Your Friend Who Had Breast Cancer Might Not Be Able to Handle Your Mammogram Anxiety
This post was co-written by members of the Love Bombs committee. Hi. We heard you’re having your first mammogram.
Good.
We are so happy you are taking your health into your own hands, and we are so happy you heard us and learned from our experiences with breast cancer.
“Of all women who receive regular mammograms, about 10 percent will get called back for further testing and of those, only about 0.5 percent will be found to have cancer.”
You’re nervous.
Maybe it’s your first time? Maybe you got a call back because your breasts are dense? Maybe you needed an ultrasound?
You are riddled with anxiety and concern over what this might mean for you.
Naturally, you turn to the one person you know who has somehow become the “face” of breast cancer.
We have been there, we know how scary it is.
It was also incredibly traumatic.
While we want to be comforting, when you ask us to join you during your time of heightened anxiety, you are asking us to step back into the darkest hour of our lives.
The truth is, some of us just can’t go back there.
So when you ask, please do so cautiously.
Do it knowing that when your imaging comes back clean and you pop back into your regularly-scheduled program, you’re leaving us back in the trenches reliving our scariest moments learning again just what it feels like to draw the short stick.
With certainty, we can confirm our story isn’t your story, which means knowing the step-by-step of how we were diagnosed will not be helpful. Knowing the size of our lump, or what our nipple looked like, or telling us “you don’t know how we do it,” won’t make it any less scary.
Because it is scary. And it is traumatic. Your feelings are valid and real.
When asking your friend who is your “face” of cancer, start the conversation with, “are you in a mentally healthy place where you feel comfortable answering my questions about my first mammogram / ultrasound / biopsy? If you’re not, I understand.”
Kate Williams
Think of your first mammogram as normal screening stuff. Just like getting your eyes checked.
Say to yourself, “this is a part of life’ I’m lucky to live in a time where they can do this for me.”
Photo taken the day of first mammogram.
Ashley Crews
I told someone the other day, “it’s fine, you’re fine, everything is fine, and even if it’s not you’ll still be fine.”
And it was truly fine.
Photo taken during a more recent mammogram.
Brooke Taylor
Ten days after becoming a mom, I had my first mammogram and breast MRI.
Of the two, the breast MRI was the most uncomfortable. Think elevated dog dish, one hole for each breast, while laying on a fresh c-section scar.
Even while fully engorged while attempting to dry up milk production, the mammogram was only slightly uncomfortable.
Photo from the lobby right before first mammogram.
Rifka Coleman
Mammograms are another screening measure you should schedule in addition to your monthly self checks. They are quick and over before you know it!
Photo captured during Rifka’s most-recent annual diagnostic mammogram February 2023.
We do have one piece of advice for you that we would shout from the rooftops daily if given the chance: do not leave until you are absolutely satisfied and certain with the answers you have. The only way to know for sure that you absolutely do not have cancer is for a biopsy to come back negative for cancer cells.
We sincerely hope that you do not have cancer. We sincerely hope you do not have your life upended by the kind of trauma we endured.
If you do, we will be one of your biggest cheerleaders, albeit, perhaps quietly from a place we can mentally handle.
We will relish in the day where we are capable of walking you through this particular brand of trauma. We just might not be there yet.
