Getting the Diagnosis

Although I did know that breast cancer was very prevalent in my family, so that was why I was doing my due diligence. And so, in April, actually it was the end of March, I went for the first mammography in 2019. And I thought everything was fine and then I went home. I got a telephone call and they said, "We would like for you to come back and redo.” I said, "Really?" They said, "Yes." So, I went back. That was April 1. April Fool's Day. And so, I went and did the mammography, and you know when something's wrong when she says, "I'll be right back." And then she steps out the room, and then they bring in another person. And then they're both chatting. And then they look at you, and they said, "We'll be right back." And then I said, "Uh-oh. Something is not right." So, when they came back, they said, "Could you please put your clothes on and follow us because the doctor, the radiologist, wants to see you."

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And that was the beginning of feeling kind of sort of like a black Alice in Wonderland. You know, I just kind of fell down and down and down and into this breast cancer issue.

I always self-examined. I self-explored my breasts and did not feel that there was any lump, any mass, anything strange, nothing. I had a physical exam; one month later, I had a mammogram, and they called me because they saw something suspicious. So, they did another mammogram, and then they told me that there were some calcifications in both breasts. I had not worried because usually, it wasn't cancer. But, the worst that it could be, if it was, would be the first stage. I mean, that would be the worst. So, I said, "It's nothing." They biopsied me. They took a biopsy in both breasts, and when they called me, I was 100% confident that it would be normal. So, to hear news like that for me was, like, the start of a nightmare, where I was saying, "This is not happening to me. No, no." I receive the call. I identified myself, and they told me that my left breast had an invasive cancer, invasive ductal. When they had commented what the worst case could be—I had in mind, oh, the worst, if it were, that would be the worst. And in my right breast, there was cancer in situ.

Yo me revisaba. Me autoexploraba los senos y yo no sentía que habían algún bultito, alguna masitas, algo raro, nada. Tuve un examen físico. Al mes creo tuve mamograma y me llamaron porque lo veían sospechoso. Entonces, me hicieron otro mamograma y ya me dijeron que había unas calcificaciones en los dos senos, que no me angustiara, que usualmente no era cáncer. Pero que lo peor podía ser que, si fuera, y sería la primera etapa. O sea, eso sería lo peor. Entonces, yo dije, ay, no pasa nada. Me hicieron biopsia. Me tomaron biopsia de los dos senos. Y cuando me llaman, yo tenía la confianza al 100% de que era todo normal. Entonces, escuchar una noticia así para mí fue como iniciar una pesadilla que yo decía, esto no me está pasando a mí, no, no.

Recibo la llamada, me identifico y me dicen que en mi seno izquierdo tenía un cáncer invasivo, ductal invasivo. Cuando me habían comentado que lo peor hubiera—o sea tenía yo como que, en mente, lo peor, si fuera, esto sería lo peor. Y en mi seno derecho, era un cáncer in situ.

A lump, yes, in the left breast. And well, at first, I didn’t pay much attention to it, but I noticed that it was like growing. So, that was where I was worried. And then I went to the clinic, and they did a mammogram on me. And also, they examined me, they examined me. And after photos and photos of the mammogram and the ultrasound, they sent me to get a biopsy. So, I waited a few weeks for the results, and they called me and said that they wanted to speak with me in person. And then they told me that it was cancer.

Una masa, sí, en el seno derecho. Y pues de pronto no le hice mucho caso. Pero noté que estaba como creciendo, entonces, ahí fue donde me preocupé. Y ya fui a la clínica y me hicieron unmamograma. Y también me auto examinaron,me examinaron. Y después de fotos y fotos delmamogramadel ultrasonido, me mandaron hacer una biopsia.

A lot of things went through-, through my mind. Not having taken care of my health, for overdoing it, perhaps, so much at work, but it was difficult, but here we are. I remember that, yes—never—the truth is, I never tried to examine my body more. Then one day, I laid down on the bed and felt—I don't know why it occurred to me to touch my left breast, and I felt something. Not a lump, but like a-, something like-, something like a mass, I should say. Because it felt like something hard. It didn't feel like a lump here in the lower part of the breast.

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But in that moment, we were prepared. It was in June, but we were more focused because we got married in August, August 30th. So, I was preparing for my wedding, and honestly, no, I didn't want to take so much attention. So, I continued with my wedding preparations. Time went by, we got married and everything. I touched it again, and that part had grown a little more. So, I mentioned it again to my husband, and I said, "I feel like it has grown a little more." And he said, "Well, we should go see a doctor or something." I said, alright. But I went to work. When I got back from work, my husband had already made an appointment and had asked places where I could have a mammogram and everything.

Pasaron muchas cosas por, pormi mente, por no cuidar la salud, por excederme quizás tanto en el trabajo, pero fue difícil, pero, pero aquí estamos. Yo recuerdo que sí--nunca, la verdad nunca me intenté explorar mi cuerpo. Más que un día yo me acosté en la cama y sentí--no sé por qué se me ocurrió tocarme el seno izquierdo y sentí algo--no bolita, sino como un--algo así como--algo como masa, podría decirse, porque se sentía algo duro. No se sentía--algo como un bultito aquí en la parte baja del seno.

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Pero en ese momento, nosotros estábamos preparados. Fue por junio, pero estábamos más enfocados porque nosotros nos casamos en agosto, el 30 de agosto. Entonces yo estaba en los preparativos de mi boda. Y la verdad no, no le quise tomar tanta atención, sino yo seguí con los preparativos de mi boda. Pasó el tiempo, nos casamos y todo. Volví a tocar, ya esa parte había crecido un poquito más. Entonces se lo volví a comentaran a, a mi esposo y le, dije lo que yo siento ha crecido un poquito más. Y me dijo, pues hay que visitar al médico o algo. Le digo, bueno. Pero yo me fui a trabajar. Cuando yo regresé del trabajo, mi esposo ya me había hecho cita y había preguntado, este, lugares donde podía hacerme mamograma y todo.

I just felt this tiny little thing under my left axilla. Which is the side I had the initial breast cancer.  So, I, you know, felt like such a tiny, tiny little thing for a couple weeks. I just thought, oh, it's nothing. I'm just being paranoid, as breast cancer survivors think. Then finally, I had my husband feel it, and he's like, "Well, it's something, I don't feel anything, but you should probably have it checked out." So, I went through my primary care doctor, and she said, "I don't, I don't see anything thing. But I don't want to be the one to make that decision." So, then she sent me to my oncologist. My oncologist said, "Oh, does it feel like anything? I think it is a cyst. It's very near the skin." You know, trying to reassure me. But she said, "We'll get an ultrasound." And so, the ultrasound comes back, and they said it's definitely not a cyst, so we will have to do a biopsy. So, you know, this-, of course, this takes about a month for all these appointments to happen. So, I'm trying to, like, keep my hysteria at bay, thinking, this can't be anything, it just can't. It had been 15, 16 years since my first bout.

I had showered one morning and went to put on my bra, and then I noticed there was like a little like dried liquid in my bra. And I was like, “What is that?” And I couldn't figure out what it was and I went about my day, or I went about my business. And when I went and put my bra on, I noticed that it was right where my nipple was. And I thought, “What?” And so, I immediately start googling, what is this? And, you know, the net said, it’s probably nothing, but you should probably go see your doctor. And I did. I made an appointment ASAP. That horrified me. And my doctor at the time thought that I was just hormonal. I was 52.  And she was right. I was very hormonal at that moment in my life. And so, she wasn't really too concerned about it, but she wanted me to have a mammogram, which I was going to do. And I just got busy. I'm a single mom. I have two kids, and I work full time. And I just kept putting it off. And then one week turned into two. One month turned into six. And I just never did it. I had a lot of other things that were going on in my life and they were distracting. But for this whole year from the first time, I noticed that I had a discharge, I went a whole year. I had discharge just about every day. And by the end of that year, it was actually quite significant. And I changed jobs and I got insurance with my job. I hadn't had insurance in the past, so this was really helpful. And I went to a doctor that I've seen off and on my whole life, my adult life. And I told her. And she was like, “I want you to get a mammogram, and I want to do an ultrasound.” And I'm like, “Yeah. It's probably time."

I noticed some like, bleeding from my, the nipple of my right breast. Like it was just a really weird thing, just some spotting. And I don’t know. I didn’t, sometimes you, there’s spotting down here so I thought maybe it’s just something that happens. So, I kind of ignored it. I thought it was strange, but I ignored it. It was just very busy at work at that time too.  But then I saw this infographic—I don’t know you may have seen. It it’s this egg carton with lemons.

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"Yeah. So, one of the—so each lemon   shows a different visual symptom of breast cancer. I think the caption said you may have breast cancer if you have one of these signs. And so, one of the lemons showed like fluid, like either clear or bloody fluid. And so that's when I was like, oh, gosh. And so, then I talked to my mom about it. And she said you have to see the doctor. And then I saw my primary care provider. And   she did like a clinical breast exam. She said she felt a lump.  And when I heard that word, yeah, that was kind of a nightmare.

I saw it on the side right here. And it was a big, green, dark, the vein was about this big of my finger. And it was right from up under my arm, down to my side, to my nipple. And I look, I say, that's mighty green. It was like a, a dark, it's a dark green then the green vein that you have in your, in your, you know, your breast. And it was running to my, to my nipple. And I said, “Oh, my god!” And I followed it up. And I followed it up under my axillary on my armpit. And it felt about like this big. So, I said, well, maybe this is an abscess.

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So, when I made, when I made my gynecology appointment, I made it as soon as possible. And he said, “oh, Mrs. [NAME], I think it's an abscess. But we're going to go on and do a mammogram, going to go on and do an ultrasound. So, I went to the surgeon So he said, “Mrs. [NAME], I think it's an abscess but, you know, we're going to go on, and do this biopsy.” And he did it. He pulled like two samples. And he put, he said, “Well,” And in my head, I'm like, if this was an abscess, it would have burst. It would have smelled. I didn't say anything to him. But in my mind, I was thinking that. I said, there's something up with this. There’s not an abscess. In my mind, I didn't say nothing to him. But I said, if this was an abscess, it would have smelled. It would have. It would have. So, he called me back. It was like a day before my, it was, it was during my daughter's birthday, the day before. Because her birthday was on a Saturday. He called me late. And he said, “Hi, this Dr. [NAME] and I got some bad news for you." And like me and him joke. I love to joke and play. When I really be, you know, really nervous and sad. But I joke it off, and probably, he said, “It’s breast cancer. And it's triple negative breast cancer.”

I guess, when I was 28 years old, I went for my annual gynecologist visit. And a couple of weeks prior, I had had some pain in my right breast. I thought since I'm going anyway, I might as well point it out to her and see what she thinks. You know, she was very receptive. She said, "I do feel something there. It's probably nothing, but we'll send you just in case." Which I feel very fortunate about because I know a lot of other people my age don't necessarily get that reaction from their doctors. But she sent me for, I believe it was an ultrasound first. So, we did the ultrasound and then they did a mammogram. And, you know, they said, again, there's something there. We'll bring you back for a biopsy. So, I went back about a week later for a biopsy and the results came back malignant for something called a mucinous carcinoma, which is actually a pretty rare form of breast cancer. I don't want to misread the statistic, but it's like 2% or 3% of all cases, usually women that are in their 60's and 70's. So, that was sort of an odd finding.

You become a little scientist when you're dealing with lactation. And I had an indented nipple, but I've always had sort of an indented nipple, so I never really thought much of it. But, when I quit   pumping, this breast continued to have a lump and be painful. And I had sort of an ache. And   everybody put it off and said, “Oh, this is a galactocele. This is a duct. It's nothing to worry about. It will go away.” Well, it didn't go away. It started to look like a bruise   and became a very palpable lump. So, I got it looked at.   I think my doctor actually fired the receptionist for putting me off.    And came back in and then said, “You need an appointment with an oncologist. Schedule, cancel the rest of your plans. You’re staying with us, and we're going to keep an eye on you, and figure out what's going on.” So, I basically walked from there to get a mammogram, ultrasounds, met with the oncologist, and could see that it was this big, spidery-looking spiculated tumor.   The doctor couldn't definitively say, “Oh, we know that it's this,” but you could see on the ultrasound what it was. And   so they scheduled me for a surgery that Monday to do a biopsy,   a port implant, and do   an axillary node dissection. They took 20 lymph nodes. 10 of them came back positive.

My beautiful daughter was born in [date] of 2015, and I was breastfeeding. And she was maybe three months old or so when I felt a couple lumps in my breast, in my left breast.  But I had also dealt with some plugged ducts while I was breastfeeding, and those hurt. The plugged ducts hurt, but the, these other ones didn't. But a first-time mother, first time breast feeder. I just assumed it was all part of it.  So, I ignored it and after a couple months, they hadn't gone away. I hadn't dealt with any other plugged ducts. So I figured it was time to make an appointment and see what was going on. And I really, breast cancer was just not, even though I had the gene mutation, it just was not in the realm of possibility." So, I went in. I met with my with my primary doctor, my OB-GYN. And she played it cool, but she said, “I want you into the breast center.”

So my journey with breast cancer began when I was 31, in January 2014, when I was diagnosed as stage 2B, with invasive intraductal breast cancer. I actually have had pretty traumatic experiences with primary care.   Basically, I had detected a large lump in my left breast. I went to the primary care doctor. And she said that I was basically probably drinking too much caffeine. It was probably a fibroid.   I had imaging, I think, the summer prior. And it was assessed. She was like, you know, it's probably just a cyst.   But it wasn't. It just didn't fit the description of a cyst. It was oblong, it was hard, and it was puckering.   And I knew that something was not right.   So basically, you know, she wasn't going to send me off to have it reimaged. I basically had to advocate for that myself. And that is really a through line in my entire story, of having to trust myself, essentially, and be my own strongest advocate.

So, March of 2018, I went in for a well woman exam. And there was nothing that brought up any red flags or anything. Everything seemed normal and okay. I was given a breast exam, a physical breast exam. But she, the physician didn't feel anything.  So then less than five months after that, I felt a lump on my own.

So, I went to [LOCATION], which is where I was going to the doctor at the time. And they did a biopsy. But the doctor assured me that I was young, and it was probably a fibroid. I forgot what they’re, fibroadenoma. And   he was actually trying to tell me that I should probably just wait 6 to 12 months and come back and see if it had grown or anything.   And my partner said absolutely not.   She had lost her mom to cancer. And she said just, you know, it's better to just check anyways. They were saying I was too young to get cancer.   So anyways, I had that cancer biopsy right away. So, then they found out it was cancerous. And shortly after that, they, they did the MRI, and then they discovered that there was more than one spot in that same breast. There were two other spots. And they weren't going to biopsy them to find out if it was the same cancer, which I thought, I mean, I don't know anything about cancer. I didn't at the time. But I was very trusting of the doctors. So, I thought it was different, but I wanted to trust them and   just go with what they said. So, the oncologist in [LOCATION] had already decided what they were going to treat me with, not even knowing the full extent to   my situation. And that was very alarming to my partner. And she said we should get a second opinion. So, we decided to go to [LOCATION]. Which at the time, it was very scary because all I knew was that I had an aggressive cancer.

So, they actually were opposite on everything in [LOCATION]. They said, you need to be biopsied. Everything needs to be biopsied, down to your lymph nodes. So, they went in and surgically removed   I think three or four lymph nodes right away.   And there was a micro bit of a cancer in one of the lymph nodes. And they then discovered that that cancer that they found in the lymph node was a separate cancer from the one that they found in [LOCATION]. So, at that point, I was told that it was odd that I had cancer because I was so young, that it was probably not cancer. And I was also told that it was very odd that it would be two cancers, which it was.

I guess my story starts probably late October of 2017. And my wife felt a lump in my breast and asked me, have you ever felt this before? And I said no. I contacted my doctor and made an appointment. And of course, I couldn't get in until the first week of December. And at that point, he said, “Well, I don’t,” he said, “I don't like this. I want you to go to [LOCATION] and have an ultrasound.” And they scheduled that pretty quickly, like a week later, within a week. And I went in, and they said, “Well, we're not going to do an ultrasound. We're actually going to do a mammogram.” I had the wonderful experience of knowing what women go through when they have a mammogram. And I report it to the Breast Center downstairs at [LOCATION] Hospital and went back to the clinic. And they came in, and they’d had a radiologist read the results. And then he said, “Well, we'd like you to come back this afternoon at 1 o'clock, and now we're going to do the ultrasound.” I went home, and I came back. And I did an ultrasound and went across the hall to the clinic and waited. And then they came in and they said, “Well, we'd like to do a biopsy.” And my visit that started at 9:00 o’clock in the morning was now going to take the entire day because it took until about 3:30 for them to get me to do the biopsy. And they biopsied my tumor, and they biopsied a sentinel lymph node. Tomorrow will be one year to the day that I got my diagnosis when they called and said, “You need to come in.” The results weren't what, obviously, everyone hoped for.

Yes, I started doing hormones in '99. And then, in 2010, I got my breasts removed. And then, in 2015, I was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Wow.

So that's why they were, yeah, it doesn't, it, it doesn't happen. From what I have understood, there's maybe a handful in the United States. Because you're, you’re removing the breasts, but you're still leaving some, some of the tissue.

Got ya.

You know?

Yeah.

 It's more of a cosmetic. So you're removing it, but you're still leaving some tissue there, so that's how a person can get breast cancer. there's just, they still leave tissue there. Otherwise, you'd just be flat-chested. So, they have to leave the muscle, and it's cosmetic. I didn't think it was possible. I didn't have, really, insurance at the time. And What are the odds? I mean. -- I thought I'd have other cancer before that. I mean, you know? I mean, that was like the lea-, the last thing on my mind.

I had noticed that my left breast had swelled. And it was noticeably larger than the right breast. So, I went to my doctor. And, you know, it was an uncomfortable feeling. It was kind of ticklish. And it just didn't seem right. So, I went to my doctor. And I explained to him about how my left breast was swelled. And it was uncomfortable. So, he examined me. And he sent me to a surgeon who specialized in breast surgery.

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He really made me feel like I was interrupting his day when he said to me, “Well, why did your doctor send you to me?” And then I explained. And then, you know, he was examining me when he said, “It's breast tissue. Men have breast tissue.” That's the way he said it. I thought, well, that's obvious. But I said, “Something is not right. This is not right.” And that's when he reluctantly, he really sounded like he was reluctant. But he said, “Well, I guess I'll have to order some tests.” There was no concern. There was, there was absolutely no concern or showing of concern for my feelings and what I was telling him. So, but I thought to myself, “That's okay.” I knew then I was going to find another doctor.