need advice Please

Hi gma,

Yes I have certainly learned a lot. I am not always sure whether that is a good thing or not. I just feel the need to know what is happening to me, so I can mentally prepare for it.

What you can't find is how to overcome the fear and sadness some days. It has certainly helped reading about all the women who have faced this situtation. Many are in a much worse place than I am. I suppose with time I will learn how to push it all back into my mind a little, it's just there first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Right now with only a little over a week until my surgery I feel like each day gone is one less day that I will be the same. I stay pretty upbeat most of the time, and then it just grabs ahold of me. Having a place like this to put my week moments into words with people who understand helps a lot. I don't feel so alone.

If anyone can give me some good advice on how to mentally prepare for the grief of losing my breasts, which I never felt that much attachment to until now, I would appreciate it. This morning I am having a hard time with courage, you all have so much.

You are right of course, I am saving my life. And I firmly believe this as i have know intention of letting this beat me. I am hoping that the morning of the surgery I will have the calmness an peace that cam over me at my lumpectomy. My sense of humor had returned and I just knew that at least something was actively being done to rid me of the cancer. I don't think you are working backwads at all, I can't imagine that anyone can be completely prepared, now matter how many pictures we look at. I tell my husband that I will just close my eyes when I take a shower, get dressed and be O.K., he tells me not to SH-- myself, I will struggle, but it is O.K., he does not care in the least (so he says) wheather I have breasts or not, he certainly did not marry me for them, as I was very small breasted and thin at the time. Can you tell me, even though your breasts are gone, does the skin that is left have any feeling of touch, not the arousal kind, just the warm comforting kind, that makes you feel close when snuggling? I will miss that safe, comforting feeling of closeness that contact can provide as you fall asleep.