My prognosis.

People often ask me what my prognosis is and I have said all along; if it comes back it didn't work and if it doesn't it did! My Oncologist refered to my, Her2 positive, invasive ductual-carcinoma, lymph-node positive breast cancer, as very aggressive disease. When I asked mt oncologist 7 months ago if we could have another baby when this was all done (which by the way isn't going to happen, it was just my hormonal response to my fertility coming back after experiencing 6 months of chemically induced meno-pause)she said I could probably have another child, but that Chris and I'd have think seriously about how he would manage with three young children without me. We are happy with our two girls and feel that our family is complete.
I've studied and looked over the stats, which Doctor's generally like to avoid when talking about long term prognosis, and from what I can figure...I'm looking at a 70-something percent chance of surviving 5 years.
The cancer agency looks at their job being to get patients to 5 years, that's their goal.If the patient survives longer, great, but they won't make any guarentees. I see myself as living much longer than that, but I can see how the treatment of the cancer could shorten your life expectancy as well. Right now I don't see myself so much as recovering from cancer, but recovering from the treatment; of which I still have one more Herceptin treatment on August 6th.
My oncologist did say to me right off the bat, my first appointment, that it was her goal to get me to 50 years of survival, not just 5. So I'm sticking to that, 50 + my 35 at time of diagnosis = 85 years old; I CAN LIVE WITH THAT!