Thursday, February 5, 2009

Me and My Mammograms

Sorry this is so long again…and it doesn’t end on a positive note.

When I was 37, I went for my first mammogram. They told me they saw something suspicious and wanted me to return for another one in 6 months. The results from this mammio sent me into a complete tizzy. I was incredibly frightened for 6 months thinking that I had breast cancer. To top it off, I had a 2 year old and was pregnant while receiving the follow-up mammogram. (And you know my fears about radiation.) So I wasn’t too happy with the whole experience when they gave me the results, “Oh, it’s nothing, probably a blocked duct.”

That’s when my mind turned sour toward mammograms. I was also into my natural phase when everything had to be perfectly safe for my children – especially while breast feeding - including trying to rid my migraines naturally and putting everyone through that hell. I read about mammograms where someone said there may be so many more cancers being diagnosed due to the radiation from the mammograms causing the cancer. In addition, I read about how they scare women and put them through too many unnecessary biopsies due to false positives.

I experienced a false positive and wanted no more of that! Now though, I wonder if it wasn’t a false positive back then. I’ve read that breast tumors start growing 12-15 years before killing their host. That would put my tumor starting to develop right about then!

Anyway after Aimee was born I found the supplements that I thought would keep me from ever dying. I mean ever! Plus, that really seemed like an incredibly lucrative opportunity, especially for a stay-at-home mom with no income who didn’t think she could ever go back to doing counseling again. It also seemed like an incredibly lucrative opportunity for everyone else too – I mean, who wouldn’t be able to see that! I did fundraisers for Jason’s preschool and tried like heck to make some money. (You know what type of business this was and I’m sure many of you have gone down that path unsuccessfully too.)

Why am I telling you this? Because those supplements really did help me – for awhile. I had this bad immune system – gee, could you guess that? All I needed to do was look at a child with a runny nose and I’d catch the cold – every 3 or 4 weeks. And this supplement took that problem away. So I tried another of their supplements and discovered that the fibrocystic stuff I’d felt since high school disappeared along with my period pain and grumpiness. So I pretty much stopped worrying about breast cancer or any cancer for that matter…I was never getting cancer with these products!

After about 5 years on these products, my symptoms returned. Now I couldn’t eat any form of sugar – besides some types of fruit - without my nose stuffing up, getting tongue sores, getting a migraine or coming down with a cold. I also had pretty bad insomnia which I’m sure didn’t help my health. I started skipping periods when I was 37 and was definitely in perimenopause by 43. I noticed that if I got my period in the morning and then took my supplement, my period went away. So I decided to stop taking that one supplement that helped my breasts. Immediately my lumps returned so that made me sure they were the fibrocysts because they had gone away when I started taking it.

My mom was diagnosed prior to this time and every time she asked me if I was getting mammograms I think I either lied to her or scoffed at them. I could tell she was worried but what could she do? I told myself that I wouldn’t get cancer because I took these supplements and I nursed my babies for so long and mammograms cause breast cancer and false positives! I also never mentioned anything to Geoff. I think he may have brought up the subject a few times and I would change the subject.

About 3 years ago I’d been off those supplements for a couple years and started getting worried about my breast. It was around the time before Jason’s Bar Mitzvah. I had other things on my mind, including a doctor who wanted a uterine biopsy due to my having a period after not having one for a year. I knew better than that doctor! G-d gave me that period so I could go to the mikvah for the first time in my life. (I wanted to do it before Jason’s bar mitzvah because I’d heard it was good for your children.) Still, I went through the trauma of that biopsy and worried about it all through the bar mitzvah. The results were negative.

After the bar mitzvah I went to a naturopath who offers thermograms – an alternative to mammograms. She told me nothing was wrong with my breasts and I needed to take supplements for other problems going on in my body. I was relieved but wondered about her results. Didn’t I see online that those thermograms come with photos of the hotspots? I never got one of those. She reassured me that her thermograms were better. Over the next year, my nipple inverted…

So I went to a different doctor who offered the kind of thermograms that give you the photo. That thermogram result told me there was the possibility that I could have cancer growing in the future and highly recommended I get a mammogram and an ultrasound. That’s when I got my 3rd mammogram in my life that led to the biopsy that diagnosed me at stage 3.

The morning before going in for the biopsy, I met with friends for tea and reassured them that I just had benign fibrocystic lumps. I told the doctor and the nurse the same thing while I was lying on the table having my breast punctured 5 times. I could sense the darkness & fear in the room and knew that they were incredibly concerned that this woman was in danger. I wished I’d brought Geoff with me to hold my hand…

P.S. I have an article about thermography written by an M.D. who graduated from Duke University who believes that thermograms are better than mammograms due to fewer false positives and earlier detection. The article has a picture of what a thermogram photo looks like. After my story, you may not care to read it, but it could be that I went to the wrong doctors and didn’t go early enough – they cost $200 approx. and aren’t covered by insurance. This doctor is in Walnut Creek. I can email the article to you if you request it. It’s a pdf file and I’d link it here but don’t know how.

P.P.S. I forgot to mention that breast MRIs catch breast cancer very early and I would probably ask for that if you have a suspicious mammogram. Unfortunately, it may not be covered by insurance and is very expensive. A breast MRI caught the nodule in my right breast which wasn't evident in the mammogram and only vaguely evident in the thermogram. It was removed when it got biopsied - which shows you how small it was! Breast MRIs may be the wave of the future.

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