Sunday 4 September 2011

Boobs

Well, what can I say about my boobs...I have  always been identified by them because, well, they are big.  I developed early and like the rest of the women in my family I am somewhat top heavy, which throughout my life has paved the way for various comments/jokes to be made and, lets just say it conversations to be had with or about my boobs.

I hated them for a long time but over the years I made peace with my jubblies and have on occasion used them to my advantage as many of my friends from my old local will attest to.

This has never changed the fact they are too big and I had for a while thought about having a reduction and to be honest it had until now only been the lack of fundage that has stopped me from going ahead.

In June I made a devastating discovery, the parts of me that so many people identified me with might be killing me.

Breast Cancer.

I don't think when anyone is diagnosed they hear the first part..it is just Cancer and people die from Cancer..and you immediately think I'm going to die and in my case, my breasts are going to kill me.

I, however was lucky, my Cancer was caught early and because my boobs are as big as they are they could get away with just taking the lump and not the whole breast, the relief was immense - I don't think I had ever been so grateful for my large rack.

Then comes a setback, I initially never had a mammogram, they don't do them on women under 35, my lump was picked up on an ultrasound scan but after I was diagnosed they did the mammogram to check there was nothing else to find, unfortunately there was...a couple of small masses deep inside the same breast as the Cancer.  I was told I may need a mastectomy after all.  I was told that the radiologist needed to confirm if these were something or nothing - and because of the timing of the mammogram and my operation I would only find out on the morning I was having surgery.

I think my initial reaction was well, if they have to take it all, then they have to.  Survival becomes more important than anything else.  Again I was lucky, what they picked up on the mammogram was nothing so I got to keep my breast.

It has just made me think about the relationship we have with our own bodies, how barbaric the things are that we do to survive Cancer - even now all we can do is cut it out of our bodies - and that's if you are lucky.

So after surgery I have a lovely scar and a bit of tissue missing from inside, but generally its business as usual.  But now I worry that keeping my big boobs will possibly give the Cancer a chance to return in the future, and it is definitely a conversation I will be having with my Consultant once my other treatment is over - do I keep them or possibly have them reduced?  I know some women deliberately have mastectomies to reduce their risk even more...I'm not sure I could do that, but going through this treatment now I think I can understand why they do.

1 comment:

  1. In that case, having big boobs became more of a benefit! It's great that you're growing your hair back now, after having gone through chemo. Seriously, you look like Nadia Petrova. I hope you're doing great now.

    ReplyDelete