Mastectomy, but can’t have chemo till I’ve also had a hysterectomy

Hello Julia, you said, 

Fridgelicker said:

Oestrogen receptor neg and HER2 receptor neg.

What about progesterone? If that too is negative, then it's a triple negative breast cancer. I have that, but I never required radiotherapy. I did however have chemotherapy and immunotherapy. The decision regarding any systemic treatment will likely only be made by your team once the pathology report is in after surgery, at which point they will be able to make an informed recommendation. I am guessing they will also want to liaise with the other team to form the best systemic treatment plan for you to deal with both cancers in one go. Not everyone requires systemic treatment after surgery, and some people need both chemo and radiotherapy, so even when it's the same type of cancer, treatment plans vary. 

I too am dealing with two cancers at the same time, so I get what you are saying about that. By the way, I love the name you chose here, Fridgelicker!

Haha! Glad you like the name! There’s someone on here called SmellyBasset! That’s my favourite!
Regarding the progesterone, it definitely wasn’t mentioned in the letter of diagnosis- and I don’t know much about breast cancer, and haven’t asked (I’ve been worrying myself to death about the sarcoma) I’ve seen people posting about ‘triple negative’ and didn’t know what it meant, till now. What the consultant said in the letter was that I would have a mastectomy, and that perhaps I would require a small amount of radiotherapy to the chest wall -  the tumour is very close to that, so perhaps it’s a precaution to make sure. I’d like to think I won’t need chemo for this, because a) I’ll have to wait till both surgeries have been done, and b) how ill I’m going to be with chemo for both tumours, Julia x

If the BC is also negative for progesterone then it’s a triple negative tumour for which chemo is often given as it’s classified as a high risk cancer type. It will depend on the pathology report following surgery - size, whether the lymph nodes are involved, and whether there’s any lymphovascular invasion at the tumour. Plus of course the other cancer and what that needs. I had an 18mm grade 3 TN tumour, clear lymph nodes, but vascular invasion, and I am having chemo. 

Hi Coddfish, thanks for info. The BC consultant said it was a high risk tumour that needed a mastectomy asap - I didn’t ask if it was triple neg, because tbh I’ve got a lot to deal with, and a steep learning curve. I shall ask her on Thursday when I have the operation,

Well, I am really bad with names so at some point I may not be able to remember "Julia" but there is no way I am going to forget Fridgelicker! 

Back to business, I am going to tell you something I have said here before many times: the general information, including general predictions, are based on overall statistics for the type of cancer in question. These statistics include patients of all ages and all backgrounds. This means they will include people who are older than you and who may have background health issues that you do not have. Additionally, these statistics are based on yesterday's treatments and outcomes. We, who are receiving today's treatments, some of which were not available before, are going to be part of tomorrow's statistics. And so, if you ever delve into any of the general stuff, please remember these two aspects.

Regarding chemo, you may not feel any worse than a patient who is getting chemo for "only" one cancer. This is because no matter what is being targetted, chemo works on the whole system. This is why, for instance, a lot of us lose our hair during chemo even though no one wanted to target that area at all. It's a little like this: imagine you spill orange juice on a dress; it doesn't matter if you have one stain or two, that dress is going to have to "suffer" the washing machine cycle just the same, and both stains would come out in the wash providing the correct detergent is used and the machine was set to the correct cycle. The drugs we are given are the detergent, the correct cycle is the dose and the frequency. I hope I am making sense to you with this.

Regarding a steep learning curve, there are reliable and unreliable sources on the internet. Depending on how deep you want to go into any of it, there are websites that are written for those of us whose expertise lies elsewhere, and websites that are aimed at people who are either within the medical community or have other science backgrounds. I tend to go with websites recommended by my oncologist, websites that belong to universities, hospitals, or known cancer organisations such as Macmillan.

I hope Thursday goes very well for you and I hope you will update here once you are on the other side of it. 

Thank you GreyCats for your post. Because I’ve got 2 big things to deal with, I haven’t searched either of them online, and the gynae consultant specifically told me not to look up sarcomas -so I haven’t, as it would be too frightening at the moment. I think I will be more focused once I’ve got the mastectomy out of the way, and I will definitely post about it afterwards. 
I like your analogy for chemo treatment compared to dirty laundry, and I hope they will be able to ‘double up’ on it all, or I think I will  be having a lot xx