The first of way too many quarterly oncology appointments

I went to my appointment on Thursday. Left without many answers. Why? Because I was dismissed to a 4th year student who took all of my initial info & questions, because she didn't review it with Dr. Paul before he came in and because he seemed to be preoccupied with something else. I only realized she didn't review it with him as I was thinking about all of it on Friday. He seemed to think I was already on tamoxifen when I had asked her about alternatives. I didn't really want a review of the side effects, I need to know why I need it in the first place. What benefit will it give me? Back up, right to the beginning. I did have my questions written down and I did ask them. There was a breakdown in between docs. This period is so critical for me and most women. Feeling dismissed to a med-student, isn't good. Let me also say I wasn't endeared to her when she couldn't even do the math and called me 51. If you can't subtract, ask the patient her age. I'm going to choose not to allow med-students to do any of my appointments. I was uncomfortable in July and this time. Two times is enough to know it doesn't work for me. If I have to pay for the specialist, I want to see only the specialist. While we do have great insurance, the co-pay for specialists is $50. (Two visits equal just about a week's worth of groceries. You see where I'm going with this...)

I did learn that most of the alternatives are for post-menopausal women. I just can't believe that tamoxifen is the only one for pre-menopausal women. While we're on that topic, the chemo shut down my menses. He said it should return. Time period is vague. But even if it hasn't returned in two years, it may come back then. How irritating. You think you're done with something and BAM there it is again. Two years later. Monitoring my estrogen levels is futile because they go up and down a lot. He said we'd have to monitor them for years to truly know if I was post-m. And if I did take one of those drugs for post-m girls, if my period did come back, it would have been a waste taking those drugs.

The other thing we didn't talk about was my future scans. How do I really know that the chemo & radiation did what they were supposed to do? I am confident that the surgery took the cancer out. I had pathology done on that tissue to confirm it. Self-breast exams seem a bit ridiculous at this point. But I am doing them. I'm right back to the beginning when I couldn't feel the cancer anyway. And no one else could either. Perhaps MRI's and PET/CT scans come only if they feel something. Mammograms come after February. Maybe he talks about this at my next appointment. (Yet if the next appointment goes like this one, I won't want to keep coming every three months.) I feel like I need more info as I look over this three-year-every-three-month-appointment-abyss. I did leave a message with the nurse who taught the chemo class. If I need to talk to Dr. Paul about any of it, she'll let me know. I also have a nurse case manager to call with my insurance. I hope they can help with a timeline and all my questions.

I'm feeling more confident as I've been able to put my concerns in a list for the nurse. It does get discouraging when you do have a list of questions and you do ask them and then you have to ask them again because the first person didn't talk to the real doctor. For the cost of all this in time, energy and don't forget money--I need to leave feeling taken care of. Not just given a prescription.

Maybe the next time I'll tell you what it was like to be told I had a wig on and should go to a shop "if I wanted anything done with it." That's code for "it looks bad and you need to fix it." Oh and this was at a breast cancer Cook for the Cure event. Sorry girls, I know you wanted us to have a good time, and we did until that very moment.