Hello Friends and Family,
I am writing to inform you of some news I have received over the last few weeks. I hate to be sending all you a message through email but there are so many of you out there that are good friends and family that it is just impossible to make this many phone calls and reiterate the information over and over can be exhausting. However, I did feel I needed to find a way to communicate this information to the important people in my life. It was important that you all hear this news straight from me rather than through the grapevine. So please don't take offense that I haven't reached you in person
A few months back I had learned that I had a cyst on my ovary. They had been monitoring it by ultrasound and over the course of 6 months it had doubled in size. The doc had said it probably should just be taken out. Before doing so they wanted to run some blood tests. This past Friday I went in to go over the results with my doc. One of the tests had come back with a marker that showed signs that the tumor could POSSIBLY be cancerous. That being the case it was decided by my doctor that I needed to be turned over to a Gynecological Oncologist to be treated from here. She referred me to a doctor that works out of the Carbone Cancer Center at the UW Hospital in Madison by the name of, Dr. Al-Niami.
From here I will be going back into the clinic in Janesville for a CT scan on Tuesday October 9th where they will check over the rest of my internal organs and look for any signs of cancerous growth anywhere else. On Tuesday October 16th I will go into the Madison clinic to meet with Dr. Al-Niami and have my pre-op. Surgery is not scheduled as of yet but I am guessing it will be done by the end of the month.
As far as the surgery and what it entails they are considering at the very least my left ovary and uterus will have to be taken out. At the very most it will be a total hysterectomy. The paperwork I have been reading from my doc says the recommendation is a full hysterectomy. It is unclear how this will be performed yet, if it will be done by a robot laparoscopic or by an incision. As for the type of tumor I have is called a Granulosa Cell Tumor. I was told that if it is cancerous it would be localized to inside the tumor therefore removal of the affected areas would eliminate the need of any post operative cancer treatment, whew! This type of tumor from what I understand won't be positively diagnosed as cancerous until they open me up and take a look at it. The blood test done is only an indicator that there was marker for cancer being there. Side note: The test that indicates the big bad fatal cancer did come back negative, so big relief there!
As for how myself and family are doing. I am holding up. I understand that it is not yet "diagnosed" as cancer but that word is hard to look past. Aaron has been great, he was with me at my appointment when we got the news and he has been very strong and supportive. My immediate family and close friends here in Janesville have been wonderful. Everyone is a little shell shocked and not knowing what to ask or say right now. I have had tremendous amount of support from offers to take the kids, offered visits to take my mind off of things and any help I could need will be there when things start to roll. That is part of the reason that I reached out to all of you as well. You can never have too much support and prayers! It is early in the game but I want everyone on my team for the pregame! I believe that when all is said and done it will all be behind me and I can breathe a sigh of relief and that is what is bringing me peace with this right now! As for the kids, the "C" word will not be mentioned, Owen won't understand and the word will only scare Grace. We will let them know I will be having surgery but nothing much further than that unless it is really needed.
I will be sure and keep all of you updated as this process unfolds. I plan to use my family blog as a update forum. You can visit it at http://sagoking.blogspot.com/ I believe there is a way I can put your email address in so that you will be emailed as I make updates. I also look forward to catching up with all of you 1 on 1 as the weeks go on don't hesitate to make the call to me if I don't get to you first. You all mean the world to me and look forward to having your support and prayers!
Love to you all,
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