Cancer is a scary word. I don’t know if there is anyone on this planet who has not been touched by this disease in some way, shape, or form. I have lost multiple family members to various forms–especially lung cancer. But I never smoked! Other than being fat, I’m generally physically healthy (let’s ignore the long list of mental health diagnoses for a moment). To my knowledge, I didn’t grow up on top of a superfund site. I’m only 34. I have a one-year-old child. Cancer shouldn’t be more than a distant thought, right?!?!?
“Something isn’t right,” whispered the voice in the back of my head. And I’m glad I listened.
On January 29th, I took my bra off at the end of the day. Does anybody else ever just give their boobs a good shake? It’s not something I always do, but I did that night. And I noticed the two sides didn’t feel the same. At first, I didn’t even feel the lump. The tissue on the right side felt thicker and more fibrous. I wanted to write it off as nothing, and for about 24 hours, I did.
Ignoring something rarely makes it go away. For that first day, I told myself that it was nothing, just a change from breastfeeding my kid for a year. It will go away! “Something isn’t right,” whispered the voice in my head. And I’m glad I listened.
On the evening of January 30th, I mentioned the lump to my husband and asked him to check to verify I wasn’t crazy (such a hardship, I know), and he agreed it felt different. I sent a message to my PCP requesting an appointment and assured myself it was more than likely nothing. The following day, the scheduler messaged me back that my doctor didn’t have any appointments until February 20th, but I could see one of the other providers in the office sooner if I wanted. I sent a text to my doctor directly asking if I should take a sooner appointment or if I could wait to see him, and he immediately ordered a mammogram and ultrasound and told me to take an appointment with someone who could see me sooner.
My mammogram and ultrasound appointment was set for February 8th, and I really wasn’t all that worried about it. I’m young. I have no family history of breast cancer. I breastfed my kid for a year. It’s probably a calcification or other benign change. Even my anxious hypochondriac brain was feeling logical enough to think it wasn’t anything to be concerned about. Quite frankly, I was more worried about potential pain from having my breast smashed than I was about the lump being cancerous. I’d heard everything from “I barely felt anything” to “it was so painful, I cried.” My experience was more mild discomfort, thankfully.
When I moved from the mammogram to the ultrasound, I spent the time laughing and joking with the ultrasound tech. She had a grandchild about the same age as my kid, and I talked about some of the trials of being a middle school teacher. I watched the screen as she moved the wand around and saw the gray blob appear on the screen as she hovered over the spot. “Guess I’m not crazy. There really is a lump there,” I thought.
I would hate to play that woman in poker (not that I’ve ever played). She’d been doing it long enough that I’m quite sure she knew exactly what she was looking at, but nothing in her face or voice betrayed it, not even when she told me that she was going to talk to the radiologist to make sure she didn’t need to get more images.
“You’re going to need to have this biopsied. We’re going to make sure this is expedited.”
– The Radiologist
Urgency in the medical field rarely means anything good. As much as we all want our concerns addressed as quickly as possible, if the triage nurse is leaving you sitting in the ER waiting room, it’s because they think your life isn’t in danger. By contrast, if they are rushing you back and in a bed hooked up to monitors, that’s when you should worry.
I was still wrapped up in a front-closing hospital gown when the radiologist came in. I’d been told to leave it on in case the radiologist wanted more images. I wrapped my arms around myself to hold it closed and sat on the bed. “You’re going to need to have this biopsied. We’re going to make sure it’s expedited,” the radiologist told me after a brief greeting. “I want you seen within a few days.” The words were too shocking to induce panic. “If it is something, it’s early.”
I put my top back on in a daze as I waited for one of the techs to come back with my appointment information. She hadn’t been able to get a hold of the Medical Assistant at the surgeon’s office, but she made me an appointment for the following Thursday. I don’t remember most of what she said, I just kept saying “okay” over and over again to everything she said. I remember thinking that there had to be something else to say. But there wasn’t.
“How do I tell Travis?” I asked myself as I drove home. “This can’t be good. What if… what if…?”
I didn’t have much time to dwell on how I was going to explain to my husband that this had gone from “it’s probably nothing” to “we need you to have this biopsied as soon as possible” because a call came through. The surgeon could see me right NOW, so I should call my husband to come meet me at his office.
I knew when I called Travis that there was no way he would be able to come to this appointment. The notice was too late, and he was caring for our son. And somehow, I didn’t think a nineteen-month-old child would be welcomed in a surgeon’s office. But Travis needed to know what was happening, so I called him over the car’s hands-free system as I navigated turning around to see the surgeon.
In our small rural hospital system, the breast surgeons are both general surgeons who also hold specializations in breast surgery. This isn’t a major medical center where they have people who only work on breasts. The office is also shared with the bariatric practice, and the front office staff who had no knowledge of the last half hour of my life probably assumed I was there for a consultation for that. But I wasn’t.
I took my top off for the second time, and when the doctor came in, I had my third feel-up of the day. And he agreed with the radiologist that it needed to be biopsied. He wanted to do it that night and left to call the hospital to see if he could make it happen. “Well, I guess I’m going to have to disappoint my wife that I will *not* have the day off tomorrow,” he told me when he came back in. “They don’t have the staff to do the biopsy tonight, so we’re going to do it first thing tomorrow morning. And I’m mostly kidding; I’ll have the rest of the day off.”
That he was coming in on his day off told me two things:
- This man really cared about his patients if he was going to come in on his day off to do my procedure. On a Friday morning, no less.
- This man really thought I had cancer.
I made the mistake of reading the radiology report when I got home. It only occurred to me later that no one ever used the word “cancer” when referring to the lump, probably in an effort to not scare me with the actual word. But we all knew. It was only when I looked at the report and saw that it was labeled as “Category 5- >95% chance of malignancy” did I even see cancer adjacent words used.
Initially, I told very few people: my boss, a handful of coworkers who were present at the dance (did I not mention that I had to decorate/chaperone a dance after receiving the news?), and my two best friends. We didn’t tell family at first. A handful of women shared their own experiences of finding lumps in their breasts and assured me that it was probably nothing. It broke my heart a little to say to them, “actually, they’re 95% sure this is cancer…” Because things moved so quickly, I drove myself to and from the hospital that Friday morning. In hindsight, there were many people I could have–and even should have–called to drive me. But I didn’t.
The procedure wasn’t painful because the doctor injected a lot of local anesthetic to ensure I didn’t feel anything. I won’t go into graphic detail, but it was bizarre. The downside of being awake for the whole thing is being able to hear the conversation as the doctor looked for a lymph node in my armpit that was enlarged.
My follow up was scheduled for Thursday, February 15th. During that week, I learned a lot about my self control. I knew that result were available in MyChart that afternoon. But I didn’t look. The results kepy updating throughout the week. In hindsight, this was because they knew more and more about the cancer: oncotype, hormone receptors, a bunch of stuff that I don’t understand. But I never looked. I asked people to pray for the 5% chance that it wasn’t cancer, and I waited.
When I went back to the exam room at the surgeon’s office the following week, there were several posters on the wall of the room about breast cancer. I knew immediately that if they’d chosen that room, I had breast cancer, and unfortunately, I was right. Invasive Ductal Carcinoma. We were still waiting on HER2 results but it was receptive to both Estrogen and Progesterone–a good thing, as far as treatment options go. Because I’m so young, they had me do genetic testing, which involved spitting into a tube (just like some of the COVID tests I did in the past…) and also scheduled me for an MRI and a consult with medical oncology (that wound up being a bit of a mess, but I made it happen) and a follow up with the surgeon two weeks later.
It’s been almost two months since I was diagnosed with cancer. It feels like it’s been forever and an instant all at once. A lot has happened in the intervening time, but I’ll save that for another post. In that week of waiting to find out, the words of Julian of Norwich became embedded in my mind. “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.” And these words still stay with me through this journey. At the end of the day, I know that I will be fine. This journey has already been full of challenges, but I know that I can overcome them and soon, I will emerge from the challenges as a stronger person.
All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.
Julian of Norwich
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