Laura P

Thanks, Julie and Tammy. I only had one lymph node, the sentinel node, that was involved at the breast site. There was a small focal point on the sentinel node. Since the other 4 were not, they did not take any more nodes. I am moving forward with herceptin for a year in total. I started that in June, 2005. I am not sure how my liver tumor grew so quickly. Even though it was small, it was close in size to my primary tumor on the breast.

I find that this situation of having breast cancer can be so confusing. I was not upset when I had one lymph node involved. I felt lucky that there were not more than that. However, I am dumbfounded by the liver involvement. I am not even really upset about it, I am numb to most of it at this point. I do get frustrated about the lack of knowledge other people have in relation to this issue and I want to change it. When you tell someone that you have a metastases, it seems like it is the kiss of death to some people. I try to put it in context and make sure they know we found it early and explain the sophistication of herceptin, but then I wonder if I am fooling myself??

I am glad to hear about the Herceptin vaccine trials. It is good to know that I will have to wait six months from the end of chemo. My oncologist and I are gathering some information to figure out how I can be eligible for them. If you all have any insight on anything I have written, let me know. I know I have gotten the best bit of information from people in my support group. We all learn from each other and I hope to help others, too.

Laura