Jeaucamom-
I completely understand.
I was dx at 34 (in 2000). I had aggressive BC w/no family history. I had a couple of other friends -young women also, dx at the same time- that I went through treatment with and they all recurred within a year. After a while I was the only one still here. My daughter was young, I NEEDED to stay around to see her grow up. For a long long time I worried about it every day. I was terrified of recurrence. Every little pain or strange symptom freaked me out. I was really uncertain I'd be around for very long. I tried so hard to de-stress and be positive: yoga helped somewhat......
I just want to say that it does get better. Every now and again I get scared again, but oftentimes I can go a whole week or even month without thinking about BC. I plan for the future now, believing I will see it.
Hang in there. Passing your 5-year mark (are you measuring from dx or treatment completion? My doc said dx, which is great because that landmark was 6 mos earlier!) may help a lot. I had a big celebration and honestly did breathe easier afterwards.
Another thing, I don't know what type BC you had, but I learned something great from my oncologist last year: the type I had was estrogen & progestrin negative..... and new research shows that while recurrence in the first 5 years is greater with that type, recurrence AFTER 5 years is far, far less. So if yours was ER/PR NEG, good news for you too, since you are getting close to your 5-yr.
I am sure that you already know all this, but try to focus on the moment. Enjoy every minute and every day and live it fully. Focus on the wonderful things in your life and be thankful for them. When my dear friend died I witnessed the last months of her life spent kicking and fighting rather than enjoying her twin babies... and I vowed to try to always appreciate every moment. It's just, well, you never know when you're going to get hit by a bus, you know? When I'd get all wrapped up in my recurrence fears I would try to focus on the moment. (I also did all I could to put fears to rest, i.e. getting tests and biopsies all the time to quell my fears. Luckily my doc understood that I needed to for peace of mind!)
Another thing that helped me was to try to do things to be as healthy as possible. (I'm a bit of a control freak, and feeling I was being PROACTIVE helped.) The really sucky thing about BC is that you don't know why you got it. It's not like you smoked or worked in an asbestos plant and then got lung cancer, and can then avoid cigarettes or asbestos! I did a lot of research on things implicated in BC, and have really restructured my life to avoid those things personally, and especially to keep my daughter as far from them as is reasonable, since she's at much higher risk having had her mom dx at a young age..... So, we don't take our clothes to the dry cleaner any longer. We use absolutely NO perticides and herbicides on our property, and we avoid any lawns with those little application flags on them. We eat almost entirely organic foods, much of which we're now growing ourselves, and especially avoid ANYTHING with added hormones and pesticide/herbicide residue. It has taken a restructuring of our eating habits, for sure. Since we can't afford to eat large amounts of organic meats, we now eat much smaller portions of meat and more veggies, which of course is healthier BC-wise, anyway. Anyway--- these things helped me to move forward....
Hugs to you, hon. I really understand what you are going through. If you ever want to talk, don't hesitate to email me directly and we can talk on the phone.
Love-
Stacey
