LETTER FROM JANE RUSH UPDATE #2

Sent: Fri, Oct 1, 2010 9:31 am
Subject: Update 2

Thank you all for your e-mails, thoughts and prayers.  I am truly blessed to have such a wonderful group of friends and family.  It has been a week since I last updated you.  So here goes…

I had my MRI last Friday morning.  I did not move too much to blur the images.  Sitting perfectly still for 32 minutes is really hard.  Of course my nose had to start to itch as soon as the procedure began.  J

I have been blessed by many new friends.  Dianne Smith introduced herself to me last Wednesday.  She is in my Bible study at First Christian Church and is a breast cancer survivor.  She got up that morning and could not quit thinking about me.  She tried to go to work, but just felt that is not where God wanted her to be.  She left after about two hours and went back home.  When she arrived there, my daughter Liz, called.

Liz asked her if she would help me with understanding the process and support me through this.  She called and asked if she could come over.  We prayed and she proceeded to share her story with me and the process she went through.  She also set some expectations of the possible things to come.

I cannot express how much that visit continues to encourage me.

Dianne did tell me that I would have good days, bad days, good hours, bad hours….  Boy was she right about that.  The initial shock has wore off, I am just ready to begin this fight.  Dianne warned me it was a slow process.  As you all know me – slow is not my nature.  Maybe that is God teaching me patience.

Jeff has been very supportive and encouraging. I am very blessed to have my best friend beside me through this fight.  He makes me laugh when I feel like crying and listens to me even during OU football J and has held me when I cry.

I wrote all that earlier this week, and could not send it….   Anyway Jeff and I went to the see the surgeon last night.  The good news is that it is a small area – about 1.3cm.  Stage one.  The bad news is that it is Triple Negative

Triple-negative breast cancer refers to any breast cancer that does not express the genes for estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR) or Her2/neu. This subtype of breast cancer is clinically characterised as more aggressive and less responsive to standard treatment and associated poorer overall patient prognosis. It is diagnosed more frequently in younger women, women with BRCA1 mutations,^[1] and those belonging to African-American and Hispanic ethnic groups, and those having a recent birth.^[4]

It has a poor prognosis (due to lack of a targeted therapy) but the PARP inhibitor BSI 201 is now giving very promising results in clinical trials.^[5] A novel, targeted antibody-drug conjugate, CDX-011, has also shown very encouraging results in recent clinical trials.

I will be having a PET scan and appointment with the oncologist next week.  Right now they are saying 3-6 months Chemotherapy, then surgery then radiation.  But that is all dependent on what the oncologist says.  Next appoint with the surgeon is October 15^th.

Thank you again for all your thoughts and prayers.

Do not fear, for I am with you;
Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God
I will strengthen you, surely I will help you,
Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.
Isaiah 41:10

Love you,

Jane