I have Triple Negative Breast Cancer

It was a Friday morning when I received the results from my biopsy through my patient portal, September 15, 2023. I was at work and I remember thinking, 'How am I going to walk out of here and get to my car without falling apart.' I shut the door to my office, called my husband and cried. I quietly gathered my things, put sunglasses on, and walked out. I had no idea what to do next. Was someone going to call me? Did I need to look for an oncologist on my own? Was I going to be ok?

My husband met me at home. We sat on the deck. I called my primary care doctor. She is not the warmest or most sympathetic. She told me to stop crying and that she would put in a referral to an oncologist. She also said, 'Don't expect to hear from anyone today. It's Friday.' And that was that. I had to get through the weekend with my son and stepson and pretend nothing was on my mind, nothing was wrong. Longest weekend of my life.

I kept going back the read the test results on the portal, trying to get some insight into what was going on with me. Triple negative. That sounded like a good thing to me. I sent my results to a dear friend who works in the medical field who didn't respond the way I expected. She quickly texted 'DO NOT GOOGLE.' I made it to Sunday night before I did just that and OH MY GOD. I had the most aggressive, hard to treat type of breast cancer.

It may seem like an odd choice to name my blog This Funny Thing, but humor is how I have always dealt with stress and discomfort, however inappropriate, While most of this journey so far has been anything but funny, I have found some moments of levity and laughs. I hope my thoughts and writings can help others going through something similar.