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Not strictly lung-cancer related...


LexieCat

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But after all the drama last year with my diagnosis/lobectomy, I didn't feel like sharing this in my circle of friends/colleagues/family.  Backdrop: lost my mom to metastatic breast cancer 30 years ago.  She'd had a mastectomy and was in the clear almost 5 years when she developed pain in her elbow (she thought it was a repetitive stress injury), but it turned out to be a spinal tumor from the original cancer.  She lived only a matter of months after that, and died when she was six years younger than I am now.  

So I've always been pretty religious about mammograms and stuff, but no other family history of breast cancer (or any other kind, to my knowledge, other than maybe small skin cancers).  A couple of months ago, I noticed a bit of bloody discharge from one nipple.  After googling, I felt somewhat reassured that there can be other causes, and I didn't have any lumps or other symptoms, but my ob/gyn ordered a diagnostic mammogram and ultrasound, which I had today.  I got nervous when the radiologist came in to see me (I've NEVER met with a radiologist at the time of a mammogram!), but he said they saw NOTHING suspicious.  HUGE relief, obviously!

The ob/gyn (a nurse practitioner, who by coincidence was there getting her mammogram at the same time as I was) suggested that given the family history and my own lung cancer, I might want to consult with a breast specialist and/or a genetic program.  So today I called the MD Anderson Center where I was treated for my lung cancer, and made an appointment to meet with someone in their genetics program, who could help me decide where to go from there.  I felt like they gave me such great care with the lung cancer, I want to stick with them.

Thanks all of you for being there--like I said, it wasn't something I wanted to dump on others--at least until there was a confirmed problem--but something I wanted to share.

Teri

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Lexie,

Sounds troubling but you are on the right path for the right reasons.  With any cancer, one needs to find, fix and finish it, and you are appropriately engaged in the find stage.

Stay the course.

Tom

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