Breast Cancer: A Survivors Story

It’s coming to the end of Breast Cancer Awareness Month and I wanted to finish it by telling you the story of a Survivor of this disease.

My Mother.

I also want to give you some insight into what it is like living with someone through this disease as a child. The decisions that are made and how they might affect others and the fears of someone living with the BRCA genes.

This is Part 1 of a 2 part story.

Part 1: Introducing My Mother…. A Survivor

My Mother was 2 months shy of her 35th Birthday when, after hearing of a colleagues wife’s diagnosis, happened to check her breasts whilst lying in bed one night. She detected a lump.

So here starts her journey through this disease, mine starts later.

The lump was found at the start of the week and by the Friday my mother was with the GP. She found herself at hospital the following Tuesday for a scheduled Needle Biopsy which in the end, couldn’t be carried out because of the hardness of the lump. She was sent home to be brought in on the next Monday for a Biopsy under General Anesthetic. Whereas this wasn’t exactly ‘routine’ I don’t think at this point the enormity of the situation had hit for my Mothers’ recollection is waking up the next day in hospital realising she had been left with half a breast. As far as she was concerned she had gone in for a biopsy of the lump she had discovered.   Then, the hospital sent her home complete with 15 staples and the fleeting care of a District Nurse.

The Friday of that week is scarred in all of our minds and will be, perhaps, for the rest of our lives.

It was Easter Week. I was off School. The house phone rang and I picked it up.

My memory of this is still quite fresh although I can’t actually remember speaking to anyone or hearing anyone I can remember how that one phone call set off one horrible Friday.

We were bundled over to our Grandmothers.

My Mother and Father were asked to attend the Consultant that very afternoon.  It was then the diagnosis was revealed.

Breast Cancer

The Consultant explained that when they had started the Biopsy it became very apparent that the cancer had already spread and so they had needed to remove the amount of  breast that they did. It was then advised that my Mother have further surgery to remove the rest of that breast.  It was also discussed at this point that this would mean a removal of her Lymph Nodes. So, she was admitted and had the surgery.

Immediately after this surgery my Mother developed Lymphoedema basically a lymphatic obstruction. She also ended up in the High Dependency Unit. It had all gotten very real very quickly.

After being discharged from hospital and sent home with the again… fleeting, if best, care of a District Nurse for simply wounds …. my Mother was left in our charge.

6 weeks later was her next contact with the Consultant who put those age-old cards on the table.

– Medication

or

– Combination Chemotherapy and Medication

My Mother and Father had a huge decision in front of them.

So, after research and a lot of soul-searching I can imagine my Mother informed the Consultant she would not be going forward with Chemotherapy and instead decided on a 5 year period managed by Medication. She attended check ups every 6 weeks.

Instead of taking you through the next few years bit by bit I can tell you my Mother then decided, herself, to go forward and have a Double Mastectomy.

We’re all still living with the results of all this BUT we are LIVING WITH IT. Why? Because of EARLY DETECTION.

Also because we are lucky. Sometimes it really doesn’t feel like it as I have to sit by and watch my Mother live with the repercussions of this disease. Life is a struggle for her. It’s the little things. Having to live with how your body has been changed without having the choice, living with the restrictive results of certain surgery’s that in a lot of our eyes were carried out appallingly. My Mother is still on waiting lists to this day in regards to reconstruction and for someone to fix what so many surgeons made a mess of. But she is living, she is alive to wait.

All of the surgeries have also had an effect on her future health prospects.

My Mother cannot be screened.

Instead she checks herself monthly and if she should find anything she contacts her Doctor straight away and is referred immediately for scans.

When asked, my Mother gave me this message for you all,

” If you EVER find even the smallest lump, the tiniest change, GO to the Doctor IMMEDIATELY. That day if you can. Do NOT put it off. Early detection is your fighting chance.”

My message to you all is listen to her.