Round Two.... FIGHT!

[Ambush Bug]

You just can't win.

No sooner than had Mrs. Bug and I engaged in a nice exercise program to get us fit than we get slapped down with some bad news.

Ze Cancer, she be back.

Well, not really. The tumor was soooo freakin' small that the biopsy actually removed the whole thing. The docs put a little titanium ribbon-shaped marker in the boob to mark where it had been.

So, right now, it's a matter of waiting. The biopsy results told us that the thing was an actual malignant tumor, but it was so small the docs couldn't have enough material to actually figure out what kind it exatly was.

This is both good and bad. Me, I'd like to know what it was, but I'm also glad it's gone.

Where we are now is waiting for an appointment with the surgeon. The choices are 'remove the whole boob and be done with it' or 'lumpectomy and be unsure if it will come back'. Current leanings: remove the second boob and leave a field where no tumor can hide.

Women: you will obviously understand how a double masectomy can be a most distressing thing to contemplate. And just after we'd gotten the remaining boob to reconnect some nerves, too!

Myself, I'm finding this to be a most..... distressing experience. The first bout... well, I could deal with that. Male protectiveness of the mate kicked in and our relationship improved. Mrs. Bug knew from daily experience that I loved her to no end, and would do anything to help her through that ordeal.

This second time, not so good. Mrs. Bug and I have done our crying so far, and we're ready to buckle down and deal with things..... but now I'm not so sure I can deal with my relatives.

I should elucidate here. I have been through an absolute, pardon my French, shitload of major surgeries. I've been cut up, experimented on, pronounced unsuitable for living, the works. Yet, I've survived. I can deal with that. If this Cancer Thing was happening to me, I'd be fine with it. I'm used to being sickly, I'm used to fending off docs, I'm used to dealing with the whole hospital thing. I'm used to being The Underdog. I've long since made my peace with Death, and I'm well prepared to leave this world and go on to the next, whatever it may be. I'd like a clean or glorious death, but that's about it as far as Final Wants go.

Now here, it's happening to Mrs. Bug. Intellectually, I knew we'd have to deal with a possible recurrence. Emotionally, I was all "Yay, we kicked the crap out of the Death Star! Wooo!" and had filed things away. Ze Male Protectiveness, it's kicking in hard.

So hard, in fact, that I've had to rethink what little religious ties I have.

Yeah, I'm a Christian. I'm not a conventional Christian, however. I've been through so much crap that I can't even take the idea of predestination. It sickens me. Old Testament God I can relate to, but I don't like Him very much. I'm well aware that my experiences have shaped me, turned me into the man I am today, and I really don't think I'd trade them for anything, given the choice.

I can't say I've enjoyed the suffering of my past, but I'm quite cognizant of how it has shaped me. This, I think, casts me into a more 'Crom' style of Christianity. If you've never read Conan The Barbarian, the general gist was that Conan's god, Crom, was the type to not interfere in his worshiper's lives. However, he'd take those worshipers and judge how they'd dealt with the events in their lives once they actually kicked the bucket. Free Will with a harsh judge at the end, basically.

That's how I see it. That's the only way I can see it, truth be told. I've been through enough horrible things that I have to reject the idea of a conventional God, one that meddles in everyday life. Such a God, given my own experiences, is repellent to me. Cruelty I can deal with. I've been dealt cruelty. What I and Mrs. Bug go through now, if one keens to the idea of predestination, is barbarism, and I will not accept that.

The very idea of God casting despair and suffering into my life on an active basis sickens me, fills me with an unquenchable rage. To think of an Active God, one that intervenes daily for good or ill, that makes me so insufferably angry I can barely spit. Omniscient such a God may be, but that doesn't keep me from feeling unfathomable rage. I've been through enough crap, why put my wife through the same thing, if such a God existed? I'm His favorite punching bag, not the woman I love! Strike ME down, dammit!

.....

...but I'm not a man to say these things to the public at large. Yeah, hypocritical of me, I know, spewing my emo to a message board like this.

*sigh*

The end result of all this is that I'm not sure if I will be able to interact with some of my family members. They are far more devout and conventional Christians than I, and I'm sure the phrase 'Test of Faith' will come up were I to discuss this with them.

As you might have noticed from my previous paragraphs, this is not an ideal that fills me with joy.

I can't curse God. It's simply not feasible or productive, the way I see things. Yet, I don't think my relatives will understand my point of view, that I've been hit so hard and so often that the very idea of this whole Cancer Thing being pre-ordained fills me with rage. I don't think they'll understand, and I'm not sure if I can even control myself if and when the subject comes up.

I don't want to alienate my family, yet I'm not sure if I will be able to prevent such a thing, so repellent do I find the idea of predestination. Good Presbyterians or Methodists or Catholics all, the lot of them. My take on things just doesn't fit into their worldviews... and I'm not sure how to even explain my point of view.

Worse, from a religious standpoint, Mrs. Bug is an atheist. Me, I'm fine with that. My view of things absolutely prevents me from projecting my beliefs on another person. What's the point? They will either believe or not believe, and the only influence I have is to lead by example, not by words. I've taken the view that we'll find out what happens when it happens. So has she. We're both scientists at heart.

But my family... for the most part, Mrs. Bug is liked by them. She has proved to them time and time again that she's a good person. Yet I can't help but fear that some elements will take this current set of events and hoist it up as 'proof' of some sort that she has gone down the wrong path, that her current troubles have been inflicted on her for such choices.

Given my current situation and love and loyalty, how can I not feel that such opinions are purely superficial and warrantless? I have learned through experience that you cannot make someone believe in something they do not fully trust. It only leads to madness and despair.

And thus, given my state and what I fear might happen, how can I possibly reconcile with various members of my family? I am set in my beliefs, chief among them the 'lead by example' one... how will I deal with condemnation by kin that cannot possibly know what I and Mrs. Bug am going through? Cancer does not run in my family, it is a foreign experience to them.

Do I have the self-control to turn the other cheek, as Jesus told us to? I have accepted many physical pains in my life and have indeed turned the other cheek to them, but emotional pains are relatively new to me. I spent most of my formative years dealing with the possibility of dying badly and coming to grips with just that; I had little time to learn the fine arts of emotional self-control. I fear that my lack of experience might very well cause me to say and do things that will alienate those I love.

Perhaps I am blowing things out of proportion. My family has been good to me and Mrs. Bug, and they've even been good to some of my past lovers, none of whom 'fit the mold', so to speak. Yet I fear, and this fear debilitates me more than any fear of what physical horrors might come to visit Mrs. Bug. My family is my support network, and I do not feel that I can lightly shred such webs of comfort, much as my currently-churning gut instinct tells me that I may have to do.

...forgive me. I cannot say that I came here to seek guidance, only to vent. I had to put this into words that others might read, however selfish that might seem. I do seek absolution from my peers, much as my beliefs tell me that such a thing is self-serving and futile. ...American to the core, hell or high water.

I wish that I had happier news for you all.

[XMEN Gambit]

Oh, Bug! So sorry. Will be praying for you guys. If I can help at all, of course, let me know.


If you need an answer for relatives thinking Mrs. Bug must have done something to deserve being "struck down" or whatever, Jesus dealt with that sort of thing in the first part of John 9.

[Spinning Hat]

Hey bug, check your Pm's. We're alll here for you and Mrs. Bug, and anytime you need to vent to put it into words, feel free to post it here. You'll always find a sympathetic ear, and we'll support you anyway we can.

[XMEN Iceman]

We love you Bug. We will pray for you two.

Don't worry about the relatives...if they think that way then they forgot that God wanted us to love people that did not believe, not prosecute them.

Hang in there bud!!!!!

David

[XMEN Ashaman DTM]

Yes, bug, we are very much here for you and the Mrs.

I hear you on the relatives. I married into a family that has some of those. Gambit and Ice said it best, and I'd have to add that a god that is so insecure that he has to constantly test, is not one that I believe in. I believe in one that is unconditionally loving. And that as long as I am a good person, I'll be okay in the end. I am a lot like you, Bug, in this. (Yes, I've said these things to my new relatives in the past.)

Another thing to bring up if you ever run into problems is to remind your family members that you and your wife need their support at this critical time.

If they turn their backs on you, then I think you need to figure out if you want them around you in the future. I've had to do this. Family is one thing, but family that doesn't support you when you need it? Hopefully they'll come around, but people are individuals.

I know that's awfully black-and-white, but to protect your own emotional stability, you need to think like this.

[Ambush Bug]

I'm much better today, folks. Thank you all for the kind words and offers of support.

Yesterday was like one of those cartoons where something bad happens to a group of people and their leader says "OK everyone, PANIC!" and it's mass pandemonium for a few minutes.

We're feeling way better today. Really, this was expected, it's just that my testicles decided to speak up and make me say things.

*shrug*

I'll deal with my errant family members kindly, I've decided. It will all work out.

[Ambush Bug]

Still doing pretty good. I feel I should apologize for my first post... not for the content, but for the repetition. I could have written that better, but I was not myself then.

Funny how various bits of my personality kick in; I'm not ashamed of how I felt then, but rather of how I expressed it. Since my employment at DxR and the fine craftsmanship required of my textual communications there, I've found that I have a burning desire to say what I mean clearly.

If any of you are Stephen King fans, you might well draw a rough parallel between myself and Harold Lauder, at least as far as self-expression is concerned.

Yet, repetition aside, I find that I still stand by my words. The crux is still there, but I am only now coming to grips with the self-control needed to ensure that I can remain rational and civil in the face of ideas that cut me to the bone.

I must once again align myself with my Zen Place. For those that do not know, my Zen Place is an image of Qui-Gon Jinn from The Phantom Menace. It wasn't a very good movie, but at the very end, when Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are battling Darth Maul, there is a telling scene when the combatants are separated by the environment in which they fight. Kenobi is pensive, but relatively calm. Darth Maul paces back and forth, looking at Qui-Gon with an urge to kill. Qui-Gon, however, takes the opportunity to sit down and meditate, to clear his mind for the coming combat.

That is my Zen Place. I've found it a constructive place to be in the past few years. To take the time from a busy day, to sit and think, if even for a moment, of the coming hardships.

That is what I do now. Perhaps our road ahead will be hard, and very likely it will be less hard than the initial road Mrs. Bug and I traveled. But perhaps it will not. I know for certain she faces a horrible choice in the near future, to have both breasts fully removed. I am not a woman. I cannot contemplate or conceive of how such a decision would affect her self-esteem or her self-image. I can only perceive that such a thing is horrible, and that I must support her in every way that I can.

Forgive my explicitness, but I have found that breast cancer and the resultant conditions thereof are intimately tied into one's sexual self-perception. What is required to defeat the Beast is most often ravaging to the woman concerned. I do not claim any root understanding of how this must feel. I can only relate through the cultural image pressed upon women in this American society, and that image definitely tends towards a 'racked-out' woman.

I perceive that this is horrible, yet it is foreign to me. Men, taken in whole, tend to enjoy their scars. A man with long tracks across his face will gladly boast of his encounter with a grizzly bear and the tale of how he survived. He will even be seen as manly, more desirable for that fact. Yet our society does not afford the same convenience for our women. A woman horribly scarred by some previous encounter is often shunned, the loss of her beauty and form taken as some sort of detriment to her character.

This, so far as I can tell, this is what distresses me the most. Mrs. Bug knows that I will accept and love and cherish her no matter what comes, but I quail at the thought of what she must endure from others, when they see that she has been physically scarred by what has transpired. This is the thing that makes is hard to sleep at night for me. A spouse takes only so much for granted from her mate; the human condition requires that we all seek outside approval from others, no matter how small. I fear that she will lose this approval in some way, and it angers me that others can be so shallow.

I have even seen this in action, from when I had to shave her bald. The chemotherapy had made the roots of her hair most painful to endure, and so there was a long, late-night episode where she asked me to take it all off to the scalp. That in itself was no fun to endure, for either of us. (It was instructive, though. I now know which way every follicle on her heads points. It's since come in handy for scalp massage! ) That she remarked of the looks she got in the corridors of her workplace made me angry. I really should have seen it as a preview of things to come.

I should really pack it in now. Any more discourse and I will be rambling. I'm not angry, nor am I depressed at the moment. I'm only looking to the future as a man who sees a huge pile of earth he must shovel and level will sigh and try not to think of the huge amount of work ahead.

Mrs. Bug has often commented that she thinks what I went through was worse than what she went through. Given my own past hospital experiences and how they shaped my mother, I'm inclined to agree. Yet my own pride doesn't really allow me to feel as if I, during my stint of nursing Mrs. Bug back to health, went through something more horrible than she.

We will get through this together. Of that I'm sure.

[Ambush Bug]

Send us some luck, folks. Tomorrow is the appointment with the surgeon, where we will decide between future reconstruction methods.

In one corner is 'microsurgery', where the docs take some belly//lower abdomen fat and turn it into a pair of boobs. Pros include a very natural look and feel and no need to have them re-touched-up if the surgery is successful. Cons include providing a place for future cancers to hide, plus an 8+ hour spent under general anesthesia. That last is no joke for anyone 30+.

In the other corner is 'silicon FTW', namely, another silicon implant. Pros include no place for tumors to hide, as the implant is put under the pectoral muscle. Pros also include the need to never wear a brassiere again, plus a mental security of not having a place to harbor cancer cells. We also have prior experience with the procedure, so aches and pains can be minimalized, but not entirely reduced. Cons include an every-ten-years replacement plan, plus the strange 'feel' of silicone. Trust me, men, your average silicone boob implant that's placed under the pectoral muscle provides some nice shape, but feels nothing like the original. We're hoping to find some softer implants for a better feel and carriage.

We've got a notebook full of questions to be answered, plus a kick-butt attitude and a will to not take vague answers.

The last couple of days have been rough. It's like the Five Stages of Accepting One's Own Death here... first we were fine, then it was crying fits for everyone, free of charge. Now we're getting ready to be caught up in the machinery of surgery again, and our practicality has taken hold.

So far, the going consensus is 'no chemotherapy needed', which is music to our wears. Chemo sucks. It works, but it sucks for multiple reasons. We may find out after the surgery that chemo is necessary, but that's in the future and we'll deal with it. But for now, the plan is masectomy>reconstruction>freaking out>resolution.

Again, send us some luck and prayers and thoughts. We could use 'em.

---

As a side note, the lack of time-sense is kicking in already. I dunno if I mentioned this, but the previous encounter rendered the both of us quite unable to tell time, or even remember what month it was, so immediate were the daily concerns of treatment. It's a strange feeling, yet not entirely unwelcome. I don't think a schedule of any sorts would have helped things.

[X Rogue]

You got it, bro.

[XMEN Gambit]

Second.

[Ambush Bug]

Well, now we have had the Day Of Inquiry, and it was good.

I should relate first that our original encounter with Mayo cancer-docs and plastic surgeons was a complete whirlwind of chaos.

You see, the original tumor had gone from bupkis to over two inches across in the space of somewhat less than eight months. As you can imagine, this resulted in docs that were freaked out and very gung-ho to have it removed, post-haste. Apparently, 'normal' cancer cells grow at a somewhat reduced rate, comparatively. As such, our treatment was fast, brutal, and very to-the-point. Masectomy, silicone implant, and regular checkups, bang-bang-bang.

The original tumor, I should add, was also of the 'non-traveling' type, meaning that it was not the type of cancer that usually travels through the body and lands in various organs. It was a 'triple negative medullar' type cancer, for those who care to look that up. Apparently very rare.

Now, this new one, it got picked up during a regular checkup. As I've stated before, it was tiny, and the large-needle core biopsy actually removed the tumor, it was so small. In previous posts, we were not sure what kind it was.

We are still not entirely sure. There was not enough material to 'type' it completely. What we do know is that it's of a similar type to the original tumor, but not an exact match. That is to say, it's fairly certain that this one is also of the non-traveling type, and it's also almost 100% certain that it was not spawned by the original tumor.

The implication here is that Mrs. Bug's breast tissue is just of the type that it spawns cancerous cells all on its own. This is very strange, as her family has no history of breast cancer. Really, we've had it checked.

So, after our visit today, which contained a lot of very informative stuff, we've decided that we'll go for another masectomy and an silicone implant. The downsides include a non-natural feel, since the implant is put under the pectorals. ('Normal' silicone implants, over the pectorals, feel totally awesome. One of our co-workers had it done some years ago with very impressive results. We should know, we both felt her up at her invitation. )

The upside is that there will be no place for new tumors to hide. Plus no bra needed again. There will be some muscle pain to deal with, but there's new surgical techniques to minimize that, not the least of which is an injection of BoTox to the pectoral muscle to prevent it from spasming while the tissue expander does its work.

Our 'informer', whom we visited today, was most helpful. We actually got to handle various implants and expanders and such, and learned that there really is only one 'softness' of silicone implant. Ah well, no biggie.

One of the cool things is that we got to handle a tissue expander and the magnetic stud-finder (yes, it really is a stud-finder!) used to aim the injections used for inflation. We got lots of good info out of her, plus names and numbers and a new plastic surgeon. Our last plastic surgeon was excellent with a knife (really, he saved a LOT of nerves!), but he was also kind of an authoritarian dick. Not someone we could relate to.

So, all in all, today was a good day. We have a plan and we're all set. Next Wednesday Mrs. Bug goes in for surgery. I'm not too worried. The surgery steps are compartively simple, and we've gone through this set before. We'll be OK.

Thanks again for the happy thoughts.

[Ambush Bug]

I don't know if other hospitals do this, but the Mayo complex has this unique (to me) set-up where you call in the evening before to an automated service that tells you when to report for surgery the next morning.

Last time, we were to come in at 7:30. This time? 5:45 AM. And we found at at 8:30 PM. Ouch. We managed to get about six hours' sleep that night, and went in. As annoying as it was getting up at 4:30 AM to make the appointment in time, there were good things about it. Parking was a breeze. We were also the first case of the day for our surgeon.

Mrs. Bug went in to pre-op around 7AM, and surgery around 7:45. She was done by noon, and by 2PM, up in her room.

Results are good. Tumor is gone, they didn't find anything in her lymph nodes, and the expander is in. There may be a need to do a course of chemo, but we don't know yet, should find out something tomorrow or the next day.

As a side note: our exercise regimen of the past few months has paid off, big-time. Mrs. Bug is already home from the hospital, and is quite mobile and feeling pretty good. The BoTox has kicked in, and there's little muscle pain this time around.

She's upstairs calling her mom now, and will probably be out cold in bed in a little while.

[XMEN Ashaman DTM]

Sounds good so far, Bug. We hope to hear more good news.

We'll be thinking of and praying for you two as well.

[XMEN Gambit]

Yay! Sounds great. Glad to hear that the proactive stance is doing you good. Rogue passes along her best wishes as well.

[Spinning Hat]

I'm glad to hear things are going along better this time around. We're all here for you, and send our best wishes. And CALL ME. I sent you my numbers in a PM a while back...