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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Hi Trudy,

You can call me Beth. Like you, I was diagnosed with breast cancer in my 40's (43). I was diagnosed with what's called an "occult primary" breast cancer - basically no tumor was ever found in the breast, but I did have 2 positive lymph nodes.  Like you, I'm also triple positive. I tested negative for BRCA1/2, but did test positive for a gene "variant of unknown significance". I do have some breast cancer on one side of my family (aunt and cousin).

I had neo-adjuvant TCHP chemotherapy, then due to my family history, I chose to have bilateral mastectomy (they did the reconstruction with implants at the same time) with axillary dissection (21 nodes removed - 2 found to still have some cancer cells upon pathology review of the tissue post surgery - no cancer cells found in my breasts at all). I am completing my year of Herceptin - will finish in October. And, I am having radiation of the axilla and breast on the effected side. I'll be starting Tamoxifen soon.

[b]The most difficult/upsetting thing for me is how little the doctors can or will tell you about your risk of recurrence[/b] - especially for me I suppose - diagnosed young, triple positive and with an occult breast cancer. There's not much out there on that combination. So it's really, really scary for me. I tried to talk with my oncologist about it and was told that I should just go home, forget about it and live my life. I was told, "you're in remission, ok?" in a very harsh way. Alrighty then....

Anyway - I'm a mom, a wife and I work full time...so juggling life and this cancer merry-go-round has been very challenging. I'm looking forward to getting to mid-October. At that point I'll be done with all the major treatments and will be in follow-up mode + tamoxifen.

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The think to understand in in these studies, there are people that beat the odds, and people that do worse than the odds.

In my case, 3 years ago, I was given 3 yr disease free survival of 15-20%.  I had/have a very aggressive (sarcomitoid differentiated) metastatic kidney cancer.  Three years later, I remain NED.   Did I beat the odds, or did I hit the odds for just me?  I don't know... but everyone is different.  In my case, there was one metastasis.  The treatment we tried was surgery (kidney and part of lung removed).  For what ever reason, that may have worked for me.  The message is there are always outliers.

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I have a theory that the difference is mostly about immune function.  Came across an interesting article the other day about patients who have metastasis and those who don't.  The difference was how actively their immune systems were fighting against their tumors.  I suspect this is why exercise is so important in increasing survival odds--because it improves immune function.

[url]http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/859945?src=wnl_edit_tpal&uac=165533BX#vp_1[/url]
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