Breast cancer?

Question

3 years survivor, had to have mastectomy on left breast and then 1 year later reconstruction with implant. I'm doing ok now except sometimes my arm bothers me. What can I do for spasms. It feels as if a muscle is being pulled under my arm pit, more like a "charlie horse" feeling. Is this normal?

Answer 1

Cookie talk to your oncologist he/she will have a more correct infomation regarding your situation and the best source for it.

Answer 2

I don't know about implant side effects, only mastectomy. I am a 3 year survivor too and no problems with arm muscles or anything.Some people can get nerve damage from the chemo. I think it is rare, but it happens. I knew someone who had nerve damage to the legs (probably permanent, called neuropathy).

If you are one year past all surgery, I would think you should be getting back to "normal" again.. check with your surgeon who did the reconstruction. If not satisfied with his response, get your records from the medical records department of the hospital to see what the surgeon's notes say and maybe get a second opinion.

Answer 3

As a prevention - Try Vitamin C therapy. A few years ago a cancer specialist came out with a paper that said the best cancer/infection fighter found to date was Interferon. At the time it was $15,000 a gram. The paper also said that Interferon was a by-product of the natural breakdown of Vitamin C in your body. Shortly after that the FDA tried to make Vitamin C by prescription only. Guess why? The FDA has the RDA for Vitamin C set at 64 mg a day, just enough to ward off scurvy. Linus Pauling, who got a Nobel Prize for his work with Vitamin C and a second Nobel Prize for Organic Chemistry, said that 1000 mg a day should be the minimum and 2000 mg a day if you are sick or smoke. He played tennis almost daily until the day he died at 96. Personally, I got sick twice a year for 2 weeks at a time, for more than 20 years, with something to this day the doctors have no idea what it was, but for a week in the middle of those 2 weeks I was flat on my back. I started Vitamin C therapy once I gave up on the doctors. I took enough to be asymptomatic for those 2 weeks. Too much and I got diarrhea and too little and I got sick. Within a narrow range, and it followed a bell curve over those 2 weeks, I was not sick. At the height I was taking 40,000 mg a day and 300,000 over the 2 weeks. After 2 years of that I have not been sick since – more than 15 years. Vitamin C acts as a natural diuretic so you need to drink a lot of water and watch your body in total, but my kidneys did not dissolve as the doctors predicted, or get massive kidney stones as other predicted. I did not dissolve my bones as some predicted or completely calcify my joints as others predicted. I had no side effects at all. It might be something to consider.

Answer 4

My mom is 2 years after her mastectomy and she says the same thing. It must be normal and it does hurt, but she just takes tylenol for it.

I'm very sorry for your cancer and very happy that you are a survivor!

Answer 5

I am a 4 month survivor, and I asked at a young survivor luncheon, and I heard that it is somewhat normal.

Answer 6

It depends on what type of mastectomy you have had...a radical or a modified...Which pectoralis muscle was removed?

It is normal to have some muscle tightening and cramping...

Answer 7

I think it is better to wait over a few more years. When all is ok, then do your stuff.

Answer 8

it seems normal. sounds like you need physical therapy to use those muscles.

do you have lymphedema? that may be causing you strain as well

Answer 9

God bless you!!

Speak with your dr. for suggestions.