Another breast cancer survivor, grade 3, stage 2, invasive ductal carcinoma, triple negative, positive lymph nodes. Almost a year's worth of treatment - surgery, three types of chemo, radiation with permanent marks/tattoos placed on my chest which are a daily reminder of my past as well as a permanent low grade, painful swelling of my arm and hand on the affected side from the lymph node removal. One of those chemo agents is known to be toxic to the heart, and I myself as a cardiac nurse take care of those patients whose hearts are failing from it, ironically enough. Follow up every three months with an oncologist, yearly MRIs alternating with mammograms, so some type of screening every six months; now to the point of yearly follow up with my oncologist and not-miss yearly primary care visits, having to schedule these along with mamms and MRIs so I have some type of screening and "hands on me" every three months. Oh and now, insurance doesn't want to pay for the MRIs so it's a fight involving my oncologist and myself with multiple appeals each time. Along with the years of worry I've had as a mom to young children about my long term survival.
Ya, fun stuff.
Honestly, people. I am sad for those of you who want to use these types of articles as an excuse to not do mammograms. Let me tell you, if you can find a cancer early, like those posters here fortunate enough to find it in its earliest stages, before it's become invasive or spread to lymph nodes or worse, distant organs, you'd be crazy not to take advantage of it. Because once you get an invasive cancer, there's no going back. You cannot undo the damage done while it's sitting there growing. It changes your life forever, and may even kill you and take you away from your loved ones and children. And even if not, it casts a shadow over the rest of your life when you have to live the way I've described above. Don't be foolish - go for your yearlies. Balance all of the above with a miniscule amount of radiation exposure.
BTW, I did have my yearly mammograms, and the last one I had prior to finding a lump in the 11th month before my next one had nothing there. I had a very fast growing, aggressive cancer that grew exponentially in that time, so a mammogram was not exactly helpful to me. But that doesn't stop me from getting them now. I also plan to have my own daughter start fairly early, at least to get baseline images and regular screening, since I myself was young-ish at diagnosis and had relatively no history in the family, am BRAC negative, etc.
Please, be smart about it.
