Dad and I sit in the conference room at Hanover General Hospital when the surgeon knocks on the door and enters. “You must be Eugenia Miller’s husband,” he says to my father.
“Yes, I’m Harry,” my father murmurs while he stands and extends his hand in the direction of the doctor.
“And I’m her daughter, Kathy,” I say as I offer my hand.
“I wish I had better news to share with you,” the doctor states as he looks in the direction of the window at the end of the room.
On March 17, 2015, I was diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer. Initially it was thought that I would need only a lumpectomy and radiation, but the biopsy changed everything.
The pathology report said that the tumor was HER2-positive and estrogen/progesterone positive. The HER2 protein makes the cancer more aggressive, so I would need, in addition to surgery and radiation, eighteen weeks of standard chemotherapy, a year of two other infused drugs and a hormone-blocking oral drug.
Still, the cancer was stage 1a with a decent prognosis, according to my oncologist, who said, “The good news here is that we have treatments for every part of your cancer. You are lucky.”
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