Receptors are how we often successfully target cancer cells and when there are no receptors, those same medications may not work. Our sisters with metastatic triple negative breast cancer have a particularly rough experience since the only medication that is usually effective are the harshest IV chemotherapeutic agents. This can mean some very rough days … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #22 →

I've regularly dealt with headaches as a child and as an adult, so after my diagnosis, this experience did continue. My doctors have always been very very concerned about my headaches and I've had multiple brain MRIs to ensure that there were no metastases in my brain. For now, there haven't been any, but we … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #21 →

For those of us with hormone positive, Her2 negative MBC, the liver is the most likely place for metastases after the bones. Knowing the symptoms and the likelihood for different areas of progression is a good thing to be aware of so that we can educate our medical team on what's going on. We will … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #20 →

Knowing the signs and symptoms of different areas of metastases is so important. Whether you are learning to listen to your body prior to or after a breast cancer diagnosis, it's incumbent on all of us to be able to give medical professionals and others the best information. We live inside our bodies 24/7 and … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #19 →

Bone metastasis are no fun. When I was diagnosed in 2017 with Stage IV Metastatic Breast Cancer, it was because of metastasis in my bones, all of them. On on a bone scan or x-ray, the lesions/tumors/mets show up as black spots; on a PET/CT, the same areas show up as bright lights, demonstrating the … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #18 →

I didn't understand when I was diagnosed how people are counted in the US or elsewhere, for that matter. As I learned more about the databases kept by the federal and state governments, I was really astonished to learn how these large and complicated databases are falling short. Not to say that their efforts don't … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #17 →

Medication can often be given to a patient in a variety of ways -- pills, liquid to be swallowed, injections and infusions. Typically pills or liquid to be swallowed can be administered at home, which most injections have to be done in a doctors office and most infusions at an infusion center or hospital setting. … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #16 →

Putting all of these timelines together is astonishing. When we are first diagnosed, it is a whirlwind of treatment, surgeries, medication, doctor visits and learning a whole new language. Add in the psychological affects of assimilating the knowledge of a truncated life expectancy and it's super complicated. And yet all the normal things of life … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #15 →

Here's what I think so many people don't understand -- Stages I - III are when the breast cancer hasn't spread beyond the breasts or local lymph nodes, but Stage IV is when the breast cancer has taken up residence somewhere outside the breasts. Stage IV is fatal, it's terminal, it is incurable, it will … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #14 →

I always chuckle a little at the irony of choosing the 13th day of October as the day to recognize the only Stage of Breast Cancer that is terminal. Once we get to Stage IV, that's it, the cancer will be the cause of our death and only a lucky few live long lifespans with … Continue reading BCAM 2021: Day #13 a/k/a US National Metastatic Breast Cancer Awareness Day →