Malignant lymph nodes - terrified

Hello  Nico1a 

I completely understand how you feel.  My cancer, her2 positive was in my lymph nodes under my arm too. I also remember reading those posts and also the look of fear and concerns on people's faces when I mentioned it. I was absolutely terrified and went into depression,  hardly slept. I was dealing with personal stuff as well and on top of that, the fear the cancer was taking trips around my body. 

Fast forward, 5 years and I'm still here. Had chemo, surgery radiotherapy and herceptin and all is good. The cancer spreading to the underarm is still early stage. I had all my lymph nodes removed as well as breast and I'm fine. I'm here if you need any information. 

Love julie 

Hi Nico1a , hope you managed to sleep ok, I’m sure your dog is a great source of comfort, I know mine is! I think one of the Snoopy ‘sayings’ was ‘Happiness is a warm dog’ (I’m showing my age….)

The anxiety about recurrence and spread is natural. It’s also too easy to focus on the aspects of our diagnoses that aren’t as good as other people’s. Just thought I’d give you some anecdotal reassurance…. On Thursday I had a lovely day out with a friend, a fellow breast cancer survivor. Her cancer had node involvement, she had chemo, Herceptin, surgery and radiotherapy. That was around 15-20 years ago (bad memory on my part). She’s doing well, has long been back on the 3 yearly mammograms and has not had any further issues. I know it’s just one example but they’re out there. And actually another friend who I see less often, had triple negative breast cancer with nodes affected and is also doing well. She must be around 10 years post diagnosis. Sending love and a big virtual hug, HFxx

Hello Nicola

Totally understandable. I had all lymph nodes removed and 20 out of 28 were malignant. That was back in 2021 when I was 55. Had a lumpectomy along with RT and chemo. Still here getting old LOL.
The new NHS Predict V3 model gives much better survival predictions now despite having so many nodes affected,ie all else being equal it doesn’t make as much difference as thought before x

Thank you that’s so reassuring.