Breast Cancer - Just Because You Don't Have a Lump Doesn't Mean You Don't Have It

I'm new to blogging but I've been lurking in the blogosphere for about six month. Why Mommy over at Toddler Planet has asked everyone to post this very scary information about a form of breast cancer most of us don't know about. If you've already read this on another blog, please read it again or send it to some women you love.

Edited on August 3 to add: Note: These are Why Mommy's words, not mine. (My mother called sobbing after she read this post.)

"We hear a lot about breast cancer these days. One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetimes, and there are millions living with it in the U.S. today alone. But did you know that there is more than one type of breast cancer?

I didn’t. I thought that breast cancer was all the same. I figured that if I did my monthly breast self-exams, and found no lump, I’d be fine.


Oops. It turns out that you don’t have to have a lump to have breast cancer. Six weeks ago, I went to my OB/GYN because my breast felt funny. It was red, hot, inflamed, and the skin looked…funny. But there was no lump, so I wasn’t worried. I should have been. After a round of antibiotics didn’t clear up the inflammation, my doctor sent me to a breast specialist and did a skin punch biopsy. That test showed that I have inflammatory breast cancer, a very aggressive cancer that can be deadly.

Inflammatory breast cancer is often misdiagnosed as mastitis because many doctors have never seen it before and consider it rare. “Rare” or not, there are over 100,000 women in the U.S. with this cancer right now; only half will survive five years. Please call your OB/GYN if you experience several of the following symptoms in your breast, or any unusual changes: redness, rapid increase in size of one breast, persistent itching of breast or nipple, thickening of breast tissue, stabbing pain, soreness, swelling under the arm, dimpling or ridging (for example, when you take your bra off, the bra marks stay – for a while), flattening or retracting of the nipple, or a texture that looks or feels like an orange (called peau d’orange). Ask if your GYN is familiar with inflammatory breast cancer, and tell her that you’re concerned and want to come in to rule it out.

There is more than one kind of breast cancer. Inflammatory breast cancer is the most aggressive form of breast cancer out there, and early detection is critical. It’s not usually detected by mammogram. It does not usually present with a lump. It may be overlooked with all of the changes that our breasts undergo during the years when we’re pregnant and/or nursing our little ones. It’s important not to miss this one.

Inflammatory breast cancer is detected by women and their doctors who notice a change in one of their breasts. If you notice a change, call your doctor today. Tell her about it. Tell her that you have a friend with this disease, and it’s trying to kill her. Now you know what I wish I had known before six weeks ago.

You don’t have to have a lump to have breast cancer."

Madre Dos

PC's mother, the Queen, died yesterday. She was 58 years old. She was diagnosed with liver cancer in October of 2006 and she fought longer and harder than anyone expected.

Linda was the mother in law everyone should be lucky enough to have. When I married PC he was 22 and I was 29. I had two kids. She accepted our sons as her grandsons from day one, she never expressed any doubt that PC was lucky to have me (PC can be a challenge and who knows that better than his mother - she used to tell me that if there was ever a divorce she got me) and that the whole family was lucky to add us to it. I tried to tell her, years later, how grateful I was of that acceptance and she seemed truly astonished. It never occurred to her to do anything but accept and love us. What a woman. I loved her so much.

I caught the quilting bug in 1997 when I was in my second year of law school and I taught her the very little I knew over Thanksgiving break that year. It turned out I wasn't doing most of it right but she caught the bug too and then it multiplied exponentially with her as the host. My big kids used to say that I created a monster when I taught her to quilt; I didn't but she did become happily obsessed. She left around 30 quilts for me to finish but she has gifted innumerable friends and loved ones with her quilts already. Linda passed the bug along to her best friend, and PC's surrogate mother, Judy. Judy's kids also declared that I created a monster but I know the joy their mutual and separate quilting brought to Linda and will still bring to Judy and I beg to differ.

Linda asked us to make her memorial service a celebration of her life and the things she loved most: grandchildren and quilting. This photo is of Linda in July 2004 (shortly before the conception of the Pumpkin) surrounded by all, ten then, of her Grandchildren, happy.

Linda fought the cancer so long and hard that we never actually said goodbye. You couldn't say it since she still didn't believe it the last time I saw her. PC and his sister we able to say their goodbyes while she still was aware of herself and the people around her. I was with her in the hospital on Mother's Day and a commercial came on the television which featured an old lady skateboarding, Linda looked at me and said "I sure wish I was going to get old." I told her I really wished so too. That was as close as we came to goodbye. If I'd been able to I'd have said:

"I promise to take care of your son and his sons; I promise that no matter how much he irritates me, I'll be married to him always; I promise to stay close to your daughter, a sister isn't the same as a mother but I'll be there for her
when she needs me; I promise to take [your best friend] Judy into our lives as if you were still here - she can't come to visit us with you but she can still come; I promise to stay in touch with your sister, I did not really know her before you were ill but I have come to love her during your illness; Most of all, I promise to do everything in my power to make you real to Caleb - he won't know you the way the other kids do but we will talk about you, and tell stories about you, and point out your things and the quilts you made and we will MAKE him know who you were and how much you loved our pumpkin; I promise not to let him be forever known as "Pumpkin Head" even though he maybe should be, I know you didn't like it when I called him that; I promise to keep you in my heart and to remember everything you've taught me; I love you." .

I hardly have any picture of Grammy and her Pumpkin. This was taken in May. She's wearing the Brighton breast cancer awareness bracelet it has charms that say "be the inspiration" "heal" "hope" "accept" and a small locket
inscribed with "mothers, sisters, daughters, wives". I have one too and I've always planned to put her picture in it. I'll wear it and let the Pumpkin play with it and open it and tell him how much his Grammy loved him and how hard she fought to know him longer. I know we can make him see how wonderful she was.

We love you Mom

The Center of the Universe

LawyerMama recently allowed me to do a guest post on her blog while she was on vacation. I liked it so much that I've decided to see if I can fill my own spot every day or so. That doesn't mean I'm foolish enough to skip an opportunity to cross-post so - if you didn't catch me at Lawyer Mama - here's the story of how the Pumpkin came to be all over again.

Just in case you missed the bulletin the world now revolves around a young Virginian named Caleb. (Hereinafter the Pumpkin.) I am 45 years old. The Pumpkin’s brothers, R and T, are 21 and 18 YEARS old. The Pumpkin is two. He is the terrible, incorrigible, adorable, fabulous, funny, willful center of my world. I got pregnant (all three times actually) the old fashioned way: unexpectedly and unintentionally. Yes, I do know where they come from but according to my doctor no more babies should have come from me. He (Cute Dr. J) sent me for an ultrasound to see why I wasn’t having periods. He wasn’t particularly concerned and it took me a few months to get around to having it (hard to schedule at the Navy hospital, new job, missed the first one when my car was left too long in the valet lot and the keys went away with the attendant – you know I was BUSY). I eventually presented myself at the hospital and was chatting with the ultrasound technician about how I’d never seen an ultrasound without a baby in it when she squirted the gel, placed the thingamabob on my stomach and Oops – I still haven’t seen an ultrasound without a baby in it. Sixteen weeks along, all his fingers and toes clearly visible, the Pumpkin.

My equally busy husband, Prince Charming, was stationed on a ship the year the Pumpkin was conceived and was deployed when I found out. Not a long deployment just gone Monday through Friday most weeks to PREPARE to deploy for six months. I told him on a friend’s cell phone (Prince Charming NEVER hears his phone ring) as they were leaving Connecticut. Prince Charming had apparently spent the weekend in various bars with his friends extolling the virtues of being at the “finish line” – said friends all had young kids and we were nearly through raising ours. T was in high school and we could see the childless light at the end of our tunnel. He also had a dream about a fish (apparently a sure sign that a baby is on the way – who knew).

Stunned disbelief followed in short order by fear, amniocentesis, and finally overwhelming relief that the baby was a healthy boy. (I know, I only wanted a healthy baby but I REALLY didn’t want to have to face a 17 year old girl when I was 60.)
Prince Charming’s ship deployed, as scheduled, one week before the Pumpkin was born (nope, they don’t make special allowances for that in the Navy, and nope, the Navy physicians do not induce labor prior to 38 weeks just to allow Dad to meet the baby before he leaves). This was followed by ten days of exhaustion in the hospital while the Pumpkin had pneumonia, four months of exhaustion and loneliness while home alone with all three boys, and two months of exhaustion and exhilaration when I started work at a new job (which I still love). Then finally, the ship came home, Prince Charming met his Pumpkin, and we gradually settled into our present life.

That life, and all its side topics, will be the starting point of this blog. Who knows where it will lead....