So back in 2003 or so, I had breast cancer. It took five surgeries, chemo and radiation,
but after 18 months or so, that journey ended and I met my boyfriend NED (No
Evidence of Disease).
Didn’t do a lot of medical stuff during 2020, so in 21 my
primary was all freaked out and sent me for a BUNCH of tests (once you’re a
cancer survivor, your doctors will always err on the side
of caution). Most of them were fine, but
there was a mass in my bladder that they wanted to examine more closely. Despite complaining that “I’m NOT a guinea pig!”
I ultimately ended up at a urologist’s office.
She did a cystoscopy and told me I had a cancer. “But it’s just a tumor, right? You can’t tell just from looking at it, you
have to biopsy it, right?” “This is a cancer, Ms. Perry.”
OK, it was a cancer in my bladder. She described the
treatment protocols (y’all I have had some AMAZING doctors in my journey. This is Dr. Elizabeth Kavaler. I went to her because my gastro recommended
her; once we started a conversation about cancer, I did some research and she’s
one of the best in the City!). She described
the likely variants of the disease and the treatment protocols for each. Compared to the chemo and radiation I went
through for breast cancer, this seemed like a walk in the park!
I was wrong about that walk in the park. In general, any sort of medical procedure
involving your genital area ain’t gone be a walk in the park. But ANY way, they did the cystoscopy, said it
was a cancer, and scheduled me for the procedure to remove it. The procedure was fine; the aftermath was not. They give you the first dose of chemo while
you’re in the hospital, and after the anesthesia wore off, the effects of chemo
kicked in. I’m grateful that I knew what
they were and how to manage them.
So the path reports came back. There were a few sites to be biopsied aside
from the main tumor; all those sites came back negative. The cancer was non-invasive, which is good
and means they got everything that was there; it was also what they call high
grade, which unfortunately means there is a high chance that it will
recur. So I get to have my bladder
washed with some immunotherapy treatment once a week for the next six weeks,
and then every six months for the next 2-3 years.
I’m writing this blog and posting it to FB because I don’t
have a lot of energy to devote to this.
I love all y’all, but from where I sit, the disease is being managed and
I now turn my focus to that dissertation.
Thanks to all who have or will be praying for my health; I leave that
and my future to the One Who Made me, and am pretty optimistic about it, though as I said, the focus right now is on that dissertation.
Love y’all to life, though you can still stay 6 feet away…..
