Breast Cancer

My Life With Breast Cancer

During the summer of 2005 I was given a free mammogram from the American Cancer Society. I get my medical attention from a free clinic for low income people and this clinic was given these mammograms to give out to their patients. I was told that I had to get this done within a month or it would be void and they could not get it back again. So I went to get it done later in the month. I think it was in July 2005 that I did this.

This was my first mammogram ever and I was 41 when I had it done. I never had one done before this because I don't have insurance and they cost way too much money to pay for in cash. I was a bit nervous to get it done because of the pain I thought the machine would cause me. It did cause a bit of pain and it squished me a lot. A while later the hospital called me back in for another mammogram and an ultrasound. They said something showed up on the first one and it could be nothing but they need to do more tests to make sure. I procrastinated getting this done because I was now afraid of the results. To me this was scary to think that I may have cancer. I know they said it could be nothing but I was afraid of the other chance that it could be something. I told some friends from church and my incest support group members about this. They helped me work through my fears which made me procrastinate. I have a friend at my church that would keep on my case and keep bugging me about calling for the appointment. The people in my support group would bug me about calling too. Finally I called in my counselor’s office.

When I went to the next appointment she went with me for morale support. As we waited we talked about things. Finally they called me in for the tests. As I stood and laid there for the tests I was worried and stressed. When the technician was doing the ultrasound I asked to see the screen and she showed me where the spot in question was. She still could not tell me for sure if it was cancer though.

Later on I received a letter saying that it was a suspicious spot. I had to go see my doctor at the clinic now to find out what to do about this. At this appointment my friend from church went with me. We had to wait quite a while to get it. When I finally went to see the doctor, she talked to me about the possibilities. Then she gave me papers to sign about having a biopsy. This scared me even more. She then stepped out of the room to get someone else to talk to me about the biopsy. I immediately called my friend in the waiting room and told her about this paper my doctor wanted me to sign. I didn't know what to do. I have never had to make such a tough decision in my life. She advised me to sign it. When the doctor came back with the nurse to talk to me further about the biopsy I cried about what was going on. I was scared and confused. When they were done talking to me I told the doctor I was going to take the papers home and read them more completely. She was sending me to a different hospital for the biopsy.

I went home still worried about what went on. My friend from church would have to continue to talk to me about calling for the biopsy now. When I finally did call and made the appointment she decided to go with me. When I went on the day of my appointment they had to set me up with another appointment to redo the tests from the other hospital. Because they said they do not take the word of another hospital to do a biopsy they have to have their own people do the tests and read the results. well it turned out that after having to redo the tests they came up with the same conclusion, this is a suspicious matter that needs a biopsy to find out if it is cancer or not. So they set me up with an appointment with the surgeon.

When I had the biopsy I was of course nervous again. They brought me to the room to get changed and put on the gown. I sat in the waiting room for a while. Then I was called in to have the procedure done.

During the procedure there was an intern that was doing it. They explained what would happen and I asked questions as they went along. They had this retractable needle that would take 8-10 samples. They would stick it in the tumor and then push a button and it would clip a sample and they would bring the needle out. Then they would put the needle back in again get another sample and continue this for 8-10 times.

The intern was not succeeding at this too well. On the third attempt he got it stuck in me and couldn't get it out. At this point I started to cry because I was thinking this is such an invasive procedure of which I have never had to endure before in my life. He mentioned how dense it was and I thought I had heard somewhere that cancer is denser. So I knew it was cancer. The other doctor then got the needle from him and did it on her side. She was on the right side of me which was the opposite side of him. She did the procedure lickity split. One, two, three and she was done. She took out the rest of the samples just like that.





Sami
To find out more about me check out my webpage at http://smcleod3.com/