Day 326: It’s a Reminder I’m Alive [Dr. Tita Gray]

Eva (00:08):
This is a story about what happens when you have breast cancer told in real time.

Kristen (00:16):
Okay. Well, good morning.

Tita (00:18):
Morning.

Kristen (00:19):
It's been a little while.

Tita (00:21):
Yes.

Kristen (00:21):
You look great.

Tita (00:22):
Thank you, thank you.

Kristen (00:23):
And I've been seeing posts about being at the gym and just how you're embracing life and all the things. So first, how are you feeling?

Tita (00:34):
I feel good. I actually wish I had been going to the gym a little bit more, but I've had just a few things that have just been, I've been working like nonstop major projects going on at the job, so that's been priority. So unfortunately eating more than I really want to be eating. So now I'm on a, okay, we're going to change all of that crap. And actually, if I was living in a neighborhood where I could walk and not have to worry about dog crap and felt a little bit more safe, I would go for runs and do all that. So I'm about to get into that environment that is going to feed my soul and I'm happy about that. So yeah.

Kristen (01:16):
That's great.

Tita (01:17):
But overall, I feel great. Spirit is great, was dating, and that sort of fell through on the dating part, but I think I have gained a beautiful, beautiful friendship. And so in this life, all you can hope is just for the beauty of things to come out of situations. So that's where I've been.

Kristen (01:37):
Wow. Yeah, I love your outlook on that. And are you feeling kind of back to yourself a little bit?

Tita (01:48):
Yeah, I am feeling back to myself. My white blood count has consistently been low. It's really funny. The last time we checked though, it was higher than it had been, which was great. I have an infusion tomorrow for my immunotherapy, so I'll be doing that. I do that every three weeks and we'll be doing that for the next six months. But what we did was my doctor and I, we went back and looked at past white blood count numbers. So even before I started chemo, and then even prior to that, my white blood count has always been kind of low. So I worked with a health coach and I found she turned me onto a really good vitamin regimen. That might be really good for it, but I feel amazing. The great thing is that with the immunotherapy, there was a point when I was still having chemo infusions that my joints would hurt.

(02:42):
Walking down the stairs was just, and I was thinking, okay, well it could be because, and this could be the case too, I was eating a little bit more carbs and gluten tends to bother me. I don't believe that I'm allergic, but it does bother my joints. And it does it for a lot of people. That's why they always tell people who have arthritis to cut back on the amount of gluten, it tends to help. And so been doing that now, not having any sort of pains in my knees and joints and stuff. A little neuropathy still in my toes. I'm going to wait until I move and then I'm going to start getting acupuncture.

Kristen (03:23):
Perfect.

Tita (03:24):
And this vitamin might help as well, but it doesn't stop me from having a great quality of life.

Kristen (03:31):
Yeah, it sounds like you're managing it is anything that's still like a lingering thing, you're managing it. And can you remind us a little bit about the immunotherapy? Because it's something that is, I think it's becoming more and more common and people think of when you're getting an infusion or something like that as chemo, like it's poison for your body. But what I understand about an immunotherapy is it's kind of the opposite, right?

Tita (03:56):
Yeah. That's exactly what it is to replenish those cells that were damaged by chemo. And I do see the difference. One, my hair started almost growing back right away, but I'm taking Keytruda and it's been helping. But I will say though, sometimes with Keytruda, or at least in my experiences, it was affecting my, what's it called? THS or TSH?

Kristen (04:22):
Thyroid?

Tita (04:23):
Yes.

Kristen (04:24):
Is that it?

Tita (04:24):
Right. And so then I had to start taking a medication to bring, because it was sky high, that TSH or thyroid thing went sky high because of the Keytruda. And I started taking a medication that is actually bringing it down. And so that's normalized now. And it's so funny, I checked with one of my cousins who's a retired nurse, and she was a nurse for 30, 40 years. And I said, Hey, my doctor recommended I take this medication. And she said, oh, that's actually a really good medication, hardly no side effects. And it's really good for that particular thing that she was talking about, this thyroid issue. She said it's excellent for that. So

Kristen (05:07):
That's awesome. So the immune thing is really, it's taking care of those cells that were so damaged?

Tita (05:15):
Yes, yes.

Kristen (05:15):
Because it's tough.

Tita (05:17):
And then I think that you try to just have a really good quality of life regardless. I think for me, overall, that's one of the things that having cancer has done for me is making me really think of what am I doing to my body? What am I putting in my body? I've started drinking casually again, but at times I'm just like, eh, is it even necessary? But nothing that is over the top, nothing excessive. So I'm just trying to make sure that anything that I'm doing for myself is not excessive regardless of what it is.

Kristen (05:54):
I'm sure there's a book or something that's called this, and I didn't just pull it out of my, but food is medicine, basically, right? And really watching what different things do to your body. And it changes as you get older, as medical conditions change, as medications change, everything, it just changes. And so yeah, I'm learning a lot about that as well, and it's so valuable. How is your chest healing?

Tita (06:19):
It's doing well. One side has a little bit keloid and the other side does not, so I don't know what that's about, but I've been using these strips that supposedly help it to at least not grow. I'm not in any pain. Still a little bit of numbness on the left side because the left side, that's where what you call it was taken out.

Kristen (06:46):
Lymph node?

Tita (06:47):
Lymph node, yeah. Well, they were both taken out on that left side, but the lymph node makes this a little bit more, this nerve damage. I think it is this numbness, but it's not that bad, it's not, I can still work out. I can still move my arms. I have all of the flexibility is there. I don't have any tearing or any issues that have come from it. So it's healing. I know it's going to take, I mean, this was just done on May 22nd, so I know that overall with the scarring and everything, it's going to take at least six months to a year to really heal. And then I'll decide what I'm going to do, tattoo, not tattoo, whatever. Is it weird not having breasts? I guess it's sort of normalizing to me. I didn't go through any emotional issues with it. I didn't feel weird when I was being intimate with my partner that it didn't make me feel like I was any less of a woman. It was just like, oh, here's what it is. Here's what it looks like. If it bothers you, I'll see you later.

Kristen (07:57):
Well, I am who I am and this is what you signed up for. And if you didn't, then okay.

Tita (08:01):
Then okay. And that's okay. That's okay too.

Kristen (08:05):
Yeah. Yeah, totally. Well, and I am trying to think of how to ask this question because are you still a little surprised when you look in the mirror after having breasts and seeing a certain thing in the mirror for 50 years, 60 years since you had boobs?

Tita (08:27):
Yeah, probably 52.

Kristen (08:29):
Yeah. Does it shock you or is it like a reminder? And I'm asking because I'm asking this because there are times when I, I'm just curious if this is a me thing or an everybody thing or just individual. There are times I had reconstruction and there's still the scars, and there's no nipples. And so I still am, when I get out of the shower every once in a while, like, oh yeah, that happened. You can go days forgetting that you had cancer because it takes a while.

Tita (09:02):
I think the only thing for me is that I've accepted it. So if I think about anything, I just think about the fact that I'm still living. So it's kind of like, yep, I chose to not have breasts. And I have a good friend of mine called me, I say good friends because we've known each other for a lot, a lot of years, but we really only contact each other via social media or something like that. We're not good friends, like some of her friends I see on social media, they're going out on trips together and stuff. We're not close like that, but I do she is somebody that I hold in high regard. And she called me one day and she said, I saw your post and you didn't know, but I literally had the exact same thing and had triple negative and everything. So she told me about her journey, and she's a very, very, very feminine woman.

(09:59):
So she decided, I think because of cautionary reasons, she decided not to have reconstruction. She almost did and then she decided not to. But what she does is she wears a prosthetic type thing because she still wants to give that kind of a feeling. But for me, I'm not doing that because I just don't feel a need. Now, sometimes people look at me strange, cuz I have short hair, I might be in my sweats and they think I'm a dude. There's no breast, there's no identifier, and I don't have on lipstick, I don't have on the eyelashes out here. So you can think either way real quick, but I just look in the mirror and I'm just kind of like, it's, I'm just looking at it more of, how can I let the scarring go away? That's more of what I'm thinking, like I just want the scarring to go to dissipate. But when I look at it, I'm like, I'm so glad I'm alive. But the breast part of it, the removal part of it, it's not even a reminder I had cancer. It's just a reminder I'm alive.

Kristen (11:08):
That's great. That's great. But it reminds you of the gratitude that you have for being alive is what?

Tita (11:14):
Yeah, but you want to know what I remember, it's gone away, but I remember I used to have a scar in my chin, and it's so funny how that has gone away though over the years. And I had it because I fell off my bike when I was a kid and hit my face and it was this bad cut. So over the years, whenever I would look at my face and I would see that every now and then the reminder of my bike accident would pop up. But to me, it's the same as any other scarring. I've broken three other parts of my body that I can look at and go, oh yeah, I remember that. But I don't dwell on it.

Kristen (11:52):
Yeah, no, that's great. That's great. So we talked about that there was not radiation required. So you did chemo and you did surgery and you're doing the immunotherapy. And so how is your oncologist doing maintenance, I guess, how is she monitoring you going forward?

Tita (12:12):
She and I are going to start meeting at least if we can, every other infusion just to check in, see what's going on. But I have her cell number. I have every kind of way to reach her. It's not like she's at my beck and call, but she makes sure that she's easy to get to if I need her. But I do know she's very in tune with how women who have had triple negative, how it shows up. So she's very, very aware of that and very understanding of what research is saying. She's on top of that. I know that about her. We'll see what's coming. The next time we'll probably meet, she'll probably tell me, okay, hey, we're this far in. I want you to get a checkup and a scan for this or that. I'm sure it's coming.

Kristen (13:02):
Yeah, it sounds like you've got somebody so good on your side. She's the right person to take care of it. And with her knowledge of triple negative. And can you remind our listeners why the triple negative is sometimes tricky?

Tita (13:16):
Well, because you don't have markers for it like you do for the other three types of breast cancer. So it's an aggressive form of cancer, doesn't have a marker. If that was the case, it would've been like, okay, here's what you have, here's how we're going to treat it. But they have to treat it almost like you have all three but don't have all three. Yeah, you're going to get a little bit of everything, but that doesn't, until we know what it is that you actually need. And fortunately, the way in which my chemo was set up and the type of treatment that I did have, obviously it worked because within three months, the tumor had almost shrunk to nothing. And then by the time I had surgery, everything was, all of the cancer was removed, including the cells, the micro cells. So she did her job, her medical treatment did what it was supposed to do.

Kristen (14:16):
So great. That's so great. Yeah. And have you gotten a referral for, even though you don't have lymphedema, have you gotten a referral for a lymphedema physical therapy or anything for them to keep those nodes moving?

Tita (14:29):
No. When I told my surgeon, when I came back to meet with her a month later, and I told her, yeah, I've already started, just started working out a little bit and everything, and she was like, then you don't need to go to a physical therapist. And she checked my movement and everything and she said, then, yeah, if you're doing all that, it's not necessary. She said, you might still have the tingling, you might still have a little bit of numbness, but if my range of movement and everything is not bothered, if it's all good, then it's not necessary.

Kristen (15:01):
That's fantastic. That's fantastic. That means you're keeping your lymph system moving.

Tita (15:05):
What I did was honestly every single day, and I still do it. I had stopped for a while and I started back again. And you can't really, lemme see. I just started doing like this all the time, just massaging it, deep massaging of that area. And I was doing that as soon as I could touch it, as soon as I could touch it without there being a problem, I started doing that. And it actually made the numbness that was felt all the way across, it started going away.

Kristen (15:34):
That's fantastic.

Tita (15:35):
So is there a little bit on this side still? Yeah. And I probably need to get back to doing the massaging while I'm doing any form of working out.

Kristen (15:44):
Yeah, totally. I'm so glad to hear that.

Tita (15:46):
Yeah, it's been a journey. Life is just unpredictable, which is what I put in my post. It's unpredictable. But when you're given an opportunity to live, then just make the best of it. And you watch those stories of people that find out that they're dying from something and they find out how long they have to live. And I love the ones that are just like, well, fuck it, then I'm going to do this and I'm going to do that, and I'm going to just live life to the fullest because we all come with an expiration at some point. We don't know when it is, so live life to the fucking fullest.

(16:25):
People walk around all I see it here, I see constantly people walking down the street who were probably half my age that looked like zombies, whether it be from drug or alcohol abuse, whether it be from mental illness, whether it be from mental illness that was something that they were born with or just sort of happened or because of situations that they were in that they became mentally ill because of their situation. But I see it every day that I can walk outside and I just say to myself, thank God for everything that I do have. Thank God for a great job. And although people are going to make me miserable at times, and sometimes the people I love are going to annoy me and piss me off sometimes, and I'm going to do the same to them, keep your spirit in tune. I always strive to just be a fucking good person.

(17:21):
Just be a good person. That's literally what has come out of this even more so for me is just that I had to fight to keep my spirit up and you know, saw everything I went through. I fought to keep my spirit up. And I know everybody used to say to me, wow, your attitude is so this and so that. But what they didn't know is that I fought for that. I fought to maintain that positivity when you are sick as all hell. And I didn't want to get up and walk my dog, but my dog looked at me like, I got you, ma. It's okay. It's okay. We can do short walks. It's okay. I could see that in his little face that he was just like, you're doing for me, I'm going to do for you. But we just, I don't know. It just out of all of that with fighting to keep my spirit up, I said to myself, I'll be damned if I let anything else take my spirit down. It's not going to be a job. It's not going to be friends. It's not going to be a relationship. It's not going to be any of the craziness going on tv politically. I refuse. But if I fought not to die, I'm going to fight to not let any of this other crap around me make my life miserable.

Kristen (18:46):
When you were talking about people, seeing people, it just reminded me of it's two things that we can all have grace and compassion and just to remember to have those two things because we don't know what everybody else is going through.

Tita (19:01):
Right.

Kristen (19:01):
And absolutely, we all have our ways of pushing through it, and I feel like this podcast has been a gift to the world, and I so appreciate you sharing everything you've shared. But I feel like it's also a way for us to have a conversation that maybe we aren't able to have and have a deeper understanding of the empathy that the world kind of needs regardless of cancer.

Tita (19:30):
I had to constantly remind myself that cancer isn't the only thing that is going on in my life. It's a piece of it. And I say that because I didn't share it with a lot of people. That would've been overwhelming to try to explain that on a regular basis what I'm going through, how I'm feeling. And I just did not want to be reminded every single day that I had cancer.

Kristen (19:58):
I was similar to you. I was on my way to radiation about the same time after surgery as you are right now when I finally shared it. I selfishly feel like the podcast was a way for me to, and I felt kind of rude when people would say, what's going on? How are you? I'd say, I really can't talk about it cuz it's so painful. Sometimes I didn't want to tell it again. And so I'd say, have you listened to this podcast? And I'm not trying to be rude, I'm just trying to say that it's really hard to keep repeating.

Tita (20:31):
There you go. Yeah. And every single day, if I had shared it, all of the messages would've been like, Hey, how are you feeling today? And oh, my friend had cancer and this is what she did. And unfortunately, everyone thinks it's the type of thing that everybody goes through the same thing. They don't know.

Kristen (20:51):
It's not universal.

Tita (20:52):
It's not. Your DNA makes it different. Everybody has different DNA. Our DNA is going to show up differently for everything. So cancer is going to hit us all differently. And it doesn't matter whether you are a big, small, white, black, it's just we're different.

Kristen (21:13):
Well, and I think that there are certain type of cancers where it's like, oh, it's this kind of cancer, this is what you do. Whereas breast cancer, because of the varied complexity of the female hormone system, it presents differently. There are a gazillion different kinds and different staging, different, all of the lymph nodes are not.

Tita (21:37):
Yeah, the staging too. Yeah.

Kristen (21:39):
All of it is very different. And it's one of the kinds of cancers where I think it has been so devastating for people because there are so many different types and they're just starting to get a handle. And this is putting it in way too plain terms for the recipe to treat. If you have this, this, this, this, and this, and you're at this stage, this is what we do. Kind of like what your radiation oncologist was saying with, I'm not just going to go say I'm going to complete the recipe and add radiation. It was that I'm going to think about it a little more progressively and say, look at your case.

Tita (22:24):
And I'm glad he did that because I did not want to have radiation. There was something in my gut that said, don't do it.

Kristen (22:31):
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I am so glad you're healthy and so glad that we've been able to take this journey together. And I'd love to check in. Please keep letting me know how you are and how you're feeling. And I'm sure we'll check in again to see what's going on and hear all the wonderful things you're you're doing and where you landed with your new endeavor. That'll be so much fun.

Tita (23:01):
Also too, I'll let you know when I was just in San Diego visiting my son and my grandson, but they take up, I don't see them very often.

Kristen (23:10):
Every minute you should.

Tita (23:12):
Yeah. My grandson even had me in tears. He was like coming up on a Sunday and he said, grandma, can you take me to school tomorrow? And I was like, I can't baby, but one day I will come and take you to school. So then when I was leaving, and my son lives with this really nice, beautiful courtyard and all the apartments and stuff, and my grandson was just yelling, Hey grandma, can you just come back? So he was like, okay, you can't stay overnight, but can you drive back tomorrow? And I was like, I can't. Yeah. I was like, I can't come back tomorrow, but I'll see you soon. Okay. And I was like, the tears were coming down my face, but I got my point was that I was going to make is that I will the next time plan out sometime for you and I to hook up and go and get something to eat.

Kristen (24:07):
Yeah, I would love that. I would love that. Well, if you need anything, please let me know.

Tita (24:12):
I will.

Kristen (24:12):
And I'm here and I'm so grateful that we had this time together.

Tita (24:17):
Yeah, thank you so much. It's been great. Yeah. Hopefully I can, my story that you've allowed me to share resonates with someone, then I cannot tell you how happy I would be with that.

Kristen (24:32):
I am just very humbled that you gave the time and your heart in this. So thank you so much, Tita.

Tita (24:38):
It's been my pleasure.

Eva (24:43):
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Eva (25:46):
Thanks for listening to Breast Cancer Stories. If you're facing a breast cancer diagnosis and you want to tell your story on the podcast, send an email to hello@theaxis.io. I'm Eva Sheie, your host and executive producer. Production support for the show comes from Mary Ellen Clarkson and our engineer is Daniel Croeser. Breast Cancer Stories is a production of The Axis, theaxis.io.