1 year ago I said good-bye to my 3 children at school & kindy drop-off. I said “I’ll be back in time to pick you up! I love you so much.”
Only I didn’t.
I ended up in hospital when an id**t Dr OD’d me on local anaesthetic for a biopsy. Even now it’s difficult to talk about in detail, and I’m still experiencing panic attacks about it.
The next day, 19th February 2021, I travelled home in time to pick up my sons from school. Which is when my GP called me, telling me to come in person as this appointment now cannot be done over the phone. So my mother drops me off, and I walk in, and my Dr looks at me and says, “So I think you’ve pretty much guessed that it is cancer.”
1 year on and I’m awaiting reconstruction surgery to fix what they did to me last year, I’ve put on weight, developed serious food aversions, lost my hair, lost my fertility, my physical strength, my confidence, and my inspiration. Every single part of my body, mind & soul has been affected. And when I look in the mirror I barely recognise myself anymore. Everything about my life, business & personal, got put on the backburner and I’m struggling to regain what I once had. And do you know how screwed up it feels in this day & age to be terrified of catching a cold? Let alone Covid? Not to mention the affect this has had on my 3 young children.
Cancer is the worst. Not only is that “nudge” sitting there at the back of my mind (IYKYK), I have yet to experience the long-term affects of chemo, and the worry that my daughter – who has to begin regular screenings at 25yo – will inherit this also.
The second thing out of my GP’s mouth was “We weren’t expecting this result at all. This isn’t right – you’re too young.” A sentiment shared by every single specialist and surgeon I’ve seen since. It’s so shit. And yet I am “one of the lucky ones” as they caught it early. I don’t feel it but I know one day I will feel very lucky. 1 year ago I was on the phone to my best-friend telling me “Nah it’s not cancer. I know you’re going to be fine etc etc.” And the next day I had to call her to say that she was wrong. #breastcancerunder35 #breastcanceraustralia #breastcancerawareness #checkyourpair
P.S One of the other screwed up things is that a school mum I was talking to about 8 months earlier was telling me the x-ray place she went for a mammogram for was complaining (YES, COMPLAINING) about this one local GP here that kept sending women for mammograms and wasting their time. Legit. F**king legit. With me my usual GP was unavailable so I actually ended up seeing that particular GP who didn’t even examine me. He wrote my referral for a scan, mammogram & biopsy (even though I hadnt felt a lump). He saved me. His “wasting of time and being lazy” saved my life.