On Friday June 20th, 2003 I went to have a biopsy done on my left breast. Of course Mike and I knew it was not cancer, I’m young, healthy and fit.  We came home and deposited our 10 year old daughter Kasey and 1.5 year old son Michael with my mom and were preparing to leave to go climb Mt. Washington and the phone rang, I was told I had invasive ductal carcinoma; it was two day’s before my 38th birthday.

Everything felt foggy. Mike and I cancelled our plans to go away and we focused on managing our overwhelming fear of the unknown. I remember Mike saying to me “don’t worry, I won’t let anything happen to you” I looked back at him and responded “you can’t protect me from this”. It was the first time in our 8-year relationship that I felt unsafe in his presence.

I wanted this tumor out now, if not sooner, so I went in for a lumpectomy on Monday June 23rd at Portsmouth Hospital and waited a grueling 5 day’s to receive my path report again more bad news on a Friday.  We found out that my margins were not clean and that the cancer had spread to two of my lymph nodes. Now being a RN I was well aware that anything that spreads is not good and I felt doomed. I wondered was “this it for me” ”was this the time I was given and that’s it” I kept feeling that this was not fair, I have a great husband, and two beautiful kids, why was this happening. Then I got angry, really angry, so angry that my husband called my bilingual because I kept over expressing myself all the time. I did everything right, I spent 20 years preventing this…. it’s not fair. The pity party did not last long, but it was needed to get me through some of this process.

We went to Boston for a 2nd opinion. In a desperate attempt to save my A- breast I agreed to a 2nd lumpectomy on July 8th, the path report revealed that I still did not get clean margins and a mastectomy was recommended. When was I going to get off this roller coaster ride? I wanted to move on to the next step. I felt so guilty that I was causing such pain and sadness with all my family and friends. Although it was not my fault, I felt responsible. I was numb, but needed to think clearly.

I started to consider doing a bilateral mastectomy to reduce my overall risk. At this point I felt my breasts had betrayed me, they were the enemy and I wanted them gone. Mike and I each wrote our decision on a piece of paper and exchanged them across the kitchen table on whether to do one or both breasts. We agreed doing both was the way to go. With the decision being made all the fears came to the surface …what would I look like? Will Mike still be attracted to me? The night before my surgery we had our farewell party for my breasts and on July 29th I had a double mastectomy at the Brigham in Boston. When I woke, I asked if it was over and when Mike said yes, I stated I was relieved and have felt that way ever since.

The following chapters outline my treatment process ... each is an email I sent to my friends and family members.