Good Blood Counts!!

Monday I saw the plastic surgeon and he finally removed about half of my stitches. Can you believe I still have stitches in, after all this time? The doc said there were multiple layers of stitches and he uses much smaller stitches and leaves them in longer. When he was removing them, he jokingly said, "who was the crazy doctor who put all these tiny stitches in here?" He's a really nice guy!! He gave kudos to Art for being there with me so much of the time because he said he doesn't usually see too many husbands. I've seen him once a week ever since my surgery on October 31st and Art has been there all but one time, when Stacey took me. I have a very supportive (and protective) family!!

Yesterday I saw the oncologist and my blood counts were good! Praise the Lord! This means I should be able to attend the Christmas service at church, which is important to me!! He also confirmed that I will not have radiation treatment. If the tumor had been within 1cm of my chest wall I would have needed radiation in addition to the chemo but my tumor was 2cm away!

A couple of weeks ago, I had a DEXA scan done to check on my bone density, prior to chemo. This was done because one of the chemo drugs (poisons) can damage your bones and they want to make sure your bones are healthy ahead of time. The oncologist informed me yesterday that my bone density is less than normal, meaning I have osteopenia, which means I have a greater risk of developing osteoporosis in the future. This is most likely due to having had a hysterectomy at such a young age (21), he said. So, please pray that the chemo doesn't do any further damage to my bones and that I won't break a bone!! They will be putting me on a medication to help strengthen my bones, too. A side effect of one of the drugs is joint pain and I did have bad hip pain, which is because of the osteopenia and the drug. Oh well, only three more to go, right?

That's the medical update for now! Sometimes I feel silly putting this stuff on my blog...like who really cares about all these details. Then, I find out that a lot of friends and family really do read these postings and then they know how to pray specifically for me. Most importantly, I love to share the good news so that you can rejoice with me!