I was diagnosed with my breast cancer on 27th September 2023 after having my very first routine mammogram at the end of August 2023. I was recalled and asked to come back for further investigations which was a 3D mammogram followed by 3 biopsies as they had seen 2 suspicious areas on my films. I had to wait 3 very anxious weeks to get my results which i already thought was going to be cancer. I was then given a date for a lumpectomy and Sentinel Lymph node removal for Friday 27th October, I can’t tell you how scared I was about having this operation. I also needed two wires inserting the morning of my surgery and also some radioactive dye injected into my nipple, which sounds a lot worse than it actually was. The surgery was absolutely fine and I needed have been so worried about it.
I recovered really well from my operation and I was nearly 6 weeks post op when I started to feel very unwell. I was admitted to hospital with an infected seroma and I had developed sepsis. I have never felt so poorly as this ever before. I was shaking, freezing cold, had a temp of 39 and was breathing very fast, I felt dreadful. I was kept in hospital for 4 days and had the seroma drained whilst continuing on the antibiotics at home that i was receiving by iv in hospital. I went back in a weeks time and my breast had filled up again with infected pus and this time they drained it again then fitted a drain to stop it filling up again. It turns out I was actually on the wrong antibiotics so these were changed and I was told to take these for another 2 weeks.
So now we are at the beginning of December 2023 and I had my follow up appointment which confirmed that they managed to clear all the cancer with good clear margins and it wasntin my lumpy nodes so that was good news, however I still need chemotherapy for 12 weeks, Herceptin injections for a year, radiotherapy and endocrine therapy for 10 years.
