On 19th September, the day of the Queens funeral I rushed to the breast screening appointment thinking I had an abysses as I had had prickling and redness on my left breast. When I finally went to the GP as the redness did not move she put me on antibiotics thinking I had mastitis but also sent me for breast screening. Thank goodness she did. The mammogram showed a tumour and I was then ushered into a room and told I had IBC which is very rare, only 2-5% of breast cancers and it is very aggressive. I was sent for an ultrasound and then three biopsies and then back to the nurse who said she would arrange for a body scan and a bone scan to see where it may have spread to as well as an appointment with a surgeon in two weeks. I was so shocked I was speechless. I was 56 years old and facing what I thought was a terminal outlook.
The following two weeks crawled by with all these scans and tests and when i saw the consultant and they told me they did not think it had spread elsewhere apart from the lymph nodes under my left arm I felt like I had won the lottery. How weird is that! I still had an aggressive cancer and the plan was for 6 months of chemotherapy and immunotherapy followed by surgery, followed by radiotherapy but with a good hope of being curable. Phew, a reason to battle through this nightmare.
And so begins my Gap year from life to try to beat this horrible disease.
