Receiving a diagnosis of breast cancer can turn your world upside down. These women share how they felt after hearing the “C word,” and how their experience has changed them.
Kavita:I did not say the word cancer until several months into my treatment. I could barely write it in a text message. It took me a while to work up to say that word, the C word, the ugly C word. And now I’m in a place I can say it. Cancer, cancer, cancer, cancer. I can say you and shout you from the mountain tops because you will not get me.
Anna:I was 27 years old and a one-year newlywed when I found a lump myself, while I was taking a shower. I didn’t have any family history of cancer, and within a week I was diagnosed with triple positive breast cancer. And my whole world fell apart.
Kavita:I was in denial immediately because I refused to believe that these were my results because my body would not have done this to me. So I refused to believe that any of it was true or that it was actually happening to me. You don’t just hear cancer and get to sit down. It’s time to get up and get moving. It was a port, MRI, chemo, breast surgeon, plastic surgeon, all these different medications, fertility, and that was the darkest and the hardest part, the diagnosis, and just getting started.
Monique:When I found the lump, I did a biopsy. It actually came back benign, but my left breast became very heavy and it also started to hurt. The doctor said, “Let’s have one more biopsy and then we’ll take it from there.” And it came back benign again. So I said, “Okay, but it needs to be removed because it hurts and it’s growing.” She removed it and she called me a week later and was like, “Okay, the papilloma we removed was benign, but there was a smaller mass behind it and that was developing cancer.”
Kavita:As a patient, you are going to be your greatest advocate. Many people are just so confused and bogged down by the diagnosis, they don’t realize that you have the power to pick your provider team at any point. It’s your body. It’s your choice. It’s your life. It’s your cancer. It’s your treatment.
Anna:I’m almost six years out from cancer. So while cancer is not an everyday part of my life now, emotionally it still plays a role in the way that I cope, in the way that I have learned to navigate the world. When treatment’s over, your support system wants to celebrate you being done with cancer. So they say things like, “Oh, the cancer’s gone, you’re done. Let’s get back to normal.” But the reality is for the person that’s been through it, there is no normal. I am never going to be Anna that I was pre-cancer. It doesn’t mean I can’t be happy. Doesn’t mean I’m not going to find joy again, but I’m a changed person.
Kavita:So I’ve been in remission for a few months now, and I’m very excited about that. And I am learning right now what it means to be what we call a breast cancer survivor.
Monique:I am currently in chemotherapy. I’m the only one that’s currently going through it. So at the end of the day, I really look like this. So, in the beginning it was really hard to accept the losing the hair, but now I just embrace it.