More information, a new plan, and a new drug

It's been another busy month full of contradictions :-) Will and I had a fabulous time in Playa del Carmen Mexico, mostly relaxing on the beach and eating good food (and drinking some tropical drinks). We also took the opportunity to go birding with a guide in Sian Ka'an, and it was amazing. We saw a ton of birds as well as jungle and ojo de aguas (small pools of water coming out from small caves in the ground...basically a tiny cenote). 

Photos below are of birds we saw on the trip and taken by our guide Miguel Amar.  Additionally, we learned about some Mayan culture, saw an amazing temple and an archaeological dig, had philosophical discussions, and ate some amazing tacos. If you're in the area I highly recommend this tour.

Lineated woodpecker

Mot-mot

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But I also spent a fair amount of time getting more information on the tumors that have popped up in the last 3 or 4 months, making plans with my medical team, and getting my hands on a new drug. The couple tumors in my liver have grown as has one in my lung, which when I saw it I thought "oh shit that's bad". That scan was shown to me by the pulmonologist after my pulmonary function test...I'm working with about 66% of my lung volume, which could be caused by cancer in the lymphatics of my lungs.  Fun. He prescribed a new inhaler that has helped with the shortness of breath (ah, you SOB). 

The biopsy was also informative. The liver tumor is breast cancer (shocking, right?), but the cancer is changing. So far my cancer has been strongly estrogen receptor (ER) positive (95-100%), but now it's decreased to 11-20% positive, which is likely why the hormone therapies stopped working. There's more nuance, but that's the gist. I'm not going to do the clinical trials I was looking into because they all involve hormone therapy, which isn't likely to work based on above.

So. Taking into account the size and growth of the tumors, symptoms, and the decrease in ER, we're going to try a drug called Xeloda/capecitabine. This is an oral chemotherapy which tends to work for both ER+ and ER- breast cancers. Switching to a cytotoxic chemotherapy is psychologically challenging. Alright, it's a scary step in this shitty journey. F'ing cancer.

The other challenging parts are (1) will it work? and (2) side effect roulette. Possibilities here include diarrhea, hand foot syndrome (redness and peeling of palms and soles of the feet), fatigue, nausea etc. I get to keep my hair, but I'd trade my hair for a normal BM anyday :-) However, it's roulette, so I could have very few side effects! I know people who have done quite well on it. Suffice it to say, I'm a bit nervous though. Bare with me. 

I'm still doing well though and keeping busy with advocacy work. We're about to start up a couple new sections of the MBC education workshop series in February (yikes, February is Thursday), which I really enjoyed facilitating/teaching last fall. I'm also working on a couple other projects that I am excited about.

I'd be remiss if I didn't thank everyone who contributed to my birthday fund raiser for METAvivor. I was blown away at the amount raised, and every cent of that will go towards research on MBC.

That's it! Thanks again for all your kind words, support, cards and love. It means the world to me.