An Introduction

An introduction is typically what you do first, so I will start there.

My name is Jerina. I'm 32 years old, have three wonderful children, an amazing husband, a job that I love, and breast cancer. I'm at the beginning of this cancer journey but I have family that want every little detail of my treatment that can hopefully read it here and I hope to be able to make a difference to at least one other person facing this same situation by writing this blog. When I first got the results of my biopsy (Invasive Ductal Carcinoma - the most common type of breast cancer) I felt like I had been diagnosed with an "old womans disease" but I'm learning every day how wrong I am. There are an estimated 250,000 breast cancer survivors living in the United States who were diagnosed with breast cancer at age 40 or younger. That is a lot of young women! I have already met some who were around my age & dealing with the same responsibilities when they received their diagnoses. You are not alone!

Anyone that knows me personally knows that I am a reader and I have been devouring information! There has been a lot of information handed to me in a short amount of time and I haven't gotten through it all yet, but I can easily see where someone who didn't have a basic understanding of medical terminology would be completely overwhelmed.

In Situ cancer. Invasive Cancer. Grade. Stage. HER2 Status. Lymphovascular invasion. Mastectomy. Lumpectomy. Hormone Receptor Status. Chemotherapy. Hormonal Therapy. Targeted Therapy.

Huh?

That's a lot of big words and I will do my best to make it easier to understand & digest. Those big words can be scary.

I also love to laugh and can always find the humor in most situations so I'm trying to laugh my way through this as much as possible. I won't tell you that I didn't have one breakdown after I first heard the words "you have cancer" because I did. But it doesn't help my situation to crawl into the dark. I have to keep parenting my kids, working, going to church, loving my husband, and laughing. Laughter is, after all, the best medicine. So my husband was not all surprised to hear me use cancer as an excuse not to do something (help fold laundry) as soon as possible. It didn't work.

If you have any questions, please ask away. I will update again soon with more specifics to my exact diagnosis.