, congrats on the uneventful checkup.

I am due for my annual diagnostic mammogram Wednesday. No big deal.

When are you planning to schedule your next trip?

We are going in May, not sure if we are going to cut the trip short a bit or not.

Boardwalk villa with boardwalk view here we come!!

 

[lookingforward]

I really want to go in May but my daughter has a show every weekend. I hate to wait until June because of the crowds. At any rate I won't be able to do more than a weekend. I have about no leave left! I did notice that the Swan/Dolphin has rooms for 159 per night over memorial day weekend. Tempting!

Is anyone into Friday Night Lights? I am hooked. Also really into Big Love on HBO and the New York Housewives. My three guilty pleasures!

 

[luvmarypoppins]

I really want to go in May but my daughter has a show every weekend. I hate to wait until June because of the crowds. At any rate I won't be able to do more than a weekend. I have about no leave left! I did notice that the Swan/Dolphin has rooms for 159 per night over memorial day weekend. Tempting!

Is anyone into Friday Night Lights? I am hooked. Also really into Big Love on HBO and the New York Housewives. My three guilty pleasures!

I don't watch Friday Night Lights but the Poster Amazing Grace has been an extra on it and so have her kids. Its filmed near her in Selma, Texas. As someone who has lived in Texas I can sure tell you they live and breathe football on friday nights for sure!! She was in the restraunt scence lately, I think its Applebys in the background.

 

[snappy]

Never heard of Friday night Lights. What channel is it on?

Maryann, did they send you home with good drugs?

Oh my, I just realized my dog (the young one, not my dar snappy girl) just ate one of the frozen spinach and feta phyllo bites I was getting ready to cook.

I know I put 4 in the pan, and now there are three.

I bet they the frozen state really brings out the flavor really well.

I guess she has eaten worse things, like my gourmet Baileys chocolate DH bought for Valentine's day.

She ate the box it came in too.

 

[dzee]

I was looking at the boards and found this thread! This is one subject I unfortunately know all about! I was diagnosed in 2004 and had a modified radical mastectomy 6 weeks later! Have been the chemo and no hair route but I was lucky there was no radiation required! And now I am a 5 year survivor!!!! Nice to have place where others know what a hard road this is to travel!! In my opinion I think we come out much stronger and caring individuals on the other side!!

 

[lookingforward]

I was looking at the boards and found this thread! This is one subject I unfortunately know all about! I was diagnosed in 2004 and had a modified radical mastectomy 6 weeks later! Have been the chemo and no hair route but I was lucky there was no radiation required! And now I am a 5 year survivor!!!! Nice to have place where others know what a hard road this is to travel!! In my opinion I think we come out much stronger and caring individuals on the other side!!

Dzee Welcome! Its so nice to see those who are years behind breast cancer. You will find quite a few right here...and its such a nice circle of friends. I was diagnosed in November of 2007 and everyone here has helped me through the last year and a half.

 

[Aliceacc]

Alice, I loved your post.

Watch out, pop daddy will accuse you of being sexy.

With my heffalump?? I don't THINK so!!!
We are going in May, not sure if we are going to cut the trip short a bit or not.

Boardwalk villa with boardwalk view here we come!! I'm so jealous! We're not going till August!! Though I'm thrilled to be going back to the Poly!!

Dzee, welcome!!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

GAGWTA, Ladies!

Maureen - Glad things are going well!

Maryann - Happy to hear you are on the mend!

Alice - I hope everyone at your house is feeling better! Maybe we'll see you in August! There will be 17-19 of us from a thread on the DISigns board all there at the same time.

Laurie - Yay for May!!

I hope everyone is well! We have had some cold, nasty rain this week. Hoping to see the sun again soon!

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I was looking at the boards and found this thread! This is one subject I unfortunately know all about! I was diagnosed in 2004 and had a modified radical mastectomy 6 weeks later! Have been the chemo and no hair route but I was lucky there was no radiation required! And now I am a 5 year survivor!!!! Nice to have place where others know what a hard road this is to travel!! In my opinion I think we come out much stronger and caring individuals on the other side!!

Welcome!

 

[Pea-n-Me]

LMP, I just got this email from one of those compulsive senders we all seem to know. I have a feeling you'll get a kick out of it:

I've probably posted this before, but I just got it as an email and always get a kick out of it:

LONG ISLAND

You live in the shadow of the greatest city in the world,

but you almost never go there.

When you're away from Long Island, you love it

and when you're there, you don't.

You think if you're not from Long Island or NYC,

you're not really from New York

You know the exact point at which Queens

turns into Nassau simply on intuition.

You don't go to Manhattan, you go to "The City".

You never realize you have an accent till you leave.

Everything north of the Bronx is "upstate."

At some point in your life you've gone clamming.

Either your parents or your grandparents lived in the city.

You'd pay $11.50 for a movie.

You don't live in Long Island You live ON Long Island OH YEAH!

Your distant future might involve the state of Florida

You can correctly pronounce places like
Ronkonkoma , Hauppauge, Wantagh, Mineola, Islandia, Massapequa
ron KON ka ma,
HAP paug,
min e O la,
I LAND e a,
mas a PEE qua for anyone not from "the Island"

You know the location of 6 malls and a dozen McDonalds

and 36 7-11's.

You never, ever want to "change at Jamaica..."

You've tried to find the Amityville Horror house.

No, you don't want mustard on that burger!!

You can't understand why a diner would ever close. Where else could you eat at 2 am???

You've had a seagull crap on your car. More times than I can count!

You have or someone you know has fallen asleep on the LIRR

and ended up in one of these three places;

Babylon, Port Washington or Hicksville .

You know White Castle is terrible for you

and the food sucks but you periodically "Get the Crave".

You want the Yankees to stay in the Bronx,

but would probably go to more games if they moved to Manhattan

You think that somehow, the Jets and Giants still play in New York

You've missed that "Drunk Train", the 2:42 out of Penn

and had the dreaded wait until 5:30.

You or someone you know has owned an animal

that came from North Shore Animal League.

Quick! Who's your county Executive ? Don't know do you?!

You've never taken an MTA bus.NOT EVER!

The Long Island Expressway isn't really as bad as everybody thinks.

You don't associate Fire Island with gay men.

You know which parts of the godfather were filmed on Long Island

You think Islip MacArthur airport is cute

and you enjoy watching it grow up.

Billy Joel said it best,

"either you date a rich girl from The North Shore,

or a cool girl from the South Shore ".

You don't really see the big deal about the Hamptons,

unless you got smashed at the Bordy Barn. We rented a house next door to the Bordy Barn during the Son of Sam summer. Need I say more??

When people ask "where are you from?"

you answer Long Guy Land and automatically assume everyone in the world knows that answer means New York.

You've always liked Billy Joel and you own several of his "records."

The Belt Parkway sucks! You've been stuck in a traffic jam

for more than 2 hours (without moving).

Your parents took you to All American, Nathan's or Carvel

(on the way home from the beach).

Regular gas - $3.29 and you still pay it!!!

You hate paying tolls.

You don't have to go far to see your family.

You remember Grumman.

You know the color of the water at Jones Beach is not BLUE!And you know what "Field Four" or "West End 2" mean without even mentioning Jones Beach.

You were upset when all the Roy Rogers turned into Wendy's and Arby's closed for good.
You can spout off all the LIRR stops between

Penn Station and Huntington.

Paying $35 for a haircut doesn't sound so crazy.

You think the people from Brooklyn are

"da wunz dat tawk wit a accent."

You went sledding in the sumps.

You knew of Massapequa before

the Amy Fisher-Joey Buttafuoco nightmare.

You think going to Queens is a hike.

The first time you heard the term "Long Island Iced Tea"

you were somewhere else and you laughed.

When you live somewhere else and are astounded

to see that people actually stop at yellow lights.

When you just sort of presume that wherever you live,

you'll be able to find good delis, good pizza, and good bagels.

You can name at least three bands that came from Long Island

When you walk in the city and you see two men holding hands...

it becomes normal to you.

No word ends in an ER, just an AH.

You understand, without looking at a map, those bumper stickers that proclaim: "Montauk... the end"


You actually get these jokes

and pass them on to other friends from Long Island

 

[snappy]

You actually get these jokes

and pass them on to other friends from Long Island

Or your wannabe Long Island friends.

 

[snappy]

I was looking at the boards and found this thread! This is one subject I unfortunately know all about! I was diagnosed in 2004 and had a modified radical mastectomy 6 weeks later! Have been the chemo and no hair route but I was lucky there was no radiation required! And now I am a 5 year survivor!!!! Nice to have place where others know what a hard road this is to travel!! In my opinion I think we come out much stronger and caring individuals on the other side!!

Welcome!!

I really like your comment about coming out much stronger and caring on the other side.

Very nicely put!

 

[Aliceacc]

Or your wannabe Long Island friends.

Well, yeah.

But I posted it to LuvMaryPoppins, and she IS ON the Island.

Of course, making you wannabes jealous is a nice little perk

 

[snappy]

We believe in perks and pixie dust here for sure.

I would love to see Long Island. There is just so much to see in NYC, I never get past the museums and theatres and shopping.

It would nice to get a sense of how "real people" live, especially the natives.

Also, to go eat where the natives eat.

Always, always, always, your best food where the natives eat.

What are some of the local food favorites?

And how about some pictures, Linda posted some great ones of the Boston shore.

Hey, is anyone celebrating St. Patrick's day?

We are not, DH has to finish some tax returns for a partner who is a SEC traded company. I may not see him until Monday.

We usually do the parades, the ones in the New Orleans area are my favorite since they throw tons of veggies. They just cycle a lot of th etrcks from Mardi Gras.

The parades tend to be huge.

How is the eye, JSK?

 

[dzee]

Dzee Welcome! Its so nice to see those who are years behind breast cancer. You will find quite a few right here...and its such a nice circle of friends. I was diagnosed in November of 2007 and everyone here has helped me through the last year and a half.

It's so important to have love and support during the Worst time of your life. Don't think I could have gotten through without it especially my DH. He put up with all my roller coaster moods and took VERY good care of me after the surgery . Couldn't have been easy for him with the drains,changing the bandages, helping me wash my hair and sponge bath. He never complained and always encouraged me by saying You look great,its not that bad, You are still You!! It took a long time for me to believe that since I didn't LOOK the same. With his undying support and love and with the same from my children, family and friends I started to believe I will get through this ,and that I'm still me!! This love and support is what I wish for all of you still struggling down this road and that you come out on the other side of challenge with a great sense of self,well being and loads of love!!!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

The St. Pat's parade here is way too chaotic for us to even attempt it.

Laurie - The eye is coming along. Still one red splotch.

 

[dzee]

Thanks for all the warm welcomes!! Hope to get to know all of you!!

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

dzee- Welcome! My mom just finished her treatment for stage III ILC. These ladies have been wonderful friends to me during the past 11 months! Please stick around - this is a great group!

 

[snappy]

Thanks for all the warm welcomes!! Hope to get to know all of you!!

Same here.

The thread was started by Laura and Linda back in '05, I think in May. Anyway, it was a thread where survivors checked in. Luckily, I frequented the Community thread a lot in those long ago days and found it immediately. I think I might be on the first page of the original thread. Right away we had another of our original members going through the diagnosis stage.

Since then we have welcomed survivors, relatives and friends of survivors, and other good friends.

We tend to get off topic a lot but that can be a good thing.

I have been fortunate enough to meet Laura and one of her daughters, Ann and her lovely sisters, Maureen and her fantastic family, and Alison who we have not heard from in awhile. I am hoping to meet more in the future.

I too was diagnosed in 2004 at age 50, had a modified radical since I had multicentric in situ cancer (DCIS on steriods) with just a minimal area of invasive cancer, thank goodness. I had 16 clean nodes removed, so no chemo or radiation was deemed necesary.

I did have those dreaded drains in for what seemed to be an eternity, those were the worst, and the surgeon said no showers so my DH helped me bathe too for about a month until the last drain was pulled.

And recovering from the node dissection has its own lovely aspects.

Also, my blood pressure and thyroid function decided to flare up at the same time. I think I aged a lot in 2004.

But, so far so good, in fact I got brave and did reconstruction in 2006 after agonizing over it and driving everyone here insane no doubt mulling it over, checking out plastic surgeons, getting a second and a third opinion.

I ended up finding the right doc for me, and had a free tram flap. More surgery, more drains, but it was a big improvement for me over dealing with a large, heavy prothesis in our south Louisiana climate.

Best move I made in the whole saga.

I will also have to credit the ladies here for being so supportive back in 2005 when our family and friends living in New Orleans went through Katrina and lived with us for awhile.

It helped to come here to the thread (when I had my alloted time on the computer which was our main avenue of communication for awhile) and connect with my sistas here when I had all those extra people and one extra doggie living in my house. We had issues even here 70 mile northwest of New Orleans since so many people evacuated, getting gas and food, and the difficulty of just getting anywhere with the roads clogged with the instant increase in our population persists today.

I felt good enough about myself to venture back into the work world in a quasi part time status in September 2007 (I sort of got recruited at a non-profit by my mom's late friend whose daughter is my boss and was looking for angel to help her). Back in the day, I worked for a big company in New Orleans for many years but "retired" at age 45 in 1998 when we moved here. Being employed again has turned out to be a blessing as I feel sharper mentally (accounting tends to make you analyze everything you do ) and we certainly need the extra coins with two in college, and one in the bull-pen (7th grade).

I feel blessed to have all my friends here. I have a lot of support in my life from DH, my mom, my sister, and my brother Tom in NYC, not to mention my friends and family in New Orleans, but there is nothing like talking to someone who has walked in your shoes so to speak.

I was even able to support my mom when she was diagnosed with extensive DCIS September 2008. She lavishes me with appreciation (it is almost embarrassing), and man does it feel good to have been able to help her through her surgery and reconstruction (yes a 78 year old with an expander).

Now I mainly worry about my daughters might face in the future, one is 18, the other 13, and my sister who is 51, and has already had 3 biopsies.

Hoping for a cure, or at least better, earlier detection. Less drastic surgery would be nice too.

But hooray for survivors, hooray for Laura and LInda for starting this thread, and hooray for all you sistas.

As WDW lovers AND survivors, one day we all need to try and meet for the Orlando RFTC. I have been two years running now, once with mom, last year with my DH. We met up with sisters from this thread both times.

WDW in October is amazing, and now that the RFTC is in October you get to do the Food and wine festival too. It is an embarrassment of riches. When I get frustrated with the accounting gig, I remember how much I treasure those trips, and I keep my nose to the grindstone.

Going to visit Micky is expensive. It is a sin that insurance doesn't cover 80% of the cost.

Maybe we can get that coverage into the next stimulus package.


OK that is my "story."

I bet others will introduce themselves as well.

Again, welcome to the GAGWTA! thread!