{NOTE: This was originally published on Vanessa’s CarePage. We are copying all those posts here to have her story in one place that all can access. We are back-dating the posts to match when she originally published the post there, and are marking the blog post here with Vanessa as the author, as these words that follow are her own.}

Posted Apr 20, 2007 10:27pm

Billy's brother Tom post buzz and thumbs up!

Billy's Dad getting it cut off (and me in my curly wig!)

Me cutting my Dad's hair in the rain.

Dad looks excited to have all his hair gone!

Billy...uhh..showing his support by "adding" hair! Thanks!??! :)

So this week was a busy one! Once my hair started thinning, it all came out rather quick. Mom and Jess helped me cut off the last of it on Wednesday. We realized that my head is actually rather small. I never knew! I’ve been wearing my wigs, but it feels good to take them off when I get home. Still haven’t been able to brave the shock factor and go out bald, but maybe someday. :)

Me in the middle of MY haircut.

What I have left...my peach fuzz!! -- Hey, no laughing! (Christina is on the other side of that phone...don't you see her?!)

I also got the results of the genetic testing back. As it turns out my BRCA genes are “normal”. Dr. Abello and the genetic counselor were surprised, considering the family history, and haven’t given up trying to find answers. I am going back to have another genetic test, called P53. Not sure exactly what this is yet, but it is correlated with other types of cancer too. So it is good news about the BRCA gene, but hopefully we can make sense of all this soon.

I’m going with Mom and Jess to visit Christina this weekend, so I’m excited about that. We wanted to do it before I start having chemo every week. Also, this is the alternative to my week in Orlando where Billy and I were supposed to be right now. We will have to got to Disney World when everything is over instead!