Update: All is well!

Hello Dear Readers,

Thank you for your warm wishes, kind thoughts, and many messages.

I'm happy to report that my healing is going very well.

Under the steri-strips, there are three incisions. The longest one, closest to the armpit, is the only one that has steri-strips discoloured by golden lymph fluid, so I assume the surgeon took two lymph nodes from there. Though Dr. Walker had hoped he might need only one incision to get the two tumours, apparently he needed two. All three incisions look clean and calm, healing well, with no visible bruising (yet?) or swelling. The discomfort is all but gone, even with movement.

The only really weird thing is the sound of sloshing in my breast when I walk! Apparently, it is a thing. A seroma. A collection of fluid in the empty space where the tissue once was. I was so relieved to find mention of it on the Sunnybrook Hospital website because I had no warning that such a thing might happen. Most likely it will resolve on its own, over time.

I will see Dr. Walker on Friday, April 22nd. He should have the pathology report at that point. I'll post an update then.

Here's my reflection from the day surgery waiting room:

At the hospital today

In the pre-op area,

I sat in a waiting room chair,

dressed in standard hospital blue,

the blanket inadequate

to warm my sock-covered feet.

The building shook briefly.

And then again.

From construction

in another hospital wing,

I surmised.

Not bombs exploding nearby.

Grateful for attentive and compassionate health care

funded by collective consensus,

it seems unfathomable that some lives,

like mine,

are meticulously tended

while others are casually destroyed

by war, famine, violence.

May the signs of spring bring hope.

xoxo