Opening a New Door in My MBC Journey

Today I walked into Dana Farber for the second time. The first time was a consultation and they were absolutely wonderful. Today I was lucky to be able to get a follow-up appointment (very quickly) to discuss clinical trials and treatment plans.

It’s no secret that my liver isn’t too happy right now but we hoped that a certain clinical trial would be a good fit for me. But unfortunately my liver tests are too high right now and we need to act fast to start my next treatment. If you’re wondering if I'm sad about not getting into a trial right now, I’m not! I will always be eager to jump into a trial at some point but the medication I will be on Eribulin (Halaven) which is a type of chemo would of been in my trial anyways.

My biggest decision today was whether to continue treatment (Eribulin) here in Connecticut or to make the jump and join Dana Farber full time. Eventually, I would need to leave for a bigger hospital. Even though many have faith that this type of cancer will go away, it’s not going anywhere for right now. (And medically you never stop being Stage 4 with breast cancer.)

So.... Drum roll… we are heading up to Boston for treatment! I will miss seeing the Starling Darlings all the time and as my oncologist says, I will still see her from time to time as well. It’s scary jumping to a huge hospital but I'll be in good hands and close by clinical trials for when it’s my time.

Back to chemo! Don’t feel bad for me, do you remember my video of my last day of chemo? You will hear me say, “last day of chemo, for now!” I never wanted to fool myself that that day I would walk out of chemo and never return. I have metastatic breast cancer, which means my journey won’t be the traditional: surgery, chemo and radiation. It’s another reason why I choose to share my story so publicly. Advocacy and awareness is being able to share your good, bad and the ugly or how else will people know that Stage 4 needs more?

But now that I’m going through chemo again, I will lose my hair again, but this time I don’t plan to have my husband shave it while I weep in the corner! If I need to lose it again I'm going to celebrate and party through it! I haven’t had a cancer party but I sure the heck deserve one!

by Larissa Gionfriddo Podermanski, Metastatically Speaking, August 2017

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