Bye Bye (much too) long hair!

I decided, that when my diagnosis of the clump in my breast is negative – meaning it’s a good clump and not cancer – I’ll get my hair cut and donate it to women who’ve been diagnosed with cancer.

I like having long hair – I’ve had it long for the last 4 years, but I’m sometimes also annoyed of it because it’s just much too long at times. Donating my hair seemed like a great idea and after I found out that there are a few organisations who take your cut-off hair and use it to make wigs I couldn’t wait to get my hair cut.

Hair Donation Before
Hair Donation – The before shot: the left image shows my daily hairstyle

So I did some research on where to donate and until yesterday I was sure to donate it to “Locks of Love“.
I actually wanted to donate to women my age who are diagnosed with cancer but didn’t find anything and L.o.L. seems like a nice organization. L.o.L. take donations for kids who mainly suffer from “Alopecia Areata” and not cancer, which I’d be ok with, seeing it’s terrible for kids to not have hair in any way.

I called my hairdresser on wednesday and my lovely stylist squeezed me in today at 3:30pm

Pantene Beautiful LengthsYesterday I did some more research and after reading a lot (also a NY Times article) and mainly after clicking following link: American Cancer Society I’ve decided to donate to “Pantene Beautiful Lengths” instead, although I was a bit sceptical at first to donate to such a known and big company – I never trust big companies ;).

But, there are a lot of points which made me feel very confident about Pantene:

  • the wigs go to the American Cancer Society
  • PBL supports women who have lost their hair through any types of cancer
  • The women get the wigs for free

Here’s the Pantene WP blog.

So, here’s my journey…
At the hairdresser:

Hair donation - before and after (ugh the natural wave)
Hair donation – before and after (ugh the natural wave – but also from the hair tie)

I washed my hair this morning at home so my stylist cut it dry. I told her the lenght I’d like to have my “new” hair (about 1-2cm beneath my collarbone) so she cut a little further down so that she has about 2cm left to style my hair. I feel so good now and I can’t wait to send it out to the States on monday 🙂

Hair Donation - before and after - the after shot - I need to wash my hair again tomorrow and dry it to get it nice and straight
Hair Donation – the after shot – I need to wash my hair again tomorrow and dry it to get it nice and straight

It’s amazing, I actually was worried to get 21cm and still keep the length I want, but a great 31cm (around 12 inches) long ponytail was cut , I never thought it would be so long. I’m very happy now 😀
Pantene Beautiful Lengths Logo

I’ve found following organisations to donate hair to:

Core needle biopsy / Stanzbiopsie

It’s done, I had a core needle biopsy today.
It didn’t hurt at all – now, seven hours later, of course I feel a bit of pain.
Here’s the procedure:

  • Before she started anything she disinfected my left breast with spray
  • First I became three needles with anesthesia into my left breast. One puncture before, one over and one behind the Fibroadenoma (FA). That didn’t hurt.
  • Then, with a scalpel, the doctor cut a little part of the skin. I don’t know how long the cut is yet, I’ll know that Friday morning, when I can take the band-aid off.
  • Next she put the “hollow needle” close to my FA. I looked at it going into my breast on the ultrasound monitor. It looked like it went in a few centimeters deep – but everything’s bigger on the monitor, it probably was only 1-2 centimeters? I don’t know, forgot to ask. The diameter of the hollow needle was about 3-4 millimeters. Quite thick, I thought.
  • The doctor and her assistant then showed me how the sound will be when the needle goes into the FA to take a sample. It sounds like a stapler.
  • Then she took four samples of the tissue. It took about five minutes. Each time before the needle shot into my breast she fixated the hollow needle so that it doesn’t slip away. Every time before she did that she asked me “ready” and after I nodded she took a sample.
  • The FA started bleeding, which I didn’t expect and which gave me an unpleasant feeling, but she said that’s normal.

I got a compression bandage around my boobs, could hardly breathe. Over the cut I got another band-aid which I have to leave on for four days, no water is allowed to get close to it either. Just like with every cut, I guess.
I’ll get my results on Thursday, Valentine’s Day. Let’s hope that Cupid shot a good tumor with his bow today 🙂

Biopsy it is

It’s been a week since the second doctor approved of me having a probably good tumor in my left breast.
I was relieved that it didn’t grow and that it looks like a typical Fibroadenoma. BUT – it’s probably that way.
Seeing that I couldn’t stop thinking about Tammy the last week and read scary stories about Fibroadenomas being not good at all, I spontaneously called the radiologist this afternoon and made an appointment for a biopsy.

It’s on February 11th, 1pm.
I’ll get a punch biopsy.
I’ll have to get a blood test before then with three values about my blood clotting.

Don’t know how I feel about the biopsy, I’m not scared of it or the results, I just hope everything will go smooth.