Dear parents,
First of all, I am sorry for the group email (and it is a long one too!) on such a beautifully sunny day, but I find it easier to tell all in one go, rather than face the reveal one by one. This email goes out to all the girls parents & one or two boy’s mums.
I have a personal bad news to share with just you… and a personal favour to ask you.
Only last month, I have been diagnosed as having breast cancer.
As you can imagine, as things like this goes, it’s come totally out-of-the-blue, and it is a terrible shock to me and my family.
Since then, I have been in and out of hospital for diagnostic tests, & then had the tumour successfully removed. It was 24mm.
The biopsy, CT scan and the bone scan showed that the cancer has not spread anywhere else – which is a very very good sign so please don’t worry too much!!! My doctor has assured me that prospects are very good, and yes, it’s serious, but it’s curable.
Here is the thing – the reason why I am emailing you today.
Although I will be fine, I naturally worry for Sakura.
We have been open with the children & discussed with Sakura that mummy had a ‘small’ lump called breast cancer that was successfully taken out.
Sakura might mention to your children that I am in & out of hospital with breast cancer. Your children might then come and ask you about what it is. If this happens, I would really appreciate it if you could reassure them by saying it can be curable, especially when caught early and treated. 1 in 8 women have it, (which is a lot!) and it just happens that I was one of them! Hopefully it is a matter of taking it out, do lots of therapies to kill off any left behind, & then look after myself so that it doesn’t reappear. - I just don’t want to worry her little soul unnecessarily.Â
Despite the good prognosis, I am expected to be on chemotherapy for the rest of the year 2016, then go on to radiotherapy, hormone therapy et al for whole of 2017, then on medication for 5 years. (I know…, it sucks… they are throwing every possible drug at me). Apparently chemotherapy is the worst of the lot and my doctor says I can be a lot more active in 2017.
I had my first ever chemotherapy last Thursday. And I have been having a bad feeling of sickness/ nausea (today is much better though!). The past week, Sakura has been “on-my-caseâ€, wanting to do normal stuff with me, but yesterday, I already let her down when I couldn’t keep to my promise and she cried.
The last thing I need is for her to be sad. (Consoling an 8 year old girl when you’re feeling like crap is a toughie!) And here, I would like to ask for your support please?
There are two instances I can think of right now:
1.
Play-dates and/or sleep-overs for Sakura to keep her busy and excited. Since I will be busy in treatment and recovering from side-effects, she will be bored = not good. I am expected to feel crappy on-and-off for the rest of this year, so it’ll be so awesome of you if you could organise something for her please?
2.
And secondly, if you hear of any tiny thing like Sakura seeming upset or she said something weird, any changes, please let me know so that I can deal with it and nip any worries she might have in the bud. I should also mention that she has an on-and-off stammering issue, triggered by low confidence, etc, so if you detect this, please let me know?
~~~~
Right now, I feel absolutely fine mentally, and believe it or not, I’m over the initial shock! By Day 3 of diagnosis I was done with the crying, worrying & fearing for the unknown, rather, am ready to fight this 100%. I am also absolutely fine about talking about it with you if you want to, totally approachable, so no need to avoid the subject with me please! ;-)
Some of you have seen me and chatted with me post-diagnosis, and I am so sorry I lied when you asked about myself & about my shop. I just couldn’t face the music at the time to tell you as my only weak spot in all of this is having to stop the work I was so passionate about. Well, with time, I’ll get over this of course. All we need to know is that I can finally go out with you guys on Thursday drinks now that I’m free! Yay!
T xxx