About Me: Female, 59, Mariposa, CA, member since Oct 2009
I am a two time breast cancer survivor. I have had a lumpectomy, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, followed by a second diagnoses one year later. That diagnoses was followed by a masectomy on the left side and a radical mast. on the right side. Six months later I had rec
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[More]onstruction surgery (TRAM flap) that has been painful since day one. I now have advanced encapsulation on both emplants that I am terrified to have removed. I am unsure of my options. I have several compression fractures in my spine as well as numerous hemangioms that are causing increasing pain and numbness in my hands and arms. I have not been able to return to my "old life" in any way shape or form. I also have fibromyalgia, severe depression and osteoarthritis caused by the chemo. It was six years after the chemo before I was able to read a book. My memory was shot. The chronic pain has limited my activity by at least fifty percent. I have started falling on a regular basis in the last six months, and I am afraid of what the future will bring. I need to find a doctor that understands all my problems instead of referring me to three or four other doctors. It is seventy miles to the doctor from where I live, so each trip is 140 miles. Still, life is good. I keep telling myself that.
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