While waiting for the pathology report I found myself in the middle of calm and anxiety.
Both were true. I was trusting in the process.
Trusting in the surgeon and praying for a direction to lean into.
About eight days after my surgery the nurse called and told me that I had great news.
The surgeon felt the cancer was fully removed during the biopsy process.
The margins around my surgery site were clean. The pathology report clean.
I had no further need for more surgery and no chemo.
I would be continuing the plan for radiation just to be sure the cells are gone.
I guess this is preventative and I will also see a oncologist for some medication advise.
This is all good news.
Did that mean I was cancer free?
What a circle of feelings to go from a positive reading to now a clean margin, in just a few weeks.
I am amazed, thankful and praise God for so much prayers and for this experience.
Yes, it’s been a new adventure. One that I could never have imagined.
Any time you do a medical process so much is layered into the experience.
Concerns, worries, fatigue and fear.
I will forever be a cancer survivor and I say that with a knowing; that I was given this so I can share with others.
My experience is not like others. Some who I know have had double mastectomies. Some have had reconstruction.
It is a very individual and unique experience for each patient.
I cannot say I am totally done with this process. Not for five years. That is the plan.
But in five years I will be seventy years old and the life that is given to me will be full of praise and thanksgiving.
Throughout my life I have survived many things, and this is one more for the book.
While waiting for the pathology report, I learned to lean in and trust deeper.