Richardson reinvented her treatment plan once again following an axillary node dissection in July 2007 that came back negative, when her surgeon pronounced her finished with treatment. "Then I went to my oncologist, and he said there wasn't any more treatment he could offer," she remembers. But Richardson wasn't done.
She went to the University of Pennsylvania and saw another oncologist, who recommended more chemo, which Richardson followed with 33 radiation treatments that finally ended in January 2008.
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Richardson weathered the ups and downs of treatment after learning one crucial skill, she says: "Being able to adjust to each twist and turn is critical. I learned that the oncologists don't really know much about this disease. They follow a prescribed protocol and have little idea about the outcome beyond the published stats."
As for what she learned about herself: "It's human nature to imagine the plan is straightforward, then to find yourself having to adjust as the plan changes because of new information. I learned that we humans are amazingly resilient and mentally capable of bouncing back from bad news."
