Doctors appointments. Everyday practically. First stop meeting with the surgeon. Dr. Tafra was the surgeon I selected. Chris and I met with her to discuss my diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment plan.  I have Infiltrated Ductal Carcinoma, Stage 1 Grade III, Triple Negative Tumor. Ok, so stage 1. It can’t be too bad? I mean a lumpectomy and maybe some radiation. I’ll be good to go in a couple weeks, right? Wrong. The key word or words in my diagnosis are Grade III and Triple Negative. The staging has to do with the size of the tumor and how far it has spread. So for right now (yes it could change) its a 1. The grade shows how rapidly the cells change.  Grade III is aggressive.  Great. Triple negative means that it tested negative for the three main hormones that usually fuel cancer growth.  In a nutshell, they don’t know what fuels it.

And because of these two lovely things my doctor utters the words I’ve been dreading to hear. Chemotherapy.