One Woman s View: Ladies, get that mammogram
Contributing writer
Last year at this time, when Carole Spohn organized a Tampa team to walk in the Relay for Life, I agreed to walk. Earlier this spring she was "testing the waters" to see whether there was enough support for a team in this year's event. I told her that I planned to do the Alzheimer's walk this year. Remembering my husband's sad decline into dementia, I said that Alzheimer's disease had touched my life more closely than cancer. Shows you how much I know!
A month or two ago I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I have had a small tumor removed, and about the time this column goes to press, I will be consulting an oncologist to determine what further treatment, if any, will be necessary.
As cancer patients go, I am one of the lucky ones. My tumor was designated as "ductal carcinoma in situ," one of the least aggressive forms of the disease. A mammogram had detected it early while the growth was very small. On the whole, the outlook for me is optimistic. I am tempted to think my guardian angel was at work.
Then I realize how egotistical that sounds, when I have friends with breast cancer, who are having to endure much more aggressive treatment than I am likely to need. Of course, I also may end up needing further surgery or chemotherapy. Very few breast cancer patients nowadays lose their lives, so compared to women of 50 years ago, we are all among the lucky ones.
I felt no "lump" in my breast. I had no symptoms of any kind. My cancer was found by a "routine" mammogram. Ironically, for me mammograms have been far from routine. I got them rarely only after much nagging by my physician.
You see, I knew in my gut I was never going to have cancer. I reasoned that heart attacks and strokes, not cancer, are the diseases which kill people in my family. I repeat, shows how much I know.
Nobody is "immune" to the threat of cancer. All of us should avail ourselves of the constantly improving methods of early detection and treatment.
Last November Dr. Campbell asked me how long it had been since my last mammogram. When I admitted it had been over two years, she urged me to get one. I promised her I would do it after the holidays. You have no doubt figured out that the end of May is quite a while after the holidays.
Fortunately I finally scheduled one at exactly the right time. If I had done it last November, the cancer would probably not have shown up yet, and (me being me) it would probably have been two or three years before the next one. I was blessed. However, in the future my "annual mammogram" will mean yearly.
I learned after my diagnosis that I was at increased risk for breast cancer, since I have never had children and therefore never breast fed an infant. If you have a family history of breast cancer, especially in your mother's family, you also are at greater risk. In my case the only breast cancer in the family was my father's sister.
A friend undergoing treatment right now had the same situation, so perhaps the father's family history is not as irrelevant as sometimes thought. Of course, as with most diseases, risk also increases with age.
If you have any of the known risk factors, you should begin having annual mammograms earlier in life. However, many women with breast cancer had none of those risk factors. It can be one of those things which simply happen without apparent reason.
No matter what your situation, as you get older form the habit of getting those mammograms. Believe me, you cannot know breast cancer is going to strike someone else, not you.
Yes, I know you are busy with a thousand day-to-day responsibilities; it is easy to think of a mammogram as something which can be put off to a more convenient time. Face it. There will never be a "convenient" time, so make time.
Yes, I know mammograms are very uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as the aggressive treatments you will need if you wait too long and not nearly as uncomfortable as dying if you wait until the cancer has spread to less treatable locations.
Thank you to all those involved in the Relay for Life this weekend. Thank you to the friends who have told me they are giving a luminary in my honor. Although I would prefer to get my 10 minutes of fame some other way, I'm humbly thankful if my diagnosis prompted this gift to further research and education.
Thank you to all those who put out the word concerning early detection and treatment. Without apology I am adding my voice to that tiresome cacophony of nagging to get that mammogram.
