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Re: Courtney - In your memory
What a great picture of you two, Steph! Thanks for posting it. This weekend was very tough for us young survivors in the Bay Area as two of our support group members passed away and another became metastatic after 6 years out from diagnosis.
After being really sad and angry at all this, I decided that we need to honor Courtney and the others by thinking how inspiring they all were in handling their disease with so much grace and optimism. Courtney in particular had so many adventures and was always ready to fight with a smile no matter the circumstances.
My husband and I are training for our first century bike ride (100 miles) with the Team in Training (Leukemia and Lymphoma Society) and I'll think of Courtney and the others with every mile. I now feel a heavy responsibility and duty of the living to live life to the fullest extent possible with everything I do. I biked 58.2 miles this Saturday, something that I never thought possible. I'm hungry for more, to honor those that can't be here with us anymore. Courtney was one of my heroes and I'll do my best to honor her by living life like she would.
Thank you all for making this wonderful support community for all of us.
May we have strength and Courtney's spirit guiding us in our fight.
Marcia
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ER+ (30%)/PR-/HER-2+, stage 3
Diagnosed on 02/18/09 at 38 with a huge 12x10 cm tumor, after a 6 month delay. Told I was too young and had no risk factors. Found swollen node during breastfeeding.
March-August 09: neo-adjuvant chemo, part of a trial at Stanford (4 DD A/C, 4 Taxotere with daily Tykerb), loading dose of Herceptin
08/12/09 - bye bye boobies (bilateral mastectomy)
08/24/09 - path report shows 100 % success in breast tissue (no cancer there, yay!), 98 % success in lymphatic invasion, and even though 11/13 nodes were still positive, > 95 % of the tumor in them was killed. Hoping for the best!
September-October 09: rads with daily Xeloda
02/25/10 - Cholecystectomy
05/27/10 - Bone scan clear
06/14/10 - CT scan clear, ovarian cyst found
07/27/10 - Done with Herceptin!
02/15/11 - MVA-BN HER-2 vaccine trial
03/15/11 - First CA 15-3: 12.7 and normal, yay!
10/01/11 - Bone scan and CT scan clear, fatty liver found
now on Tamoxifen and Aspirin
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