Follow up to surgery...

Surgery went well on Friday. I was lucky. I found out that I don't have the BRCA gene; that means no mastectomy needed. Only one lymph node removed. The procedure is a "sentinel lymph node" removal. And only the 1 lump removed. I'm still really sore, but I can go into that another time. What was really great was hanging out with friends and family this past weekend. It's helping me recover faster. 

Here are some interesting photos from the surgery that I hope explain the process. First, I was injected with a radioactive dye so the surgeon could trace the lymph nodes that were connected to the malignant lump. That hurt and burned like crazy because no local anesthetic was used. (If you have to undergo something like that, please ask for anesthesia. It makes a difference.) After that, I went to the surgery center and waited for the lump to be prepped.

To remove the lump, they have to insert a "J-wire" into the lump itself.  You can see that in my x-ray below. The wire sticks out pretty far so I had to be careful while I moved my arm before surgery. 

You can see the "j-wire" actually looks like a J. And that it's directly in the black dot, the lump that was going to be removed. The lump is less than 1 cm in size. The two bright white dots are fibroid lumps that were tagged during core biopsy procedures.

The surgery lasted for only about 1 1/2 hours. I was put under general anesthesia, so I felt nothing during the entire procedure. They went in under my arm to remove the lymph node and lump. Hopefully, I will only have a small scar after I heal. My arm has been sore ever since. I was lucky that no other lymph nodes were affected when they tested the one node removed during surgery. Otherwise, the surgeon would have removed a lot more. That could lead to lymphodema and limited use of my arm.  

My mother and sister were with me the whole time. We had some great laughs and reminisced over good times. We were so loud that every time the nurses walked by. They must have thought we were crazy for laughing so hard. I think that helped me calm down, even though I was in tears from laughing so hard. I got a sexy photo with each one of them.

The strange thing is waking up in the recovery room with my chest taped up. It felt like I was trying to be a boy since they were so smushed together. Funny, but sore at the same time. I've been icing my chest and arm down all weekend. My arm has been numb off and on since then. I hope that's not too permanent. I'll have to find out  from the doctor though. 

The entire day lasted from 6:45AM to 4PM. It was a long day of surgery, but worth it. I am happy to end the first step and start the next stages of treatment. It was even better when my boyfriend got to take me home and take care of me. He's really good at that. He was careful while he gave me hugs though. He was worried about squeezing me too tightly after surgery. 

The great thing was that it was an outpatient procedure. That allowed me to catch up with good friends at a their wedding, see a friend's adorable daughter celebrate her 3rd birthday, and relax with my friends and family after surgery. All in all, not a bad weekend. 

Now it's time for the next step... Egg retrieval. That's coming up on Wednesday so fingers crossed that everything goes according to plan. Plus, I get the pathology results from the lump and lymph node removed from surgery in one week. Hopefully, that comes back OK too.