National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc.

About Me

I am a HUGE advocate of self exams!!!! Why? It saved my life. I found a lump the size of a small olive on 7-13-07. I already had my annual exam scheduled for 7-25-07 so I tried not to panic. My longtime Gyn ordered my first mammogram which should have been screening but ended up diagnostic due to the "palpable mass". That led to an ultrasound the same day (8-8-07) and core biopsy 8-15-07. The very next day, 8-16-07, I was told I had colloid carcinoma - a rare (but "lazy") breast cancer. I was blessed with a top-notch breast specialist, a City of Hope-trained surgeon who sent me for a breast MRI to be safe, then on 9-5-07 I had a lumpectomy with sentinel node dissection. Again, I was blessed - she got clean margins, there was no lymph node involvement, it was under 2mm, I was stage 1, HER2 negative, and ER and PR (hormone receptor) positive. I endured a chemo cocktail of Taxotere & Cytoxan which was recommended after an OncoTypeDX score of 24. I did the chemo every 3 weeks, 4 rounds of it from 11-15-07 to 1-17-08. I completed 6 weeks of daily radiation in March 08, and am on Tamoxifen for 5 years.