The past few days have been quite good. I overdid it shopping for some winter clothes and party shoes for the girls on Monday (glad to have done it though), and then slept a lot yesterday and spent hours finishing a great Maggie O'Farrell novel. Today: coffee in Stony and into the library to hand in a letter of support (it is threatened with closure in the cuts - it would be a huge loss to the community).
The good news is that the surgeon and nurse are happy with my progress. I had my appointment with them yesterday afternoon (so my day wasn't only about sleep and reading in case you wondered!). Wound(s) all healing well and looking very good considering it is only three weeks since the surgery.
The surgeon talked through what came back from the lab analysis, and I am pleased to report she told me everything was removed with a good margin (minimum margin at any point was 1cm), and only one of 14 lymph nodes contained evidence of cancer (compared with at least 3-4 showing up on the MRI scan prior to treatment). The chemoradiotherapy effectively down-staged the diagnosis from T4N2 to T2N1. A good result.
I was given some information about the likely drug regime for the chemotherapy, but as I am now being referred back to the oncologist there will be more to report on that when I've seen him.
When I left the surgeon's office, I realised that I may not have need to see her again so I thanked her again for doing such a neat job. I feel very lucky that she was successful in carrying out the key-hole surgery.
There are some great people and some great teams of people working in the NHS. Long may that continue.
Whatever cancer throws your way, we’re right there with you.
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