Health Updates & New Treatments

In the continuing saga of “Crys Beats Cancer”, the new year brings new treatments to keep all things cancer far away from all things Gorman.

One thing I didn’t know prior to being diagnosed is that all cancer is not the same; I thought cancer was cancer. I mean, I knew there were different kinds of cancer like breast cancer, colon cancer, lung cancer, that sort of thing. But did you know there are even different kinds of breast cancer? Who knew! Some kinds are affected by hormones, some have to do with genetics, some have big words like “in situ” or “triple negative” and I don’t really know what they all mean. Cancer is as individual as your fingerprint and the great thing is that doctors understand that now better than ever, and treatment is individualized as well.

All that to say – my particular cancer  is was ER/PR positive, which means the cancer cells are fed by estrogen. There are a lot of theories that cancer is fueled by sugar or can’t grow in alkaline environments, and I’m sure there is some truth to those somewhere. But when it comes to me, mine is fueled by estrogen. (So bring on the desserts!)

Which makes things a little bit tricky because as mature as you think I am (annual Disney trips not withstanding) I am still pre-menopausal, which means my body still makes estrogen, a totally normal thing for a 38-year-old body to do.

But for a 38-year-old body that uses estrogen as cancer-fuel, that’s not ideal. For this reason, I’ve continued to be on a chemotherapy called tamoxifen for several months. Tamoxifen is an estrogen-blocker…that means that if there just so happens to be any stray cancer cells left after surgery, chemo, and radiation (and we are believing there are NOT!), the idea is that tamoxifen forms a barrier around said stray cancer cell so the estrogen my body naturally makes cannot feed it, and the cell ultimately starves and dies instead of growing and causing more problems.

Now that I’ve been on this for several months and life is just beginning to stabilize, it makes sense that it’s time to throw another wrench into the mix! Discussions have now turned to another treatment we’ll be adding, which gives additional protection against cancer coming back. This treatment is a monthly shot that basically “turns off” my ovaries, the chief estrogen-producing factory. This means that not only does the tamoxifen block the estrogen from fueling any stray cancer cells, but we are also turning down the amount of estrogen in my body to begin with – all good things for ER/PR+ breast cancer.

The downside, as you might guess, this puts me into early menopause. But, since I have been an over-achiever for 38 years, it’s only natural that I would choose the advanced honors route in this area of life as well, so bring on the hot flashes!

I received my first shot already and it takes a little while for things to kick in, but so far so good.

I would love to receive your prayers over this new process, and that I experience as few side effects as possible. As I mentioned above, life has had begun to settle down, we’ve begun to figure out how to manage the side effects of the current chemo treatment, and in the last few months we’ve been able to have thoughts and conversations that don’t revolve around cancer – imagine that! So I hate that now we’ll be rocking the boat again, but it’s all part of this “new normal” (whatever that means) and I know we’ll settle into this treatment after a few months as well.

Thanks for your prayers, and if you see me fanning myself when it’s 35 degrees or lingering in front of the refrigerator…don’t judge.

(My apologies for all the men who just read a post with a whole lot of words like “ovaries” and “menopause”. You have permission to go chop some wood or grill some meat for your troubles.)

*If you feel like this post would be helpful to someone you know, I would be so honored if you shared it! It encourages me greatly when God uses the struggles of my story to help someone else in theirs.