From the first moment
my wife discovered she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from
the men I know. Even ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer
seemed to have received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did
little more than mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known
reason, I started this blog…
I have a divot in my forehead.
My wife has a divot in her side. Both sides, actually.
Breast cancer – skin cancer in my own experience – is all
about divots.
Define divot (plural divots)
1.A torn up piece of turf (e.g. by a golf club in making a
stroke or by a horse's hoof).
2.A disruption in an otherwise smooth contour.
It’s the second definition that concerns me here.
After discovery and confirmation four years ago this week,
the breast cancer specialists we were working with looked at several options.
One of them, used in cases where the cancer was discovered early and was small,
is called a “lumpectomy”. In this procedure (I was just struck this MOMENT by
the sterility of this word. It sounds so clean and simple. Like when I did “cookbook
labs” as a science teacher. It involved steps students would follow to achieve
a very specific result. For lots of kids, it involved reading and rereading the
procedure, their finger under the step they were following so they could get it
“right”. Lumpectomies are nowhere NEAR this simple and involve invasive methods
that deform the breast...) “Lumpectomy is the removal of the breast tumor (the
"lump") and some of the normal tissue that surrounds it.
Lumpectomy is a form of “breast-conserving” or "breast
preservation" surgery. There are several names used for breast-conserving
surgery: biopsy, lumpectomy, partial mastectomy, re-excision, quadrantectomy,
or wedge resection. Technically, a lumpectomy is a partial mastectomy, because
part of the breast tissue is removed. But the amount of tissue removed can vary
greatly. Quadrantectomy, for example, means that roughly a quarter of your
breast will be removed. Make sure you have a clear understanding from your
surgeon about how much of your breast may be gone after surgery and what kind
of scar you will have.”
While this makes an attempt at realism, nothing can quite
convey the results but a person who experienced it.
My wife had a double mastectomy which is the most extreme
form of breast cancer surgery possible.
I can NEVER know what that’s like. I can only imagine it.
Since my own skin cancer surgery, I’ve had a tiny,
non-life-threatening taste of what it might possibly feel like to have a
lumpectomy. One of the cancers on my face was on my forehead. Using the Mohs
procedure (described here: http://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2014/11/guys-gotta-talk-about-9face-and-breast.html)
layers of tissue that have cancer cells are removed, tested, then the incision
is either closed or another layer of cells are removed and tested. The end
result, after healing and recovery, has been a “divot” in my forehead. Touching
it right now, I can ASSURE you that it is gigantic and I’m positive everyone
sees it but out of politeness, ignores it.
Right. I work in a high school. Politeness is something we
work on in our kids every day because about half of them have never experienced
it at home. If anyone noticed a divot in my forehead, they’d tell me. Ergo: it’s
not noticeable.
My wife had me look at a small lump on her left side the other day,
asking, “Is this one of the places that the drains went in?” A matched spot
above it confirmed that it is, indeed, the place where one of the drains exited
the surgical field four years ago. She also has a scar where the port was
placed in order to do chemotherapy.
Lumps. Bumps. Divots. Scars.
These are clearly the legacy of breast cancer – of any kind
of cancer. I’m sure plastic surgery could clear up many of them, yet I feel no
compulsion at all to GET the surgery. I wonder why...
Sorry for the rambling commentary. But that’s where I’m at
today...
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