The Inevitable: Marlene's Breast Cancer Story, Part 3

You have heard of the old “good news/bad news.” Well, this is sort of the bad-news-is-bad-enough-but-could-be-a-whole-lot-worse news. I got cancer. I don’t want it. I am not keeping it and I am not inviting it back again.

I meet with Dr. Peter Mann, my gynecologist, for my annual fun-filled afternoon and the biopsy results. Dr. Mann has received many honors.  He should get one for “Best Bedside Manner.”  You are sitting on this narrow little cot, wearing a paper shirt that lacks six inches from closing and a paper sheet.  He takes your hand and tells you how pleased he is to see you again. I am thinking, “I am naked wearing totally un-accessorized paper vest and you act like, “let’s have a hot fudge sundae and chat.” 

He very gently tells me that I have ductal carcinoma in situ, DCIS for short.  Under normal circumstances I would think, four years of Latin, I can translate that into cancer in a milk duct in place, contained. But, my brain short circuits.  Cancer is all I hear. Well, off we go. 

Dr. Mann has carefully explained where it is, what it is and what all the next steps should be. He assures me that a lumpectomy followed with medication and perhaps radiation is all that will be needed. I ask for a referral to a surgeon. I am confident that I can handle this.

Then he tells me to stop all hormones. The internal combustion engine is about to be reborn.

'You Have Active Cancer'

The first surgeon I see is a woman. She comes in and says “You have active cancer. Do you want a lumpectomy or a mastectomy? You need to let the office know by Friday." Fired her. I am thinking I need you to meet my GP and the two of you should be trapped in the Iron Maiden for a couple of hours. His left testicle and your right breast with just a little more pressure applied every two minutes should change your attitude.

I had my left breast fondled by several surgeons, had a few more tests and pictures made and determined Dr. Victor Pavamani of Eastside Surgery Center was the man for me. If you ever have the opportunity to meet Dr. Pavamani, you will like him. He was Daddy’s surgeon and was wonderful to Mama.  He is delightful, funny, energetic and painfully honest. When I asked what the chances were of the DCIS returning, he said not very likely, but things happen. Actually, that isn’t exactly what he said, but I can’t publish that word. But, we all know “what happens.”

On Wednesday morning, I show up at the Eastside Diagnostic Center where Dr. Biafore and her trusty cold-handed, warm-hearted nurses again tighten me into the Iron Maiden, plunge a needle the size of a Varsity drinking straw into my breast. She injects blue dye and then inserts a long thin wire as a marker for Dr. Pavamani. He will use this wire to find his way into the marker at the center of the cancer site.

'So What's Cancer?'

I ride in a wheelchair across to the hospital. I am sitting in a wheel chair with a wire thrust into my left breast like an antennae and the office secretary is pushing me OUTSIDE under the walk way awning, open to the world, into the hospital surgery center. Visions of leeches and blood letting whir through my mind. I suggest to Eastside that adding a couple of walls to the covered walk way would be nice. It was rather windy and a bit chilly that morning.

I am rolled into Room 12 to await my fate and Dr. Pavamani. I have a very pleasant time in the Room 12. Ms. Jane Alexander, the Queen Mum of Gwinnett County Education, comes by to visit. Ms. Jane volunteers at the hospital but comes to the surgery center just to see me. We visit and laugh about her second great-grandchild who was born the day before.

My husband Snell meets four or five people he knows in the surgery center. After living in Snellville all of his life and teaching/counseling at for 34 years, he frequently meets people he knows. Dr. Pavamani pops in and out to visit and reassure me. The nurses who did my pre-op stop by to say hello. The anesthesiologist and his assistant come by to tell bad jokes. And, then, in comes Nurse Tammy with the good stuff. 

I have a who can’t see and refuses to acknowledge that she can’t hear, a husband who can’t hear, a special needs child who doesn’t listen, a traumatically brain injured cat and two kittens that masquerade as flying monkeys. So what’s cancer…?

If you have not had your yearly mammogram, may I suggest:

Center Breast and Diagnostic Center, 1700 Tree Lane Road, Suite 100, Snellville. Call the center at 770-736-2568.