Feeling Good

Mary Jo is recovering at home and improving more everyday from her most recent surgery last Tuesday.  She is feeling pretty good today and she claims to be almost pain free just six days since she underwent two simultaneous surgeries for the removal of her Purple Power Port and for the second and final stage of breast reconstruction after last year’s radical mastectomy which her surgeons remove both of her breasts.   Mary Jo had discovered on July 4th of 2009 what turned out to be a 2.2 cm Invasive Lobular Carcinoma ILC tumor on her right breast and a 9mm Invasive Ductal Carcinoma or IDC (which is a different type of invasive breast cancer) in Mary Jo's left breast.  Here we are a little more than a year later and we are thankfully looking at a beautiful bright light at the end of what was a long dark tunnel.  Today is undeniably a time to celebrate but we will continue to be vigilant with oncology doctor follow up visits for years to come because Mary Jo was a stage IIIb cancer patient.  She cancer had a number of elements that continue to make her a high risk patient,  such as MJ is  HER2+, carries the BRCA2 mutation, had a 2.2 cm ILC tumor that had spread to 9 lymph nodes and she unclear surgical margins on the 9 mm IDC tumor.  The next doctor visit will be a routine follow up visit with Dr Luong (Mary Jo's plastic surgeon) next week to see how Mary Jo is doing post op.  Mary Jo and I feel very blessed to have so many friends and family praying for the wonderful outcome that god has blessed us with throughout this most challenging year and a half of our lives so far.


Kevin and Mary Jo today