A new friend and a Day of the Dead pillow cushion the blow of cancer surgery
Every three years, the NHS Breast Screening Programme invites all women aged 50 to 70 registered with a GP for a mammogram. Each year more than two million are carried out. In about 96 of every 100 women screened, the mammogram will show no sign of cancer and no further tests are needed. About four in every 100 women are asked to come back for more tests after screening – and one will be found to have cancer. In a diary, Indie news editor Sinead Corr plays this numbers game…
Monday, July 1, 2024
And so it begins. We head to St Margaret’s Hospital in Epping once again for another procedure.
Neither I, my surgeon, nor sonographer Helen have been able to feel my cancer thus far, but all the tests show it’s there.
So at 9am, Helen carries out a wire-guided localisation. She threads a thin wire into my breast, which anchors the tumour, ready for the operation.
I’m told it feels like a bee sting. Unfortunately, my perception is clouded by my revulsion at the coil of metal now taped to my chest. It’s not painful, but I feel like a hand grenade with a loose pin.
I’ve brought a pillow to cushion my chest as we get back in the car and head for Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow for my pre-surgery checks.
The staff, like those at St Margaret’s, are cheerful and helpful. As they take my blood pressure, take samples and swabs and hook me up for an ECG, the nurses tease my partner about the household duties he will have to take on as I recuperate from the lumpectomy.
Little do they know he’s already the chief cook and bottlewasher in our household - although I will miss hoovering.
They also share a top tip - a small, heart-shaped pillow to cushion my wounds will be invaluable as I recover. Not for the first time, I wish I’d done more research. I discovered there is a wide range of handmade examples on eBay - you can have almost any fabric you fancy, but if I want quick delivery, I need to buy off the shelf, and a Mexican Day of the Dead design seems apt.
Tuesday, July 2, 2024
I need to be back at Princess Alexandra Hospital by 7.45am and as I shower quickly, carefully trying the keep the guide wire dressing dry, I’m acutely aware that this is the last time I will be able to wash easily for a while.
When my cancer was first diagnosed, my first instinct was to have a mastectomy. Now I feel strangely protective of my breast and apprehensive of the changes to come. I haven’t eaten or drunk, but I have no appetite. My stomach is churning.
As soon as we arrive at the day unit, I am shocked to be taken into the assessment area immediately and separated from my partner. Not for the first time, I’m unprepared.
Because I have absolutely no sense of direction - I can get lost in a shed - I was relying on him to guide me to the hospital’s nuclear medicine department, where my breast will be injected with radioactive tracer to highlight the best lymph nodes for the surgeon to remove from my underarm.
But it’s time for him to go home and wait patiently for the call to pick me up. Outside of my cubicle curtains, I can hear two other women answering the same questions as I did before we can go to the theatre.
Then my name is called, and as I emerge from the drapes, I am joined by one of them. A nurse is taking us both to the nuclear medicine department.
My fellow patient immediately tells me she knows who I am and that I work for the Bishop’s Stortford Independent.
This is clearly not her first rodeo. I’m flapping in clown trousers and Birkenstocks, she’s cosy in leisure wear and Uggs. She is also wearing a close-fitting woollen hat.
I’m a bit disconcerted, but her directness is disarming, and as we walk through the corridors, we fall into easy conversation.
She has HER-2 positive breast cancer and has already had chemotherapy to shrink the tumour. She was too young to be called for routine mammograms, and finally consulted her doctor about a lump after some liberal nagging from her sister.
Around 15 out of every 100 breast cancers have large amounts of a protein called HER2 (human epidermal growth factor 2). Most, like mine, are oestrogen receptor positive or ER positive (ER+) breast cancer.
By the time we reach the department, we realise that we’ve been too busy talking to take any notice of where we actually are.
After some comical to-ing and fro-ing where we say goodbye several times, only to find out there’s a further wait while our radioactive tracer arrives from London, we decide to return to the unit together. We clearly both look baffled about which way to go, and a kindly nurse takes pity on us and guides us back.
We have no more time to chat. After consultations with the anaesthetist and surgical team, I’m the first to theatre.
After what felt like a very refreshing sleep, I came round feeling surprisingly good. There is some tenderness, but no pain yet, and I’m eager to go home.
I accept a cup of tea but decline the offer of a snack - a decision I later regret as the third woman sits up in bed munching, and I’m hit by the delicious aroma of hot, buttered toast as I’m waiting to leave.
As I pick up my bag, my new friend is wheeled past me on her way to the theatre, and we wave.
Back at home, after a bowl of spaghetti Bolognese - my first meal in almost 24 hours - I wonder how she got on and wish we’d had a chance to say good luck and goodbye.
During our all-too-brief chat, it emerged we had one mutual friend, and I decided to ask her to pass on my Facebook details in case she wants to keep in touch.
Our pal guesses the connection: “Tell me to fuck off if none of my business but are you having similar treatment? If so, I’m sending you much love.”
Over the next few weeks and months, my funny and feisty fellow patient becomes a font of good advice, signposting me to a podcast by Dr Liz O’Riordan called So Now I’ve Got Breast Cancer, which I fervently wish I’d known about long before.
We share milestones in our recovery and look forward to Wednesday, July 24, when we will meet again at St Margaret’s to get our next set of results.
We both had a lumpectomy, or wide local excision, to remove our tumour.
We also had a sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy to remove one or more of the glands from our armpit. Tests on this tissue will show if the cancer has spread.
It’s a waiting game, and I’m very grateful to have someone who knows exactly how I’m feeling to confide in.
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