I honestly didn’t think I’d be writing another post in my cancer blog. Seems I spoke to soon by ending my last post with "This will be my last cancer blog post. This is what has been happening so far.
Three weeks ago I accidentally came across a Dispatches program on channel four about Breast implants being highly toxic and causing all sorts of illnesses. I thought, oh god what the hell is this!! I didn't want to watch it, but left it on and carried on doing listing vintage clothing on my phone, half listening to the program. I was thinking this better not be anything to do with my implants. I’m going away soon and don't need anything to get in the way of that. I kept hearing the words "cancer", "toxic implants", breast implant illness", "banned implants". It finished and I ignored it. Quite typical of me which is really bad I know! I just thought I’m sure it’s not related to me and I will be ok.
The week after, I was speaking to a friend about my boobs and saying how I should probably get them checked out before I leave. I was thinking more about breast cancer recurrence and to ask how long I had left till my implants would need changing. I rang someone I knew who’d had implants and asked how long she’d had hers in for. She had awful news to tell me. Hers had ruptured and the silicone had spread to her lymph nodes…. I freaked the fuck out at this point and got really scared!! I’d had a bit of pain in the past and they didn’t feel right to me. I’d booked an appointment with my surgeon which ending up clashing with my trip to Thailand and so didn't end up going. The pain stopped and I felt ok again, but It had always been in the back of my mind after this. I decided to watch the program again, properly this time. There were lots of women complaining about all sorts of symptoms that is now believed to be caused from Breast implant illness. Symptoms such as joint pain, brain fog and memory loss, depression, anxiety and many more. I thought, well I do suffer with joint pain, memory loss and anxiety and depression, but I was pretty sure this was all related to my cancer treatment. Chemo had left my immune system low and tamoxifen had brought on early signs of osteoarthritis. I had always had a bad memory too which had got worse after chemo. Most scary of all though were the links between breast implants and a rare type of immune system cell cancer called Breast Implant Associated Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma (BIA-ALCL). It can lay dormant for seven years and be undetected until the implants are removed or first sign of symptoms being excessive fluid build-up around the breast implant, which can cause pain, swelling, or lumps in the breast or armpit. It was two makes of textured implants that were causing this, but I realised after doing more research that no implant was really safe.
I’d spoken to my friend on the Saturday night and decided I’d get checked out. I had no idea what implants I had so I needed to find this out too. I totally freaked out that evening and all my memories of having cancer came flooding back. As well as this happening, I had a poorly cat on my hands and took her to the vets the next day. The vets found a lump and feared it was a tumour. I was told if it was cancer she’d have to be put down. I was absolutely devastated and couldn’t believe what I had just heard. I broke down in tears. I couldn’t cope with losing Yoko as well as possibly having issues with my breasts.
I cried all of Sunday night thinking I was going to lose Yoko. The next day I had to get it together as I had a lot to do. I took Yoko in early for an X-ray and then headed off to make lots of calls. I rang the doctors to get a referral to the breast clinic and tried calling my surgeon to find out what implants I had. Finding this info out was proving to be very difficult. I was going around in circles talking to doctors, secretaries, and the hospital. In the end, I had to fill out an application to get my medical records that were also not easy to get hold of. Even the hospital had trouble tracking them down. I spent nearly two weeks nervous about which implants I had, but was sure I’d got the textured ones because I remember the surgeon giving me them to feel. Days past and each day I’d wake up feeling very differently. The nightmares weren’t helping either. It reminded me of when I was diagnosed. I spent two weeks crying on and off and each day brought a different emotion. I eventually got the information just before my breast clinic appointment. When I saw the word Nagor I freaked out. This was one of the brands of implants that was mentioned in the dispatches program and are now banned in France and Canada. I couldn’t believe after all this time I might have issues with my implants and need more surgery, or worse, possibly be left with no boob at all. Of course, it also could all be ok- my implants not textured, no leaking or rupture, no cancer and no surgery. Though by this point I’d done so much research, that I was starting to feel like I didn’t want these plastic toxic bags in me anymore and unless there was a 100% natural safe alternative, then I was going to be left flat.
So, most of you won’t remember what procedure I had in the first place. So, to recap – I had a mastectomy on my left side with implant reconstruction. I was so skinny after chemo I had to have some muscle and skin taken from my back to help reconstruct. This left me with an impressive huge scar on my back, which I now tell people was from a shark attack and they even believe me! When I’d had my mastectomy, my other boob seemed to lose its life and deflate. So, to balance me out more I had an implant put in the right one. I wasn’t overly happy with my results but this was as good as it was going to get. Dr Robin Fawcett so brilliantly says the reconstruction options are like a menu of shit sandwiches. No option is an appealing one, so you just have to choose between a selection of shit sandwiches. This made me laugh because it’s so true!!
After my first set were put in, the right implant seemed to buckle after a mammogram. I was living back up in Leicester and went to see a different surgeon, who gave me a new set of implants that he said were new on the market and a lot safer. These are now the Nagor polyurethane textured ones. I came out of surgery and my right implants started to swell. It took about four lots of different doctors to finally decide this wasn’t right and I had to go straight back into surgery. This was just horrific for me!! Surgery isn’t pleasant, I don’t deal with pain very well and I hate morphine. Finally, after more surgery I was ok. That was 7 years ago.
So, I was going through the options in my head. If I decided to have both implants removed that would leave me flat on the left side and possibly a small saggy one on the right. I’ve no idea what size my natural breast is, but I’m pretty sure it’s the same deflated one I had 11 years ago. This in a way, would be like having a mastectomy all over again. I knew this wasn’t going to be easy to deal with and had no idea how I was going to cope afterwards and what psychological and emotional pain I would be left with. I actually surprised myself when I had my mastectomy. An expander that was put in straight away (this was to stretch the skin). This gave me a small, hard lump with no nipple. I coped better than I thought I would and remember looking down at my chest for the first time in the bath. I didn’t think I looked deformed or ugly, I actually felt more beautiful because I’d been though something pretty big and harrowing. I thought maybe I could possibly feel this way again. I would be so proud of myself. I sat down and wrote a list of the positives for losing my breast. It went like this-
1 - It will make me stronger. I can handle this, I’ve been through so much already.
2 - No more bras (I always hated bras.)
3 - No worries about toxic plastic being in my body and possibly making me ill.
4 - No more surgery after this and the cancer journey will all finally be behind me.
5 – I can own this. I will feel empowered, liberated and feel like a true warrior!
6 - It will filter out all the dickheads I meet and will never have to date another arsehole again.
7 - When I finally leave to go travelling I will feel the most amazing sense of achievement and finally be able to take on the world with my past behind me.
8- People will think I’m really brave and fucking awesome!
As you can see that’s a lot of positive and I’m sure that out weighted the positives of keeping implants in, which I didn’t even bother writing out. It would have probably gone a bit like this-
1 - I will kind of have a normal set of boobs but not really…. One is useless anyway and functions as just a lump and is obsolete.
2 - Ummmmmmm can’t think of another. Oh, some men might prefer it? Well they can fuck off.
Not really a list of good reasons to want me to keep them.
I felt good after writing this list and thought “YES I CAN DO THIS!!”
Last Friday I met a lovely friend who’d had a mastectomy and no reconstruction and a lady from Flat friends, a wonderful organisation helping to support women who decide to go flat.
After talking to both women I felt so confident that I could do this and I could finally stick my two fingers up to cancer and my past. I felt like I was going to be one of those kick ass chicks from a Tarantino movie that go around kicking men’s butts, getting revenge on any man that had ever hurt them”. Ha-ha not really, well maybe a just little. I love to watch Death Proof when feeling enraged about men and how they’ve treated me in the past.
So, this was it, I was preparing myself to go flat after deciding I didn’t want implants, and anymore surgery for the rest of my life. Mondays breast clinic appointment arrived and I saw Miss Shah. I’d heard mixed things about her. Mainly that she didn’t like leaving women flat and this concerned me. Miss Shah examined me and then was sent off for an ultra sound and mammogram. The great news was there was no signs of any breast cancer reoccurrence. That was the best news ever. However, after examining my breasts she said it felt as if they had been leaking and calcification had occurred. I wasn’t really sure whether I was to worry about this, she didn’t seem alarmed, but it also didn’t sound great either. She said she’d send me for an MRI and asked me what I wanted to do which I thought was odd, seeing as she was the expert. I told her my concerns and that I wanted them out with no replacement. She agreed this might be a good idea for the right breast but not necessarily the left one, and that I would be left looking deformed if I had that one out with no replacement. DEFORMED?! Well obviously I wasn’t going to look great, but I was very aware I was not going to look the same ever again. In my eyes, I was already slightly deformed, although I would never have used that word. I had a delayed reaction to what she had said and later on the day I became really upset and even angry. It had knocked my confidence and I felt like I was back to square one again. Miss Shah said she’d get me referred to see a plastic surgeon to talk about my options, but this could take a while.
For the next two days, I felt very anxious and upset. Miss Shah’s comment had made me question my decision again and I thought, maybe I’m not ready to go flat yet or even ever. I was also angry that this was happening to me after all this time This was all very inconvenient, the timing couldn’t have been any worse. I’d finally done so much work on myself and was so happy how far I’d come with my self-healing journey. I had changed so much and was a different person to who I was all those 11 years ago. After deciding my new plans to go away and be a travel writer I was furious this was happening now. I really wanted to scream out "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!" like Drew Barrymore's character in Donnie Darko. I was livid!
Oh, I thought I should mention, Yoko is alive and well. After a very expensive X-ray, the lump showed up to actually just be some very hard poo!!
To be continued.
Three weeks ago I accidentally came across a Dispatches program on channel four about Breast implants being highly toxic and causing all sorts of illnesses. I thought, oh god what the hell is this!! I didn't want to watch it, but left it on and carried on doing listing vintage clothing on my phone, half listening to the program. I was thinking this better not be anything to do with my implants. I’m going away soon and don't need anything to get in the way of that. I kept hearing the words "cancer", "toxic implants", breast implant illness", "banned implants". It finished and I ignored it. Quite typical of me which is really bad I know! I just thought I’m sure it’s not related to me and I will be ok.
The week after, I was speaking to a friend about my boobs and saying how I should probably get them checked out before I leave. I was thinking more about breast cancer recurrence and to ask how long I had left till my implants would need changing. I rang someone I knew who’d had implants and asked how long she’d had hers in for. She had awful news to tell me. Hers had ruptured and the silicone had spread to her lymph nodes…. I freaked the fuck out at this point and got really scared!! I’d had a bit of pain in the past and they didn’t feel right to me. I’d booked an appointment with my surgeon which ending up clashing with my trip to Thailand and so didn't end up going. The pain stopped and I felt ok again, but It had always been in the back of my mind after this. I decided to watch the program again, properly this time. There were lots of women complaining about all sorts of symptoms that is now believed to be caused from Breast implant illness. Symptoms such as joint pain, brain fog and memory loss, depression, anxiety and many more. I thought, well I do suffer with joint pain, memory loss and anxiety and depression, but I was pretty sure this was all related to my cancer treatment. Chemo had left my immune system low and tamoxifen had brought on early signs of osteoarthritis. I had always had a bad memory too which had got worse after chemo. Most scary of all though were the links between breast implants and a rare type of immune system cell cancer called Breast Implant Associated Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma (BIA-ALCL). It can lay dormant for seven years and be undetected until the implants are removed or first sign of symptoms being excessive fluid build-up around the breast implant, which can cause pain, swelling, or lumps in the breast or armpit. It was two makes of textured implants that were causing this, but I realised after doing more research that no implant was really safe.
I’d spoken to my friend on the Saturday night and decided I’d get checked out. I had no idea what implants I had so I needed to find this out too. I totally freaked out that evening and all my memories of having cancer came flooding back. As well as this happening, I had a poorly cat on my hands and took her to the vets the next day. The vets found a lump and feared it was a tumour. I was told if it was cancer she’d have to be put down. I was absolutely devastated and couldn’t believe what I had just heard. I broke down in tears. I couldn’t cope with losing Yoko as well as possibly having issues with my breasts.
I cried all of Sunday night thinking I was going to lose Yoko. The next day I had to get it together as I had a lot to do. I took Yoko in early for an X-ray and then headed off to make lots of calls. I rang the doctors to get a referral to the breast clinic and tried calling my surgeon to find out what implants I had. Finding this info out was proving to be very difficult. I was going around in circles talking to doctors, secretaries, and the hospital. In the end, I had to fill out an application to get my medical records that were also not easy to get hold of. Even the hospital had trouble tracking them down. I spent nearly two weeks nervous about which implants I had, but was sure I’d got the textured ones because I remember the surgeon giving me them to feel. Days past and each day I’d wake up feeling very differently. The nightmares weren’t helping either. It reminded me of when I was diagnosed. I spent two weeks crying on and off and each day brought a different emotion. I eventually got the information just before my breast clinic appointment. When I saw the word Nagor I freaked out. This was one of the brands of implants that was mentioned in the dispatches program and are now banned in France and Canada. I couldn’t believe after all this time I might have issues with my implants and need more surgery, or worse, possibly be left with no boob at all. Of course, it also could all be ok- my implants not textured, no leaking or rupture, no cancer and no surgery. Though by this point I’d done so much research, that I was starting to feel like I didn’t want these plastic toxic bags in me anymore and unless there was a 100% natural safe alternative, then I was going to be left flat.
So, most of you won’t remember what procedure I had in the first place. So, to recap – I had a mastectomy on my left side with implant reconstruction. I was so skinny after chemo I had to have some muscle and skin taken from my back to help reconstruct. This left me with an impressive huge scar on my back, which I now tell people was from a shark attack and they even believe me! When I’d had my mastectomy, my other boob seemed to lose its life and deflate. So, to balance me out more I had an implant put in the right one. I wasn’t overly happy with my results but this was as good as it was going to get. Dr Robin Fawcett so brilliantly says the reconstruction options are like a menu of shit sandwiches. No option is an appealing one, so you just have to choose between a selection of shit sandwiches. This made me laugh because it’s so true!!
After my first set were put in, the right implant seemed to buckle after a mammogram. I was living back up in Leicester and went to see a different surgeon, who gave me a new set of implants that he said were new on the market and a lot safer. These are now the Nagor polyurethane textured ones. I came out of surgery and my right implants started to swell. It took about four lots of different doctors to finally decide this wasn’t right and I had to go straight back into surgery. This was just horrific for me!! Surgery isn’t pleasant, I don’t deal with pain very well and I hate morphine. Finally, after more surgery I was ok. That was 7 years ago.
So, I was going through the options in my head. If I decided to have both implants removed that would leave me flat on the left side and possibly a small saggy one on the right. I’ve no idea what size my natural breast is, but I’m pretty sure it’s the same deflated one I had 11 years ago. This in a way, would be like having a mastectomy all over again. I knew this wasn’t going to be easy to deal with and had no idea how I was going to cope afterwards and what psychological and emotional pain I would be left with. I actually surprised myself when I had my mastectomy. An expander that was put in straight away (this was to stretch the skin). This gave me a small, hard lump with no nipple. I coped better than I thought I would and remember looking down at my chest for the first time in the bath. I didn’t think I looked deformed or ugly, I actually felt more beautiful because I’d been though something pretty big and harrowing. I thought maybe I could possibly feel this way again. I would be so proud of myself. I sat down and wrote a list of the positives for losing my breast. It went like this-
1 - It will make me stronger. I can handle this, I’ve been through so much already.
2 - No more bras (I always hated bras.)
3 - No worries about toxic plastic being in my body and possibly making me ill.
4 - No more surgery after this and the cancer journey will all finally be behind me.
5 – I can own this. I will feel empowered, liberated and feel like a true warrior!
6 - It will filter out all the dickheads I meet and will never have to date another arsehole again.
7 - When I finally leave to go travelling I will feel the most amazing sense of achievement and finally be able to take on the world with my past behind me.
8- People will think I’m really brave and fucking awesome!
As you can see that’s a lot of positive and I’m sure that out weighted the positives of keeping implants in, which I didn’t even bother writing out. It would have probably gone a bit like this-
1 - I will kind of have a normal set of boobs but not really…. One is useless anyway and functions as just a lump and is obsolete.
2 - Ummmmmmm can’t think of another. Oh, some men might prefer it? Well they can fuck off.
Not really a list of good reasons to want me to keep them.
I felt good after writing this list and thought “YES I CAN DO THIS!!”
Last Friday I met a lovely friend who’d had a mastectomy and no reconstruction and a lady from Flat friends, a wonderful organisation helping to support women who decide to go flat.
After talking to both women I felt so confident that I could do this and I could finally stick my two fingers up to cancer and my past. I felt like I was going to be one of those kick ass chicks from a Tarantino movie that go around kicking men’s butts, getting revenge on any man that had ever hurt them”. Ha-ha not really, well maybe a just little. I love to watch Death Proof when feeling enraged about men and how they’ve treated me in the past.
So, this was it, I was preparing myself to go flat after deciding I didn’t want implants, and anymore surgery for the rest of my life. Mondays breast clinic appointment arrived and I saw Miss Shah. I’d heard mixed things about her. Mainly that she didn’t like leaving women flat and this concerned me. Miss Shah examined me and then was sent off for an ultra sound and mammogram. The great news was there was no signs of any breast cancer reoccurrence. That was the best news ever. However, after examining my breasts she said it felt as if they had been leaking and calcification had occurred. I wasn’t really sure whether I was to worry about this, she didn’t seem alarmed, but it also didn’t sound great either. She said she’d send me for an MRI and asked me what I wanted to do which I thought was odd, seeing as she was the expert. I told her my concerns and that I wanted them out with no replacement. She agreed this might be a good idea for the right breast but not necessarily the left one, and that I would be left looking deformed if I had that one out with no replacement. DEFORMED?! Well obviously I wasn’t going to look great, but I was very aware I was not going to look the same ever again. In my eyes, I was already slightly deformed, although I would never have used that word. I had a delayed reaction to what she had said and later on the day I became really upset and even angry. It had knocked my confidence and I felt like I was back to square one again. Miss Shah said she’d get me referred to see a plastic surgeon to talk about my options, but this could take a while.
For the next two days, I felt very anxious and upset. Miss Shah’s comment had made me question my decision again and I thought, maybe I’m not ready to go flat yet or even ever. I was also angry that this was happening to me after all this time This was all very inconvenient, the timing couldn’t have been any worse. I’d finally done so much work on myself and was so happy how far I’d come with my self-healing journey. I had changed so much and was a different person to who I was all those 11 years ago. After deciding my new plans to go away and be a travel writer I was furious this was happening now. I really wanted to scream out "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!" like Drew Barrymore's character in Donnie Darko. I was livid!
Oh, I thought I should mention, Yoko is alive and well. After a very expensive X-ray, the lump showed up to actually just be some very hard poo!!
To be continued.
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