It's not like I don't like writing, but when I wrote the last of my breast cancer journal entries on Father's Day this year, I was relieved to think it would be the last. The reconstruction process was not yet complete, but I was given a clean bill of health after the mastectomy was performed, and I put cancer in my past. Unfortunately the cancer was not through with me.

BREAST CANCER See Pam's Story Her Struggle From Her Husband's Perspective Pam's Last Chemo Treatment E-Mail Pam Spread Word Survival Stories Myths and Facts Cancer Quiz Risk Factors SELF-EXAM How To Do It Diagrams How Do You Check? How Often? ARTICLES: Fitness Center For Patients WEB RESOURCES: Susan. G. Komen Foundation National Alliance Of Breast Cancer Organizations Breast Cancer Info National Breast Cancer Organization National Breast Cancer Coalition

I had surgery to "install" the permanent implants on Aug. 25. Shortly after that I started having trouble with my left shoulder. I was losing range of motion. But since I just had surgery, we thought it was probably just scar tissue, so I started physical therapy. During those sessions, the therapist would rub on my upper pectoral muscle, and her hands found a bump. I had just had a blood test that showed everything in normal levels, so we assumed the bump was a knot in the muscle. But the more PT I did, the worse the pain became. It got so bad that I wasn't able to sleep at night because pain would shoot through my shoulder and down my arm. The bump was also getting bigger, and I could even see it just by looking in the mirror. Since PT wasn't helping, I called my surgeon, and she suggested an MRI. Sure enough, there was a large mass in my upper pectoral muscle, but they didn't know what it was. So I was scheduled for a needle biopsy on Nov. 19. The call came the next day that it was indeed the cancer returning.

Like weather, medicine is not an exact science. Even though the doctors couldn't detect any more cancer after my treatments were over, there must have been at least one cell that survived. Because it was the same cancer that was so aggressive before, this one too was aggressive. The week of Thanksgiving I did a brain MRI, PET scan and bone scan. Thankfully, the bone scan was negative, but the PET scan revealed several lymph nodes in my chest and neck that were involved, and the MRI showed five nodules in my brain.

Yes, we were shocked. We hadn't expected something like this so soon after my last chemo treatments were over. The doctors were also quite surprised, especially since my blood didn't show anything out of the ordinary in October, when I was already having pain in my shoulder.

We were shocked, but not devastated. We still totally trust in God's plan. I can look back on so many things in my life that seemed to be negative, but see how God turned them into blessings. I am already seeing a blessing from this in that my husband and I are closer than ever. Kids tend to take our attention away from each other, but this has allowed us to become best friends again and we can focus on our relationship even more. And who knows what other blessings God has in store for us. We just continue to trust in Him.

My treatments consist of taking three chemo pills twice a day along with radiation to all the locations where cancer was found. This happens five days a week, and will continue for seven weeks. As of today I have three weeks down already. Constant treatments are tough, but it's only seven weeks compared to eight treatments over a period of eight months last time. Because I'm getting radiation to my brain, I have lost my hair again. But I shouldn't have to be without it for as long as I was last time!

I hope to write each week as I did last time, although the treatments are tiring me out. But through these writing I hope to encourage others to be even more aware of their bodies. If you know when something is out of the ordinary, you can get it checked out. As before I can't stress enough that the sooner a cancer is detected, the more likely you are to survive. So KNOW YOUR BODY!

Until Next Time,

Pam Daale

The Happy Cancer Patient ... again

You can e-mail Pam Daale at Pam_Daale@TheDenverChannel.com.