[Mary Jo]

Hi Louise,

When I was where you are I would have loved to hear "no chemo" HOWEVER, now that I have finished with chemo/radiation/herceptin I am thankful I went through it to give myself all the added protection I could. Nothing is guaranteed BUT doing all we can is helpful. Both oncologists I met with said they would most definitely recommend chemo for any invasive breast cancer. I fought it every step of the way and argued against most things said to me. In the end though, I gave in (I think my husband would have killed me if I opted out of chemo to be honest with ya - Hehe) I did the dose dense regimin. Four A/C and four taxol. I started the herceptin when the taxol started and did that every 3 weeks until just recently. My chemo ended Nov. 30th and my herceptin ended Oct. 11, 2006. I am so thankful at this point that I did it all. Recurrence is a very real threat to all of us and after going down this road for a while you start looking at your body in a new way. Everything becomes a "what if it's cancer" issue. Knowing I did all I could for myself helps put my mind at ease somewhat.

So......................................there's my 2 cents worth. Chemo wasn't that bad for me. Maybe I just sucked it up and made the best of it - I don't know. All I do know is it really didn't hold me down too much.

So, God be with you as you make a decision. I hope this helps a bit. I'm happy you had no lymph node involvement and your scans showed no metastic disease.

Hugs -

Mary Jo