After going through the ringer since early January, my surgery week was finally here. It was scheduled for first thing Tuesday but I had to go in on Monday for some procedures. I was as prepared as I could be and was looking forward to putting it behind me.
You know me so won't be surprised that I'd scheduled lunch with Dodie on Monday to get some happy in. My first stop was dropping Dottie's huge yarn box at the UPS location at the Wahoo hardware store and dropping my spare car key at my friend Lorri's house. As usual, I had planned to drive myself to surgery and then have Anne drive me home in my car and have Rene follow us to drive Anne home. But Lorri mentioned that she and her husband would be in Lincoln on Tuesday afternoon so I asked if Bob, her car guy husband, would be willing to drive my car back, saving Rene from taxi service. He was happy to do it, saying that he loves to drive different cars when I dropped the key. Great.
Lunch with Dodie was good, as always, and with an hour to kill, I stopped in the office. I had planned to check in with Layton but spent so long chatting with Lacey that I had to head straight to the doctor. I had to have a radio frequency thingie (I called it the nubbin) put in my breast next to the spot they'd be removing. Then it was off to nuclear medicine where they injected me with something to identify which lymph nodes were draining the cancer area. What I didn't expect was having to wait until the juice made its way to the nodes so they could take pictures with the gamma camera. It took so long that I only had time to slam together a sandwich to eat on the way to the library for knitting. I went to bed early and set the alarm for 5:30 am.
I slept OK and after a quick shower, I was out the door at 6:40 to head to Anne's. I parked in her driveway and she drove me to the surgery center. Everyone was super nice and it was the usual pre-surgery stuff then chatting with Anne until they were ready for me. I woke up back where I started but with a post surgery bra on and feeling dopey. I got dressed and we headed out but I couldn't even cope with holding a coffee when Anne did the Starbuck's drive thru. We picked up lunch for me and my pain meds and I was home. Anne got me settled in my chair and left. A cup of tea helped with my headache (should have gotten that coffee) and I spent all afternoon doing something or other (still dopey) before logging on for a lecture on children of Nazis that I'd signed up for. It was very interesting and I did more nothing before going to bed. I wasn't uncomfortable but took a pain med and went to bed. I'm happy to report that sleeping in the bra, which I'd have to wear 24/7 for the next week, wasn't uncomfortable and that was the only pain pill I ever took.
Needless to say, Wednesday was a quiet recuperation day. I spent most of the day talking, messaging and emailing family and friends. The only thing I accomplished was bleach testing the 2 bags of the yarn I'd bought on Friday that I suspected was sock yarn. Whenever I got up from my chair, I'd snip off small pieces of yarn and put them in the bleach. If they completely disintegrate, they don't have nylon so I won't use them in socks. I'm happy to report that about 2/3 of the yarn had nylon. Yay!
On Thursday, I could take a shower. It felt great but I was shaking as I dried myself off. Despite this, I ran some errands in Wahoo. When I was back home, you would think I'd run a marathon. It was warm enough to read on the bench outside but otherwise I did nothing for the rest of the day.
I had an all day zoom on Friday called Big Talks from Small Libraries. It was fine to sit in the sun, knitting and watching the presentations. The best thing was getting a call from the surgeon who told me that there was no cancer in the lymph nodes which means I'm now 100% cancer free. Such a relief!
Andrea and I had an outing scheduled Friday afternoon to go to a civic garage sale (that's what my dad called them and where he shopped for books) at a high school in the next county. She picked me up mid-afternoon and we found a few things but were done way too early for supper so we headed to David City. We hit a thrift shop then went to Buresh Meats, where I found a bunch of bargains. It was still early but we headed to Abie's Place, where Andrea's boyfriend met us for dinner. It was fish all around and their fabulous French fries. Afterwards, we headed to a hill to see if we could see the planetary alignment. We could only see a couple, which looked like bright stars. Underwhelmed and tired, I sat in the car after just a few minutes. I was happy to get home and into my nightie. That was a busy day for me.
I was back in quiet mode for the weekend, chatting with family and friends, slamming out a pair of shortie socks that needed to get mailed and streaming or reading. I still had no pain but was aware of my incisions. I took off my bra long enough to wash it on Sunday and was happy to put it back on with a fresh nightie after another shower. I was in the home stretch and was feeling good.
So surgery was done, no other cancer was found and by the weekend I was getting my energy back. The stress dreams had also let up and it was warmer so I was able to get outside some. A good week, right? I'll have a few more weeks before radiation and hormone blockers and I plan to enjoy them.
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