I eventually changed the treatment plan to lumpectomy first and then chemo and radio therapy. I can use lower dosages of chemo after the surgery, which helps a lot on the side effects.

I would think they'd want to get rid of the tumor first and then treat surrounding areas with chemo; that's what I did.

I am triple positive
Small 1.4cm breast tumour but 2.5cm node involvement
My Oncologist is treating me with chemo first for 8 rounds then surgery and radiation and herceptin infusions are also planned for one year and then oral meds for 5years
My understanding is that triple positive is aggressive and therefore cell division needs to be interrupted

Thank you for the info. The size of tumor is 1.2 cm local. No lymph involvement based on biopsy, mri and PET scan results. Genetic testing is also negative.

For triple positive, it depends on the size of the tumor, and if there is lymph node involvement. For those reasons, Neo adjuvant (chemo before surgery) is recommended for lymph involvement and larger tumors (not sure the size). The benefit of chemo first is, if it killed all the cancer in the breast, it probably killed any floaters that got out. No matter if you do chemo first or not, you would have Herceptin for a year. If you have chemo first, and it does not kill all the cancer, they change from Herceptin to Kadcyla.
Nobody wants chemo (I surely didn’t!), but if I had to have it, I think I would do it first, get it over with. I think it is better way to see how well the chemo did its job.
Surgery decisions are driven more on how much cancer is in the breast, not the bio markers, and if you are BRCA+. A single tumor can be removed with lumpectomy, but if it covers a bigger area, it may be harder to remove it all.
Wishing you well!