Sentinel Node Biopsy

HI everyone- 

I am new to this site as far as posting, but I have been reading one's posts for over a month trying to soak up knowledge! I was diagnosed with Melanoma a few months ago- Dec 1, 2018, to be exact. It's funny but you remember dates like those. I was shocked and broke down so much those first few weeks. Then I went on a rampage of digging to understand this. Afterall, Melanoma is so misunderstood. People take skin cancer so mildly. Anyways, my anger today results from how my General Surgeon handled my case. Unfortunatley, I did not go to a cancer center at first. I had a punch biopsy in Nov,2018 from my G.P., which led to the diagnosis. Afterwards, on Dec 12th I was directed to a General Surgeon (did not specialize in Mel). He said initially that after looking at the 1st path report that he wants to do two procedures: SNB and wide excision. You see, I was .76mm Breslow and Clark level 3 with Mito at 1/  he thought it would be good to do the snb. I had already done some research and agreed (even though I was in that phase of .76 borderline for snb.  Moving now to Jan 18th 2018…day of surgeries. To my surprise, as I lay in the hospital room with I.V.'s in my arm an hour before surgery, the nurse informed my that only ONE procedure was on the books for me- just the Wide excision! I was dumbfounded to say the least. I knew the chances were not great that it had moved into my lymph nodes, but we were going to make sure! My surgeon entered the rrom 5 min prior to surgery time and was not even going to tell me of the change of plans! I also knew that the SNB should be done PRIOR to the WLE. But i let him do the surgery …12 days later I get the call on my path report: it was twice the depth (breslow)…now it is 1.6mm, with a Clark Level 4 !! They said he now wants to do a SNB. I said NO and that I wanted a copy of my path report NOW. So, here we are today, knowing that the mapping part of the SNB could be screwed up because he did the WLE first. But I called Siteman Cancer Center in ST Louis,MO and in two days I will see the leading researcher and surgical oncologist there. He is the tops. I am thrilled to say the least! He is doing his own path report and I will talk and set in motion with him the next steps. Really, I have not even been staged yet- Just 1B according to latest, without doing the SNB. I have been encouraged to learn of so many of you that are doing research to become your own advocate in this fight! We have to! And keep doing it- keep up with the latest developments! And THANK YOU all for being on this site, so now I can recieve much needed encouragment and hope to give some back as well! ((HUGS))!!